John Lewis - misleading?

Was in JL the other day and of course they have a large HD screen pointing out at the rest of the shop.
Excellent picture and from one who has a PDP43MXE-1 with a HCPC I recognised that the picture was HD.
But there was a DVD player under the monitor and a video box only?

To the side was a plastic placard proclaiming "never knowingly undersold", I moved it to the side to find a hidden imported Jap Hard disk player which was looping demos.
Now this screen was surrounded by people amazed at the picture, blissfully unaware that to get such a picture requires :
an imported jap box,
or a PC and imported WMV DVDs (with no Dolby)
or a wait and goodness knows how much for a Sky HD tv box

and that it wasn't TV or the DVD that were on display producing the picture.

Chappy said to me it was "to demonstrate what it was capable of in the future", marvelous but I didn't hear him explain that to the couple in front of me who parted with their hard earned cash probably thinking that eastenders was never going to look the same again!!

 

Well, it wont...In about a year. I dunno, when is HDTV coming to the UK?

By the way the recorder that was from japan, was it a blu ray? or just a regular HD recorder?

Not many recorders can record an Hi def image, so im guessing it would have to be one of the few available.

Anyways, you cant blame JL for other peoples ignorance. The people who buy this stuff should at least do their home work before buying a big expensive HDTV. They should know that Hi def TV isnt actually available in the UK just yet.

They should also be making sure that TV is fully compatible with HD equipment. (ie making sure it has the propper resolution and conections)

If they dont then they can only blame themselves.

 

I think this is a bit unfair! It's too easy when your already involved/interested in this sort of thing to think that its easy to understand. I can imagine my parents going in to a shop and buying something because its being advertised in a certain way, surely its up to the store to not advertise in a false manner, personally I would have told the people exactly what was being displayed and explained what they would need to get the same picture quality, they could of least then asked the salesperson to show them the screen playing a DVD or videotape so they could demo it in a manner similar to they would use it at home.

 

Yes and no. People should ask questions and research and item they are after and if they are told lies then that's the problem. If they just buy from the look then that's there fault.

Same with a computer, you should know what you are buying, but so many people either go for price or CPU speed not caring (or dont understand) about how good the other components are. How many people kept Time and Tiny in business

Again if you were going to buy a car, you don't just walk in to a showroom and go I like the look of that car I'll buy it, or do some people?

 

It IS unfair, but that is partially how marketing works.
It plays on peoples lack of knowledge.

In a way thats how many things have worked throughout time.

I dont want to start a religious debate but people were always being kept in check out of fear for "gods wrath"

Now that we know a little better we dont fear in this way anymore.

Its always about the strong praying on the weak of mind.

Not eveyone is as moral as you. Many sales people are instructed not to lie, but to hide the truth.

Thats why everyone should inform themselves before making a big purchase.

 

hang on a sec, TVs ain't cars. You do buy them for the way they look (i mean produce a video image not the case).
So if they're giving it a feed that's the absalute nuts, but unatainable by the average joe and hiding the source to boot, that's tricky

 

Interesting - I was in JL (Cheadle) yesterday and they too have a Panny 500 set up with a HD signal on a loop (had Panasonic written on the screen so obviously a demo from them) and above it a regular non HD Pioneer with the same picture obviously not in HD and the number of people that went past not realising saying how they woul buy the Panny instead of the Pioneer as the picture was "amazing".
It actually took a lot of effort to get the sales bloke to admit it was actualy a HD feed and he wouldn't put the screen on a normal TV picture "as this set isn't connected to an aerial".

Anyway all that aside can anybody tell what the Panny 500 picture is actually like once it is set up properly in your house with brightness, etc etc set up and watching for example Eastenders..?? Is the picture better than an analogue picture on a CRT tube or as good as a digital picture on a CRT tube or somewhere inbetween..?? If that makes sense....I have a digital Sony with a brilliant picture so don't really want to go back to a poorer picture until HD really takes off in a couple of years, may as well wait till the picture improves before parting with 2-3 grand.

 

John Lewis are using a Panasonic set top box with an iLink connected IOData hard drive to demo Panasonic plasmas.

In all the JL stores (High Wycombe, Oxford Street) I've seen this kit being used it has not been hidden and clearly visible. The assistants I've seen selling the displays have mentioned to people watching that this is a demo of HDTV that we will get when Sky launch their HD service, and when BluRay and HD-DVD come out.

Personally I think that if you are buying an HD-Ready display, you should certainly be able to see it displaying HD as well as SD images. In fact surely it would be madness to buy an HD display without seeing it fed an HD picture...

Sure - you should ensure purchasers are not misled - but surely anyone buying a TV would ask to look at BBC One, ITV1 as well as some strange Japanese loop wouldn' they??

 

The JL in High Wycombe has the Panasonic/IOData loop demo player connected to both a 42" and a 37" Plasma - one in component HD the other via S-video. The interesting thing is how similar they looked (sure you could tell one was HD if you looked carefully - but the difference was nowhere near as huge as I would have imagined, and most other people didn't notice the difference until I mentioned it.)

I suspect that the HD downconverted to SD was a VERY good SD signal...

Anyway - the most noticable thing was how dreadful the integrated Freeview receiver that both sets had looked in comparison. The compression artefacts were incredibly visible - though switching in the MPG filter improved things quite significantly.

I suspect interlaced CRTs are more forgiving of MPEG2 artefacts (I think the interlace structure masks some of the HF mosquito noise) than progressive plasmas and LCDs...

 

I did ask and they wouldn't show me..!! I can see a non HD picture at another shop but they only set them up straight from the box so I still can't tell how good it would be once set up properly....has anybody got one..?? What's the picture like - please..??!

 

Surely if they're going to drop £2000+ on anything most people do some research first don't they?

 

I am sure they do, but it does not mean they dig out the truth, does it?

 

Comets have been displaying Sagem DLPs with a hard disk drive providing a HD picture and Dixons have an LG with a little black box round the back.Out local dealer, Hughes. has been showing Euro1080. I suppose its a bit misleading if people are fooled into thinking this is the quality of picture they are going to see at home. On the other hand people have been just as willing to part with hard earned cash on the basis of watching Shrek or Shark Tales on a badly set-up LCD. Customers are equally willing to shell out a grand for a set from Aldi without seeing a picture at all. I suppose its a case of let the buyer beware.

 

I don't see how its misleading. Its showing you what the TV is potentially capable of. I don't think I've ever seen a TV in a shop with a label telling me what its source material is?

I've seen this demo loop in a couple of panasonic shops, and its mostly very good. Some of the F1 shots are a bit noisy.

Surprisingly, it also looks very good fed to an SD plasma they were showing it on. Apart from the more noticable dot matrix close up, it looked great.

Very pleasantly surprised by the 37" panasonic. Still think I need to stick with LCD from a gaming/DOG safety point of view.