Where WILL I want to buy

[seregloth]

THE LONG VERSION:

[Show spoiler]***So, I am going to be pooling resources for an eventual 3D tv buy over this next year. My issue is that I kind of want to decide by January where I am going to want to buy it later in the year- namely because I have $75 of ebay bucks that will go live in Jan, that I'll put toward buying a gift card that I'll put toward the tv (follow that?). And I'll also be buying charity gift cards etc so that the wife minds me upgrading my 37" Akai a little bit less. She really wishes I would just stay with what I've got, but I'm a LotR geek, and if that's how the Hobbit is being shot, that's how I want to watch in my house.
Anyway. She doesn't mind me using charity auction gift cards, or money that's off the radar like rewards bucks (and I just found out I get a christmas bonus at my new job which will help too). ****

THE SHORT VERSION: I would want as cheap a 1080p tv as possible. No bigger than 50". Wallmounted. 3d "ready" is fine. Prefer LED but whatever. Will probably end having less than $1000 all told... I know that's all a tall-ish order but it's the framework I have to work within.
You folks that have been watching trends for a while, do you think that I'd do better hoarding Amazon certs or Best Buy GC's or ??? if I had to choose right away where I'm likeliest to find my good deal next year. (In the wider new england are)

as a follow up, is there any reason not to do the "3d ready" checkerboard conversion jobs, if they end up being cheaper? Is there a difference in the picture, post-conversion? people seemed to fall on either side of that.

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ed: I also have a Costco membership and access to a BJ's club membership if those would be the cheaper choices.