Pnambic
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Posts posted by Pnambic
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1.) "Someone said there was a shortage on these TV's? Well here, let's make 'em taller."
2.) "I'm so sly...chunkin' a deuce..." (girl just left of center...in the red)
3.) "Done". "Done?" "Done done."
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This could be a really good thread. I'm really interested to learn what people are using and what they're getting out of it.
Playing music isn't a sell for me - I have headphones or a system with much nicer speakers for that.
Weather reports aren't a sell for me - my Apple watch does that really well actually.
Reminders...well, my phone and Apple watch do that, though I should use them more often...
I would love something that allowed me to turn off lights remotely, say from my bedroom at night, tell HAL, "turn off all the lights" and it does.
Or make sure the garage door is shut...
Or make sure the doors are all locked...
Or speak to a particular room...(It's time for dinner kids, get down here.)
What else are people doing with the tech?
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That was really easy to do last year because still cost a little more than 1080p. This year, I feel like it's hard pressed to find 1080p. Next year, 4K might be dirt cheap. The media and streaming may not be available yet, but there's really no sense in getting 1080p when there's virtually no cost difference to have the "futuristic"
4KYou're absolutely right, that if all else is equal, might as well get the 4K - shouldn't hurt, right?
But I encourage everyone to check the stats on RTings.com if you can. There are dozens of ways one TV can be better than another. Better contrast, color, response times, streaming abilities, reflection, frame rates, yes - even 4K. But I'm not holding my breath on 4K being "just around the corner". Remember, 1080P was released at least 10 years ago and still there are no broadcasters using 1080P. Even if all the broadcasters agreed today that they would all start broadcasting 4K signals ASAP, it would take years to implement this as it would require enormous investments in hardware and software upgrades and massive efforts to train everyone on the new systems. It's not like they can just flip some magical switch. And as we've already seen, they would need to change the way in which Americans watch TV in order for them to even be able to see a difference (they'd need to sit much closer to the TV). I've read that in places like Korea and Japan where they've already embraced smaller living spaces, they've already created an environment where the viewer is close enough to the TV to see the difference with 4K, so those places are already working on implementing 4K. And that makes sense. That's why here in America we made the move to 720P/1080i back in the mid 2000's as pretty much everyone could see the improvement. It's just a harder sell now when the American norm is LARGE living spaces.
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Oh how I miss plasma
I'm waiting to see how the whole OLED thing starts to shake out with their yields finally going up which is helping to bring the pricing down. Hopefully by the time I'm ready to replace my 70" Vizio 1080P set in the living room the technology will be at a place where it's affordable for me.
I still regret not picking up the 60" Pioneer Plasma from Best Buy's Magnolia when they were closing them out.
...me too my friend...
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Honestly, my current TV, while okay, was a very quick purchase with very limited research time, as my old TV died and, yippee, it was my birthday weekend, so I actually wanted to sit and enjoy the NASCAR race. I don't like the sports bar scene for watching races, didn't have local friends with any interest at the time, so new TV it was. Race green flagged just after 7 pm that night. My TV died around 10 am. (Figures, right?)
I, for obvious reasons, had a limited budget to spend on a TV all of a sudden, so I chose one I could afford that was basically the same size as the dead one. As a sports-watcher, though, the fast-action capability on the one I ended up with is sub-par (something I would've known had I had more than 9 hours to research, shop, and buy). It drives me nuts when I'm watching races/games. Seeing as the prices on the 4Ks have become much more attractive in the past year, I've been doing more research and will have a bit more available to spend if I see one that truly fits my criteria. Hence, I'm at least looking this year.
Get familiar with this site. They have a great standardized test process and they report all the important details.
- the TV is only 60Hz? Box the box says 240...
- the input lag is poor on this TV? But it doesn't say anything about input lag on the box...
Something you mentioned was a sore point for you is the fast-action capability. This is often directly related to the refresh rate on the TV. Plasma, due to the technology of plasma, allowed those sets to employ a 600 Hz refresh rate which is why you didn't have motion blur on them as compared to the LCD and LED/LCD sets. It's complicated, but it's difficult to make LCD screens flicker faster than 60 Hz has the backlight is generally tied to the power grid's delivered 60 Hz - the TV manufacturer has to incorporate tricky bit of technology to overcome this and 95% of people don't even notice the difference. So instead, most manufacturers began plastering meaningless numbers on the boxes to make the buyers assume 120, 240 or even 480 Hz refresh rates. (see here) Check RTings for their test results to make sure you get a TV with a proper refresh rate to enjoy the racing without the blur.
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There are some great reasons to buy a new TV this year.
- Your old one is too small.
- Your old one stopped working.
- Your old one doesn't stream.
- Your old one requires you to bash in the side in order to get the cathode ray tube to wake up.
So, buying a new TV because...
