Funny thing happened on the way to the theater

So we got Danny and Brenna off to their 4 day camp, then back home with Lauren and MJ.  Lauren went over to a friend’s house and so MJ, Angie and I were playing on  our computers.  Angie decided we’d sneak out to see Kung Fu Panda with MJ.  But we got a late start and couldn’t make the movie show time.

The next show would start after we’d have to pick up Lauren, so we worked out some logistics, then decided to go to Cosco to fill our larder.  After grabbing some frozen stuff to put in our freezer in the garage, we figured had a bit of time to do some window shopping.

Wait, need to esplain, no it is too much, will summ up: Our current HDTV has lost one of the color channels.  Unless we like watching smurfs or leprhchans (blue of green) watching our TV had become a little frustrating.  Especially, if like Angie loves to do, you’re watching a home design show and they decribe a vibrant yellow that looks like a muddy green.  So yesterday it was sorta like the TV commercial where the wife says, yeah, we need a new TV, and the guy grabs his keys.

We went to Conn’s, mostly because we have good credit history with them (about to pay off three kitchen appliances we bought in ’05) and started looking.  Our current TV is a 28″ HDTV CRT, and so we started out at around 30″ and just kept going up.  We liked a 46″ LCD, and so asked the salesman to run a credit check.  While he was doing that we wandered to the rear of the store and found some absolutely lovely DLPs.  The price for DLPs is much less than an LCD, the cost is a bit more space (can’t wall mount) and a DLP does have a bulb that will wear out.  So while we were watching the pretty pictures, and wondering around the small furniture section, the sales guy comes back and says, you can pretty much get what you want (he ran the high end of the LCDs we were looking at).  I respond with, “That’s a bit scary.”  We talked with him a bit about the DLPs, then it was time to get Lauren, and try to make the show.

Only we waited to long, by the time we got Lauren and headed back to the freeway, the clock had again ticked past and we’d get to the theater too late.  So back home to do research and discuss some options.  We use our living room to host a weekly American Idol party when that’s in season, and so that was part of the discussion.  We talked viewing angles, and flexibility of rearranging, and sizes, and by the end of the time, we’d pretty much agreed on a moderate sized LCD in the middle of our price range.

We set off to Pei Wei to eat, then back to Conn’s to make the buying decision.  We got back to the store, and start to look and narrow down.  The one I liked from my research was a bit about our agreed upon price point, and so we hemmed and hawed, and wound up back in the back with the DLPs, and a nice console that met Angie’s standards.  The console ended up being out of stock, and then looked at the DLPs a bit more closer, the one we liked was a 60″, but next to it, the same model and features was a 65” a hundred less.  We bit, then added an upscaling DVD player (not ready for Blu-Ray yet) and some cables, and we’re out the door.

We had to drive to almost Irving to pick up the behemoth after dropping off the kids, to clear out the van.  The box filled up the back of the van (with the seats folded), and setup was a breeze.  We obviously need to do some rearranging, and maybe buy different furniture for it.

Once we placed it in the room, we realized how absolutely ginormous this thing is… Turning it on, was surreal, crisp vibrant colors, deep fine features in 1080i from the Verizon FiOS tuner.  MJ, just wanted to play a game, so he hooked up his SpongeBob game contoller and got lovely 16bit quality pixelated video that he played avidly.  Still have to test the Wii and hookup the upconverting DVD.

As you can see from the picture, about 4 of our old screens would fit in the screen size of the new one.  We’re a bit overwhelmed, but I think we can adapt. :)  (link to the TV at amazon)