Cheers Squirrel God.
rmsdev,
That's it: 50Hz for analogue and 100Hz for digital - like for like.
I've got a digibox and every now and then I get tired of looking at rich, ghost-free, anamorphic widescreen pictures and I switch back to the analogue tuner and... after I recover from the shock of seeing half the picture disappear, I sort of think, hey, analogue ain't so bad, it looks kind of clean and natural and sharper. Sure, there's two of everybody and the picture on five is a bitch but it's not bad. And then I switch back to digital and I think, hey...
They both have their strengths and weaknesses. Digital is ghost-free and it's anamorphic. I bought my widescreen TV to watch DVDs, but really what's the point of watching stretched 4/3 pictures when you can go to 16/9? Analogue is shaky but sharper and more contrasty. It's like the difference between a digital photograph and a conventional photograph, or a studio production like a soap and a movie. You might see every hair poking out of Trevor McDonald's nose on News at Ten but the picture doesn't have the shading and depth and character of something shot on film. Okay I'm getting boring now.
Digital is the future, but as in most things, when it replaces analogue technology completely, something will have been lost. Some people won't mourn it, but more people drink Fanta than vintage Muton Rothschild, right?
As regards TV brands, why not have the best of both worlds and get one of the new Prog Toshiba's? They're switchable between 50 & 100Hz. I'm not crazy about the stand and the box but the quality's there.
I like Philips' technology - the way you can zoom the picture in steps instead of having to pick 4/3 or 16/9 etc. I also like the way you can raise and lower the volume without a thick bar appearing on the screen for ten seconds, obscuring the picture. It's the small details that make owning and using a good TV enjoyable. That said, Philips haven't got anything enticing on the market at the moment. Pixelplus is the work of the Devil.
I've also got a soft spot for the Tosh Picture Frame ZP18. This is a top notch box, despite what you might have read elsewhere on this forum. if you get the 32inch instead of the 36, there are no black bars. Yeah I know, it's 100Hz. Behave.