- it's bigger
- it streams (loving my Roku TVs)
- it can be hung on the wall clearing up 10 square feet of floor space from your old console TV
These are good reasons.
Streaming really does look like the future here. I'm a big fan of Roku and am working on transitioning from DirecTV to Sling/Netflix/Amazon.
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On the other hand, there are other reasons that people are using to justify buying that new TV that really aren't very good. Such as...
- 4k
- HDR
- the Joneses did it and they look so happy
- My bank account is just too full, it's becoming a liability
And this isn't new or exclusive to TVs. People spend unnecessary amounts of money on status symbols all the time. I have an apple watch. Totally unnecessary, but I like it. If you're looking for a status symbol, 4K TVs have been marketed very well to fill this need. Knock yourself out. But if you're looking to spend your money wisely and not have to buy a new set in a year or two because you chose incorrectly, keep reading.
4K
I generally link to this chart every year, but it's one of the best tools I've found to determine what the best size and resolution TV is for a particular room.
http://s3.carltonbale.com/resolution_chart.png
Visit the page and read up. There's a lot of good information there.
But basically, you need to be sitting no further than 5 - 6 ft from a 55inch screen in order for the human eye (assuming 20/20 vision) can even begin discerning the difference between 4K and 1080P.
This is real science. Testable, predictable and repeatable as opposed to that quasi-faith-based climate science junk. So get out the old measuring tape and measure the distance from where you want the TV to be, to where your head would be while sitting on your couch. Then take a look at this chart here and figure out what size TV you need in order to get the best out of your viewing experience. Most homes watch TV from 10 - 12 feet away, which would mean you'd need a screen thats 8 ft or more in diameter. Let's be clear here - I'm not saying 4K isn't great. I'm sure 4K material is really spectacular (if it's true 4K material and not upscaled) when viewed on a quality 4K screen from close enough to tell the difference, like when standing 4 feet away from it at Best Buy. I'm planning on getting a 4K computer monitor or two this year as I actually am sitting close enough to tell the difference at my desk. I bet it's pretty impressive. But in my home, and every home I've visited, ever, not one has been set up with the TV close enough to the viewing area to be able to tell the difference between 1080P and 4K (except one guy who had seats about 8 feet from a 10 foot projector screen - that was pretty nice).
So, 4K? Nice, but shouldn't be something you spend more money to get or a reason to upgrade from a perfectly good 1080P TV. UNLESS, you're simply looking to impress the feeble-minded visitors you might invite over to brag about your new 4K TV. You will likely have success there as the marketing is strong with this one.
But if one of those visitors is educated or discerning, they'll just roll their eyes.HDR
Now we're talking! HDR is fantastic. Technically, HDR doesn't require 4K, but no manufacturers (to my knowledge) are producing 1080P TVs with HDR as they're working hard to get you to buy a new 4K TV. HDR, especially when combined with Wide Color Gamut (WCG) gives you better contrast, deeper colors, light and shadow are much improved, it just makes the world (as seen through your TV) a better place to look at. All those advantages plasma has over LED/LCD, well HDR finally gives LED/LCD the ability to look like plasma, probably even better. So, you may be asking yourself why I listed HDR in the "not very good" reasons to buy a new TV...and that's for the simple reason that there is no single HDR technology that's been made THE standard. Last I checked, there are 4 major competitors at the moment. Video Cassettes only had two (Beta and VHS), HD movies on disk only had two (HD-DVD and Blu-Ray). In most technical reviews I've read, both Beta and HD-DVD produced superior images and/or audio, but neither won the trophy. So buying a new TV now that supports HDR10 may end up being just like buying a BETA player back in the 80's, or a HD-DVD player in the 2000's - basically a big waste of money. Last year at this time there were only two players - HDR-10 and Dolby Vision. I warned against counting on either as it was impossible to guess which might win out in the end let alone if a third or fourth option might come along. Well, this year we have HLG and Advanced HDR as well. It's anybody's game at this point. And the fact that there are twice as many choices this year as compared to last is not a good sign. The trophy will end up going to whoever makes the most closed door deals and you and I just have no way of knowing. SO! When HDR finally is standardized, I will probably be the first in line to get a new TV or 3 that supports it. But until then, I'm taking a wait and see approach. I still have my HD-DVD player staring at me from my component stack to remind me why.
There, your uncle Pnambic has shared his sage wisdom.
Now, go and throw away your hard earned money in whatever way makes you happy.
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Harbor Freight - 10/15/2017
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Last year, the Lowes near us began honoring their BF deals on appliances the weekend before Thanksgiving. All you had to do was ask nicely.
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Couple thoughts to start the discussion.
- 4K Media - How much are we seeing out there? Where is it? How do we get it? Is it worth it?
- We had HDR10 and Dolby Vision as the two competing HDR formats last year. Now we have two more major players in HLG and Advanced HDR. So, how's that "future-proofing" working out for you?
