Which buying decision would you recommend?

[ADWyatt]

My now-old 58" Panasonic 3D plasma still works great, but present and near-future technology is leaving it behind in terms of display quality. I would like to upgrade either this year or as late as December 2015, but this isn't such an easy thing to do.

It seems as if for television this is truly the best of times and the worst of times. While 1080p sets have never been better, 4k programming will finally start to emerge at the end of 2015 with DirecTV offering more than 4k pay-per-view. And it may be reasonable to assume that 4k Blu-ray players will start to make their appearance. And then, of course, there is 4k OLED, which at the end of next year might almost be affordable.

Here is what I'd love to have: For some odd reason I'm a big fan of the soap opera image. I don't know why, but there it is. My Panny can't display it, so I'd like to have a TV that can. Naturally, I also love 4k quality, and I really would like to have active-shutter 3D, or at the least a passive-shutter 3D image that could equal an active-shutter 4k 3D upscaled picture.

Right now there are two possible TV purchases I'm looking into, and either one could be a bad misstep. Your opinion and advice could save me a lot of money and heartache by showing me buying strategies that I'm not considering. Here are my choices right now...

1. The Sharp Aquos 60" 1080p set that shows images somewhat higher than 1080p, as the company claims that it has a million more pixels than a standard 1080p set. This is currently a Best Buy exclusive that until recently was on sale for $1,699 USD. This set definitely has the soap opera image in 240 Hz that I'd like, and also uses active-shutter 3D. However, this isn't a 4k TV, and I have yet to read in-depth customer reviews on just how good this set is. I'm thinking it may be possible that when this set goes on sale again before the end of the year that I might keep it for three years, and then buy into 4k OLED, when the technology is more affordable and refined. The down side is that my contract with DISH will be up in November 2015, and by then DirecTV may have available one or more 4k channels.

2. Wait to buy until December 1, 2015, with the expectation that a 65" 4k OLED set will street in the U.S. for about $5,000. That would be passive-shutter 3D, and I'm not sure if such a set would give me the soap opera look, but it seems to me that 4k OLED would be the last word in picture quality for many years to come. I've never seen an OLED display, to be perfectly honest, and I can only assume that from the images I've seen on the internet, that this will be noticeably superior to LED. (By the way, I'm also fully aware that Panasonic is going to be releasing the 65" AX900 4k LED TV later this year, and the specs are all my heart would desire, but Panasonic seems to have trouble making a good LED model, or so I've read. But if this is a good set, it might be a more affordable alternative to OLED.)

I have no doubt that there are many facts and considerations that I'm not taking into account for a purchase decision, and so I will thank everyone in advance who would like to offer his or her advice.

[ADWyatt]

I'm going to go ahead and answer my question myself, partly because I am getting zero response from any of the members here, and partly because I can now see the obvious purchasing strategy for my situation. I should have known what to do all along, and I'm sort of embarrassed that I didn't see it as plain as day.

When I am contractually able to join DirecTV by about November 2015, they will already have PPV 4k movies, and will shortly have one or more 4k channels up-and-running. That's the time to purchase a new 4K TV, and not before. The 2015 sets will be more refined and somewhat lower in cost. Almost certainly I will not have the budget for an OLED TV, as I believe a 65" set will probably cost at least $7,000. However, LED sets are really quite good already, and should be even better by the end of next year.

So for now my Panny plasma will do just fine. It's not 4k, and technology has passed it by, but I've certainly gotten my money's worth from it.

Thanks, everyone, for all your replies, such as they were.

[Suntory_Times]

Originally Posted by ADWyatt

I'm going to go ahead and answer my question myself, partly because I am getting zero response from any of the members here, and partly because I can now see the obvious purchasing strategy for my situation. I should have known what to do all along, and I'm sort of embarrassed that I didn't see it as plain as day.

When I am contractually able to join DirecTV by about November 2015, they will already have PPV 4k movies, and will shortly have one or more 4k channels up-and-running. That's the time to purchase a new 4K TV, and not before. The 2015 sets will be more refined and somewhat lower in cost. Almost certainly I will not have the budget for an OLED TV, as I believe a 65" set will probably cost at least $7,000. However, LED sets are really quite good already, and should be even better by the end of next year.

