Big screen LCD TVs

Exactly.
These new sets are no different then hi-end audio: garbage in, garbage out. You really need a digital signal from cable or satelite to appreciate them. These sets will really expose poor analog signal.

I finally ended up with the 60" Wega Sony and I love it!
Believe it or not I actually purchased the 65" Mitsibuishi CRT unit first, but after the first day I pleaded with the store to take it back for exchange.
High def signals looked great but... Video tapes looked ugly!!!
Now, I know that is not the ideal medium to play on such a large image , but the Sony seems too handle that input much better.
Again,High def broadcasts are awesome, so I find myself watching very little Video Tape now. But, lets face it, we probably all have treasured tapes of our early lives, some sets will display them fine (like the Sony) and some sets make it look like a big blur with smeared colors! (Even with SVHS Tapes!!!_
The 60" Sony picture in High Def is as good and as bright as any Plasma set I have seen (in 50" version.)
The only drawback with the Sony LCD is on extremly dark scenes the detail gets lost.
I am not sure how the Plasma units handle the dark scenes,but the Mitsuibuishi CRT did fine .

I have the Sony 50" lcd. After getting over the fact it had to be serviced within 30 days, I like it. I agree with others that some standard def stuff is unwatchable, really unwatchable. And I have had no luck with the internal line quadrupler or whatever, it seems to have no impact at all.

What about "ghosting" or some call it "tracer" effect? Is it really a problem with LCDs?

Emil,

Were you asking about direct view LCDs? I noticed some of the replies discussed RPTVs.

One suggestion I would make is to determine your viewing priorities and personal preferences, and match those against the strengths and weaknesses of each set. There is no ideal TV. What's best for me may not be best for you.

In my own case, watching SDTV was a distant 3rd priority to viewing DVD and HDTV, as this was for my home theater and I watch SDTV in other rooms. I ended up with a Samsung 61" DLP TV, and a critically important reason was its synergy with upconverting DVI equipped DVD players (I have the Pioneer DV-59AVi). The native resolution of the Samsung (1280 x 720) matches one of the HDTV native resolutions (720p), which matches one of the standard upconversion resolutions on DVI equipped DVD players. This makes the (DVD) picture quality really stand out.

Another suggestion I have is to view as many sets in as many different stores as you can. For example, I was mainly comparing the Samsung DLP to the Sony GWIII when I did my test viewing. Sometimes the Sony looked better than the Samsung, but at other times it looked washed out and much worse. The Samsung had a more consistent PQ to me.

Bruce