by Woodrow C. Irwin
The technology for HDTV-compatible TVs is advancing quickly. A movement toward integration is inspiring developers to create TVs that can do more and more. One day in the very near future, most people will have TVs which are linked to every other media in their home. Your computer, telephone, TV and music will all be conveniently linked to your giant entertainment center. This integration is important to keep in mind when choosing your HD-capable TV. Although there is no way to know for sure what we will need from our TV set five years up the road, it is still wise to be forward thinking in your purchase. Keep an eye out for the following five aspects when you get ready to buy your HD-compatible TV set.
Cable Card-ready? Along with local over-the-air, broadcasting and satellite, cable is racing to keep up with the technology for digital and high definition programming and services. Knowing that people always like sleekness and convenience in their media, more and more cable companies are now offering a Cable Card. This card will give you everything you need to watch your HD programming. The Cable Card-ready TV set has a slot (usually in the back) which will accept the cable provider's information card. The potential for the card is already being speculated upon, because games and other media besides HD programming can be conveniently put on the card as well. Another benefit to this is that it keeps you from having to have a cable box in your living room. Everything is on the card.
Marriage accustomed one to the good things, so one came to take them for granted, but magnified the bad things, so they came to feel as painful as a grain in one’s eye. An open window, a forgotten quart of milk, a tv set left blaring, socks on the bathroom floor could become occasions for incredible rage. And something happened sexually in marriage—the swearing to forsake all others, despite its slight observance, had a profound effect. Some people felt trapped by it, impelled to assert what they called freedom. Some accepted it like a rein, and in the effort to avoid pain in the form of hopeless desire, cut off occasions of desire, avoided having long talks at parties with attractive members of the opposite sex. In time, all feeling for the opposite sex was cut off, and intercourse limited to the barest politenesses.... But something happened to you when you did that, a kind of death seeped up from the genitals to the rest of the body, till it showed in the eyes, the gestures, in a certain lifelessness.
—Marilyn French (b. 1929)
Plenty of ports and hook-ups? If you imagine yourself keeping up with the technology of TV and media, then make sure your brand-new HD-capable TV has all of the ports, jacks and hook-ups you could possibly imagine needing. Do not be shy about having ones that you do not imagine using either. USB ports, and a variety of other hook-ups, may surprise you by how useful they are a year or two up the road. The motto seems to be that you can never have too many ports.
Small screen or big screen? Getting the right size for your TV is never easy, but a couple aspects about HDTV should get you in the right direction. First, as opposed to the big screen TVs of the 80s and 90s for analog programming, watching HDTV on a big screen does not lose picture size or quality. In the past, the bigger one made the analog picture, the more one lost. Because HDTV is virtually a perfect picture with its high resolution, you can never have the picture too big. Second, HDTV is already in wide screen format. Now, you really can feel like you are at the movie theater. Of course, it is not mandatory to get a massive screen, but just know that if you decide to get another eight or 10 inches of TV set, you will not be disappointed.
HD-ready? Is your TV HD-capable? Does it come with an HD-decoder? There are several terms being used in the world of electronics lingo which all basically mean the same thing, with one exception. Some of the TVs, which advertise HD-ready or HD-capable, may actually just mean that they can receive the signal, and nothing else. This means that you receive HD programming, but you do not actually have the capability to view it the way it was meant to be viewed. When you buy your HD-capable TV, be very clear that you want to be able to enjoy all of the features of HD resolution, formatting and sound. Save yourself the trouble of having to return your TV set for one which will allow you to see the high definition you are paying good money to enjoy.
The gaze implies a concentration of the spectator’s activity into that of looking, the glance implies that no extraordinary effort is being invested in the activity of looking. The very terms we habitually use to designate the person who watches tv or the cinema screen tend to indicate this difference. The cinema-looker is a spectator: caught by the projection yet separate from its illusion. The tv looker is a viewer, casting a lazy eye over proceedings, keeping an eye on events, or, as the slightly archaic designation had it, “looking in.”
—John Ellis (b. 1952)
Does your TV include HDMI? So you are ready to buy the 80-inch, Cable Card-ready HDTV-capable set with all of the ports and jacks. You also made sure that you can actually view the resolution of high definition programming. You have everything you need. Well, there might be one more thing to consider. If you can find one of the HD-capable models which includes HDMI (high definition multimedia interface), then you will be able to cut out another accessory. HD-capable sets with HDMI built-in allow you to directly receive the 5.1 Dolby-sound which is part of HDTV formatting. Otherwise, you will need to buy special components or cables. If you are not able to find one with HDMI though, do not fret. These are hard to come by for now.