So for now my Panny plasma will do just fine. It's not 4k, and technology has passed it by, but I've certainly gotten my money's worth from it.

Thanks, everyone, for all your replies, such as they were.

Firsstly it is UHD tv, not 4k (calling it 4k is a misnomer). The standards for UHD beyond resolution have yet to be standardized. So know is not the time to buy a UHD tv. It is likely that the standards will not be in place and films will be released of at least another year or two (even if they soon have a big announcement).

Once UHD actually does come out content becomes the issue. There simply isn't much of it. There are far more 3d films made currently then 4k films (this is the appropriate time to use 4k as it is a professional standard that movies can be made to). Think of all the best looking films from recent years. Star Trek, Star Trek Into Darkness, Avatar, Hugo, the Hobbit films etc, nearly all of them are made using a 2k DI with only a small number done using a 4k DI (the only ones that come immediately to mind are TAS1, Skyfall, Girl with a Dragon Tattoo and Elysium. But even then much of the source material is often not 4k (Elysium for example was shoot below that and Skyfall was shoot at 2.8k).

Widespread UHD content is a long way off, even next year will be very early to buy in.

As for the soap opera effect, I myself hate it, but what model do you have? I thought there plasmas for years had all had frame interpolation (then again this is a feature I never really check for unless I have to turn it off).

[tezster]

I would personally wait for OLED to become more affordable - LG are making great strides towards increasing production, so I think the price will drop pretty quickly in the next 2-3 years. I'd love to see their 77" OLED around the $4k price mark in that time frame.

[Suntory_Times]

Originally Posted by tezster

I would personally wait for OLED to become more affordable - LG are making great strides towards increasing production, so I think the price will drop pretty quickly in the next 2-3 years. I'd love to see their 77" OLED around the $4k price mark in that time frame.

15k down to 3.5k in eight months. Still, is there actual plans for an oled that large? (I'm a bit behind on oled at the moment).

[ADWyatt]

I'd like to thank everyone for their opinions and advice. You've all brought up some good points.

Of course, Suntory Times is correct when he states that 4k is really a slang term, and that the final specs for UHD are not yet in place. Many of us just assume that the resolution currently used in UHD demos will be approved, and I will go so far as to say that this might be a reasonable assumption on the public's part. It seems to me that enough UHD televisions have already been sold that any future variations from the expected standard will be accommodated by those televisions, and should be fairly straightforward.

In any event, such discussion was not the main point of my original post. The question regarded the best time and way to upgrade from my current TV.

As revealed in a previous post, it would certainly seem that a UHD set would be the best choice for the future. I sit twelve feet away from my 58" 1080p plasma, and when I stand that far from a 60" Samsung UHD set, it appears that the same picture would be sharper and more detailed on the LED Samsung than on the 1080p Panasonic plasma, but this can be very tricky reasoning when you take into account 1080i broadcasting, 1080p movies played natively or upscaled, motion juddering and lighting uniformity. Throw into the mixture sales people who will usually be trying to maximize profits, and you begin to think that spending all your time playing the piano might not be such a bad idea.

One thing I've noticed (and please feel free to correct me if my reasoning is wrong) is that on the Samsung 60" 7150 1080p LED TV, when I played a Blu-ray movie at 240Hz (for the soap opera look that I love) I could notice no juddering problem at all. Not so for any Samsung UHD TV, no matter how the salesman tried to adjust for it. It appears that Samsung does indeed have a judder problem with their current UHD sets, and to me it's distracting.

But UHD of some kind is the future, and there is not the slightest doubt about that. I'm calculating that problems with today's UHD sets will be largely resolved in the next models, and they will be a little more economically priced. And so I'm sticking with my timetable. I don't see a 60" or 65" OLED being sold for a halfway-reasonable price at the end of 2015, but if the cost came down to around $5,000 USD, I would be truly tempted to pull the trigger.

[Blove23]

With all do respect, LG calls it Cinema 3D or Passive 3D. I only say that because in your post saying passive shutter glasses will definitely confuse some people.
The only 3D glasses that have shutters are active.
I recommend the television that fits your budget the best!