- What do you know about ATSC 3.0? Looks like another hardware revolution that will require at minimum new set-top boxes.
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What's a good laptop for software developers. I have been using an old Dell laptop that I have had for quite sometime. It has gotten the job done but it is time for an upgrade. I would like to stick with Windows since I am accustomed to it, but I can always switch.
Sent from my SM-G920T using GottaDEAL mobile app
I found the most valuable attribute to me when it comes to coding on a laptop (which I try desperately not to do anyway) is a nice big screen with lots of pixels. That way I can see and use the toolbar at the top, the Projects and Navigator panes on the left, the Output pane on the bottom for troubleshooting and still have plenty of room to write and edit code (in NetBeans for example). As far as everything else, well, compiling code isn't normally a really resource intensive process, so you don't HAVE to spend the big bucks for big stats. Windows is of course all over the place and you can find IDE's for it at will. And it's super easy to make a laptop dual boot to something like Ubuntu or Mint to get a linux OS. Macs are fine machines, you just pay a premium for the perceived luxury. Were it my money, I'd target an i5 Windows laptop with a big screen and a big battery.
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I actually have looked into this, but never followed through...my son has pretty much monopolized it now so I still may look into a new KB, again...and still get a new one for myself...
I was enjoying lunch with my 17 yo son at Firehouse the other day.
Somehow I ended up with a meatball in MY lap from HIS meatball sandwich...
Some kids are just messy.
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Supply and demand. Keep the supply limited to drive up demand.
I think this is Nintendo's primary business philosophy.
Although, to be honest, I'm kinda surprised at the rate these things are selling. I suspect there will be a TON of these at Gamestop in the used pile a month after Christmas.
Come on people, most if not all of these games are 20 - 30 years old, maybe older. They're not going to hold the attention of kids these days past the initial novelty. If there had been any other really cool game system released (like a Nintendo Switch, or a PS5 or a XBox3840), I don't think we'd be talking about this more than just a cool gift for us old people to reminisce over. But since the really cool new stuff is really expensive VR that not everyone can afford, this is kinda filling that void.
Do I sound fickle, or what?
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I just read an article yesterday about this happening, and how when/if it should happen, you are not legally bound to return the item/s that were shipped to you in error. Knowing that, I'd have probably kept them, LOL...
https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/articles/0181-unordered-merchandise
Hmmm...
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Not even a thank you from Best Buy. Just a reshipment of my original order, to be delivered on a day that I won't be home which they apparently can't change, and some return slips in the mail to reship the TV's back to them. My effort, on my time. No points. No coupon codes. No price adjustment for the trouble of the 30 minutes spent on the call to help them straighten out the mistake they made in my favor which they didn't even know about. No good deed goes unpunished indeed. Even when I asked (always politely) to speak to a manager as I expected the first line person probably couldn't do any compensation, the "manager" never even said thank you.
Very poor customer service Best Buy.
Very disappointed.
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Really disappointed in how difficult it was to snag one of the $99 3DS deals. I read an article a month ago that talked about how Nintendo had been preparing for this Holiday season and were going to have tons of product. Near as I could tell, not one store sold them online (aside from scalpers). And they vanished into thin air in stores leaving no trace. Somehow, Nintendo thought 5 or 6 of these per store would be sufficient for the demand?
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Anyone else having trouble with their online orders or deliveries?
I ordered several gaming chairs from Kohls for in-store pickup the Wed before Thanksgiving. Went and picked them up Friday night. Super nice people, great experience. They even helped bring them out to the car for me. Then two days ago, I got an email that said they were sorry that I didn't pick up my order and they had cancelled it and refunded my account and that they hoped I would be doing business with them again sometime soon. But I have the items. Now I need try to figure this out as it feels like stealing to me.
Then today, I was expecting two 24" monitors from Best Buy. The dog starts barking at the door about 1:00 and when I get there, I watch the UPS truck drive off, having left two 43" Sharp Smart HDTV's on my doorstep. I checked the delivery tags to see if they were maybe intended for one of my neighbors, but the tags clearly say my name and list the 24" monitors I bought. Best Buy currently has an hour hold time on their customer service line.
That's $1000 in regular priced merchandise I've been given incorrectly this year. This hasn't happened to me before, and from two different stores.
Maybe I should start ordering some jewelry or something...Powerball/MegaMillions, here I come!
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I haven't taken delivery yet, but this is the truck...
http://images.usedcarsgroup.com/2016-ford-f_150-exeter-nh-i2638034121037046596-3.jpg
That's a nice looking truck! Congrats!
Now its time for the JC Whitney catalog and cattle bar on the front and light bar on top and raised suspension and and and...
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Just want to thank the wonderful ford employees of dearborn michigan for my awesome new toy. best BF deal ever.
Come on, pics or it didn't happen.
