LCD HDTV Buy Now

I can tell you about the 42D64U (http://www.cheaplcdtvmarket.com/sharp_lcd_tv_quick_launch.html)
which is the brother of 42D62U from Sharp.
Since it has at 6 ms response time, the motion blur will not be caused by the LCD TV itself, but I believe, that the source signal is not so good.
Check and see if what they sell as full HD programs are actually high definition programs.
And, off course, the LCD TV has 2 HD component video inputs, check and see if you plugged the cable in the right one

I work as a freelance video tech. I’ve worked with the Sharp Aquos 42″ LCDs several times. Some of the problem is the nature of LCD TVs. If you want to test the quality of your TV try hooking up your computer’s VGA output to the set and play a video on it.

My guess would be that you are not getting an HD signal into your TV. Part of the reason 27″ (to maybe 32″) was the biggest TV you would want was because broadcast TV was at too low of a resolution to look good stretched out. To see an example of this, take a picture on your computer and keep zooming in on it until the area you are looking at becomes colors and squares.

If you are looking at a low resolution, ordinary program on your 42″ LCD a couple of things are happening. First, you’re stretching the video signal to the point where the pixels are too big to look good to the human eye. Second, the nature of LCDs is to refresh (update the image you see) at about twice to 4 times the rate that standard TV updates (29 times a second).

What makes motion look weird on an LCD even with high resolution signals is the WAY the LCDs refresh signals. LCD = Liquid Crystal Display and the liquid can only refresh so fast. What happens is every time the image scans across the LCD panels, it refreshes every other pixel. In highest resolution, each pass occurs every 1/120th of a second. That means you get a completly new image every 1/60th of a second. When you’re putting a signal that only refreshes at once every 1/30th of a second, then devide that in half because of the way LCDs refresh, you’re looking at an image that is refreshing at every 1/15th of a second. That’s slower than old Super-8 Movies!

If you are recieving your signal over cable, there’s a whole other issue of compression that I won’t go into here. Try hooking up rabbit ears and setting your tuner in your TV to “digital broadcast signal” or whatever they call it. Local stations broadcast over the air in digital HD and it’s the highest resolution available. The next would be satalite, then cable.

Bottom line is, LCD is never going to look as good for motion as DLP, Plasma or LED screens. That’s why the LCD was cheaper. My advice would be to put that TV back in the box, take it back and drop the extra bucks to get a better format.