LCD True HD and Full 1080p

It would seem that 1080p LCD in the 37 to 55 inch range is going so strong that any other display tech is going to be price sensitive very soon. This is the Westinghouse Digital Lvm 42"



1080p at 42" only 4.5 inches deep is the Westy LVM-42W2, and at a street price around or under $1500 it is perfect as a start for your 1080 experience without breaking the bank, and totally connectable to all your devices. Mine uses both component inputs, one for the Cable box and one for the HDV video camera, one of the 2 DVI inputs is my main computer with an nVidia 7600gt card and the other DVI is to a small Aopen box i use for tradeshow HD loop delivery. The HDMI connector is to my DVD player and the VGA connecter is to my Laptop. I have 6 sources of HD video to pick from.

1080p doesn't have to wipe out your wallet

I see a lot of posts out there that say you cant get over 40 inches for 1080p for under $2k and that is just plain wrong. This Westinghouse screen is so good that usually it is not on any display floor, since other 42" displays look a bit fuzzier at 1366 x 768 and cost more $. No retailer wants to obsolete his own inventory, so to get this one you usually have to ask for it. They tend to keep them in the warehouse. Or weighing in at only 60 lbs , have it shipped to you. I asked for mine at Magnolia, an HD TV store within a store at Best Buy. I asked about it, the manager came over, nodded, said it was a great unit and got me one in 3 days.

http://www.westinghousedigital.com/details.aspx?itemnum=44 Because the LVM-42w2 is a true 1080p monitor, you can attach all your favorite sources using uncompressed digital interfaces. Multiple high-bandwidth digital interfaces mean high-performance HD digital cable, HD satellite and an HD game console. Additionally, PC and notebook users can enjoy the same fat pipe, along with industry-best Genesis Display Perfection® technology. It is important to note the Faroudja DCDi 3rd generation chipset is in this one, making all your source scaling as good as it possibly can be.

In my humble opinion, this display is perfect for your average living space, has no HDTV tuner so it costs less and connects to your HD Cable / Dish / Satellite provider set-top box, and has very basic speakers that you do not even see. Very clean front -- you can even disable the lit (w) logo on the front. My unit is not bright silver, sort of a brown tone that reminds me a bit of the old high-end macintosh tube amp front bezel. The Scaler chipset is worldclass and all computer connections to it are pixel perfect. Its contrast ratio at about 1200:1 reads like it might not have black levels that a true home theater enthusiast wants, but it displays the entire color gamut of my sources perfectly, i just dont have the backlight set at full , usually about level 2 out of 5 is more than enough, and with that setting, black levels are about right for me.

Most importantly, every computer, game, dvd player we connect to it displays perfectly. We have 3 computers ( 2 on DVI and one on VGA ), and all are doing exactly as i set them up to do, no fiddling on the display side. Part of this benefit comes from an auto-display-config that is built in and figures out what its incoming signal is. That mode pops up and sets itself correctly every time, so i dont have to click through the source options to see, just turning on the connected device causes the display to switch to it and run display optimizing. I dont know whay they dont brag about this on review sites or on the westinghouse digital site, but they should since this makes it a perfect conference room / trade event click and use solution.

This is one display that looks great with your nose right up to it.

And trust me on this, people will do that. In fact they may just prefer to park themselves 4 feet away and stay there to look at it. I run my HDV-FX1 hd video camera right in to it with component input and it becomes my interview realtime review monitor. Its display latency ( the difference between actual time and display time lag ) is so short that no one has a problem with it. It is so accurate that its now my reference monitor for lighting and camera exposure.

All i need now is a nice Anvil transit case for it.

HD1080i endorses this display as a best $ for the buck.