Hi,

This looking as an all American discussion, I might as well put in my 0.02€'s worth:

I have a Philips 32" 16:9 TV-set, which was bought about a year ago. The reasoning for this is:

- I love movies, and expect to expand my DVD collection. The wide-screen format is IMHO the way to go. The 4:3 format doesn't give you the "full" experience, as you would either have to loose some of the original content or live with
- More and more european stuff is being sent in 16:9 format, though formatted for 4:3 (with black bars on the top and bottom of the screen).
- The stuff that is in 4:3 format, can be 16:9 resized by the TV-set. The Philps set does this in a very clever way, that you (well, at least I) do not see. It cuts away a tiny amount of the top and bottom of the screen. Then it streches the left and right 1/8 of the screen somehow, and you have a 16:9 picture. You would probably expect the perspective to look WAY off, but it doesn't. Surely you can see the difference when you switch back to pure 4:3 format, with black inserted at the left and right, but in everyday use I never see it (and I'm picky).
- I don't care about HDTV as the TV-set is as small as it is (but HDTV isn't really a European thing as far as I know).

If you have little room for the TV, but wan't a large picture (and cost is no question :), I'd go for a LDP projector. They have superior color, and the newer 1000+ lumens things do not need you to dim the room completely.

The new digital projectors have built in line-doublers, and give you a stunning picture.

Tony, this being the off-topic forum, I might as well sidetrack to the DVD-thread you posted on recently. If you want great looking DVD-quality, you should let someone demo you a DVD played in XGA on a computer equipped with a good software decoder or a hardware one (I have the Hollywood+ which is really great). You get more details out of the DVD than with a regular PAL/NTSC encoding.