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Awesome news! Glad it all worked out really well!
For the record, if someone wanted to rub my belly or scratch me on the head or back, at work or anywhere else, I'd probably let them.
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Barely stepped in any stores this year - only Kohls really. But not during the rush.
Let's see...
- Amazon got me for a PS4 game ($20), a PS4 controller ($40), and 3 Wii U games ($30, $20, $10)
- B&H got me for an Apple Watch Sport 38mm ($169)
- Best Buy got me for 2 Sony Blu Ray players ($50 x2), 2 ACER 24" monitors ($80 x2)
- Toys R Us got me for a couple games ($12.50 x2)
- Target got me for a TV (the TCL 40" 1080P smart one for $200 since rtings.com said it was the best out there under $300)
- Kohls...I just don't have the heart to add that one up right now...
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I didn't notice this before, but it looks like it says on the front of the box, bottom right, that it does NOT include a charger.
Wow.
Good catch Riven.
Specific to the new $99 white and black editions.
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Excellent little read.
Not cutting edge of course, but probably a good platform to build on and a great exercise to take the kid through.
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My mistake, it's a JVC (not Sumsung). I've looked at so many I can't keep them straight
http://blackfriday.gottadeal.com/BlackFridayScans/SamsClub/10
The specs don't look the greatest, but it is a Smart 4K TV for $299. So, I think it's a perfectly fine TV on a budget if you're not looking for the best of the best.
What we know:
- it is 4K
- it doesn't support Wide Color Gamut (it says 16.7mil colors and WCG is over 1 bil)
- the refresh rate is 60 Hz
- it is LED backlit but we don't know if it's direct lit, edge lit, has local dimming, etc
- it has 3 HDMI ports but only one is HDMI 2.0
- it has 1 USB port
- it has 1 composite and 1 component input
- specs say it has one VGA port but I can't find it in any pictures
- looks like an optical out for a sound bar is there in the pics
- it does not do music or video from USB, only pictures
- reported contrast is way low, but that's not a hard measure to use to compare between sets
- the specs say it is a smart TV, but with no built in WiFi and no Ethernet, I can't imagine how that works (reviews say its not a smart TV)
What we don't know:
- if it supports any HDR material (probably not)
- who the heck makes this thing? JVC's website hasn't heard of it - it doesn't have ANY TV's on it.
If you want a cheap 55inch HDTV, this might be OK. But if you're replacing even a mediocre 50" 1080P simply because this one says 4K on the box, don't. Right now, 4K material is sparse, but when/if it ever does become available, it will be using HDR and Wide Color Gamut and this TV doesn't support that. You'll get the 4K pixels, but you won't enjoy the deep rich colors that are the real reason for going to 4K.
If it were my money, I'd get the Sharp LC-55LB481U in the Best Buy ad for $250. It's a smart TV with built in WiFi, comes from a company that at least acknowledges that it makes TV's, is cheaper, and will likely even be a better picture since there's nothing to watch in 4K anyway. That way, in a year or two, when 4K has some legs under it and TV manufacturers are making TV's that actually support all the HDR and WCG material, you can get yourself a 4K TV that actually looks as amazing as it should.
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4K
But if one of those visitors is educated or discerning, they'll just roll their eyes.
Official Black Friday LAPTOPS Discussion Thread
in 2017
Posted
In my personal opinion...
1.) getting your daughter a laptop under $350 should be easy. Some things to consider there would be weight (will she be carrying it around school?). Larger screens are nicer to look at, but they translate to heavier laptops and shorter battery life. A 13-14 inch laptop with a good 6 cell or more battery might last 10 hours or more where a 17 inch laptop with a 2 or 3 cell battery might only last 3 or fewer hours. Most any entry level laptop should be able to server the needs you described. We will be able to direct you better when the ads are out.
2.) getting your son a laptop for "gaming" under $350 will be really tough. I'd have to check the old charts from last year to be sure, but I don't think there were any laptops with discrete video cards (they game better than onboard video) under $450. Heck, a quality discrete video card for a laptop will cost a good deal more than $350 all by itself. If I recall correctly, I think $500 - $700 was the sweet spot for the best deals on laptops that might have been used for low to mid level gaming. Some things to consider here are discrete graphics, RAM, screen size and resolution, HDD speed/SSD, and processor. I haven't had the pleasure of using any of AMD's brand new processor options that seem to be pretty darn awesome, but traditionally, an i5 Intel processor or better has been what you should target for gaming. Programming doesn't really require heavy computing power, most any laptop will do there - though as I have mentioned before, the more pixels the better when coding - the better to have all the side bars and bottom debug panels and such visible.
I think its safe to say that laptop prices will range from about $200 to about $3,000.
But for email, browsing the Internet, shopping online, etc, I suspect you will be able to choose from several options in the $300 - $400 range that would plenty powerful for your needs.