Hitachi 42" Plasma HDTV 1080i - $688 at Circuit City

actually its 1024 X 1080
rectangular pixels FTG (for teh ghey) - lol
how it is these plasmas get away with lower detail/definition horizontal resolution is just odd.

This bums me out I just got rid of the box for the 37" Philips that I picked up from Office Depot on the deal a few weeks ago.
At least I think I have broken my string of bad luck on LCD TV's. It has lasted more than a day - 17 days and counting.

I have this TV it is great I bought it a year ago for $775 worth every penny... Great for Wii & PS3.....

Great price sweet picture... But yes only 1080I.....

Why all the red?

looks like a good deal to me

kool

dwit said: Hapless said: Why all the red?

I think, in general, because Hitachi continues to tout this tv as 1080(i), which confuses the "unsuspecting" (eg, OP), into thinking it is full 1080p.

In reality, in a side by side comparison with the 720p Panasonic, the Hitachi looks decent, but unremarkable.

it's actually not either.. it's 1024X1080 which is kinda pointless. It's better than 1024X768 plasma but not much..

tonysavealot said: It's 1080i

it have 1080 vertical lines, but two rows share anodes.
So only one row can be updated at time, e.g interlaced.

So it's much better than 720p but not as good as 1080p

pros:
it does help eliminate the screen door effect as it only have half the numbers of the thin black lines between pixels.

The panel itself is not 1080 anything. Unless you'd consider a display that was 2 pixels wide by 1080 pixels high to be 1080p ? It accepts 1920X1080 interlaced signal and then transforms it into the ridiculous resolution of 1024X1080.... there by cutting the resolution widthwide in half but preserving the vertical resolution.

...that's one incomprehensible post.

owenscott said: Guess because its clearance they no longer have it on the website?

So i called the store and the employee told me he would look for me .... i heard him call his friends and tell them to get down there now for an excellent deal ....... boy are his friends gonna be disappointed .... he just told me they are out of'em. *smile*

wat?

just fyi- this set will probably use more electricity than the set it replaces, even if the set is crt. plasma uses alot of power, and also release more heat than a lcd.

Adding the extra AAA 8% makes this very hot.

gollum said: does the AAA 8% work in store too?
I doubt it. I know AAA used to have coupons that were B&M for CC, now it seems they changed their terms and conditions to online and phone number only. Freakin weak CircuitCity! I'm going to try it out tomorrow and see if it works. Hopefully my store has the tv in stock.

If they do not allow me to use the coupon, i'm filing a complaint with the BBB. ty

SDpwnsFW said: gollum said: does the AAA 8% work in store too?
I doubt it. I know AAA used to have coupons that were B&M for CC, now it seems they changed their terms and conditions to online and phone number only. Freakin weak CircuitCity! I'm going to try it out tomorrow and see if it works. Hopefully my store has the tv in stock.

If they do not allow me to use the coupon, i'm filing a complaint with the BBB. ty

I've got one of their emails in front of me. There's an 18 digit instore code.

Only annoyance I have with the CC coupons is that they don't give you a code for online use (which they used to ......), it auto-enters it through referral..... which means you can't combine them with other non-coupon referrals. That's BS to me and I'm sure it's intentional.

People spend way too much time worrying about resolution and not enough time worrying about how it looks in person. I'm sure that Hitachi didn't release a tv that looks like garbage where everyone says 'hey look at the rectangle pixels!' when they look at the tv.

Most CC's WILL apply % off coupons on clearance items if you are persistent enough. At $688 I think this is a pretty decent deal, but $688 - 10% would make it really nice.

Most of the Hitachi's I've tinkered with have been decent. Not quite up to par with a Panny, but similar to say a Vizio, and better than the cheapies like Maxtents or Sanyos. It is just my opinion but they seem rather dim, even after tweaking.

Black levels take a hit versus other Plasmas, or as compared to LCDs? I suspect its still superior to LCD for black levels.

I have a Panasonic Plasma though, becuase of black levels and because I wanted a hard panel. (I move about more than most, LCDs are more fragile)

I picked up one of these in October from CC and via a tremendous price match to Sears, incorporating a $150 instant rebate for financing the TV, I managed to get it for $5 cheaper than this deal, unless you got the AA discount to work, and that's still the best deal I've seen on a 42" flat panel HDTV. In this day and age of rapidly decreasing prices on consumer electronics, that says something about how good of a deal I got.

Pros: Very realistic image; slightly better resolution than 1024x768; quality construction; quality name; very effective image retention prevention (no ghosting).

Cons: Blacks are less dark than Pioneer, Panasonic and Samsung plasmas; menu inputs take too long to appear and change - at least three to four seconds after remote keys are pressed; sound is average (not as good as my 32" Toshiba LCD); No VGA input, Hitachi says HDMI inputs not compatible with PC's and some reports on AVSForum that it's difficult/incompatible with an HTPC (although I've heard there are work arounds and I'll be trying to implement them myself in the near future); store display models are usually poorly set up, have a very grainy image and store personnel are clueless as to how to adjust them properly.

Hitachis tend to do poorly in the professional reviews and there are a lot of debates on these Hitachis on AVSForum.com, all centered around the weaker contrast levels and black levels the Hitachis produce, with critics claiming Hitachi plasmas cannot even reproduce blacks but instead just display a greenish-tinged charcoal color. My take: contrast levels are inferior to the competition but to say it won't even reproduce black is nonsense. If you look at a Hitachi next to a Panasonic or Samsung with its contrast levels cranked to the max at the local store, the other two plasmas will have much darker blacks. However, if you look around you at everything in your environment that is black in color, you'll notice that virtually everything that is black is not a deep, black-hole level of dark, but most black items are either slightly faded or have a bit of a sheen on them. The only thing in my living room that is a really deep, dark black (i.e. darker than my Hitachi will display) is, ironically, the inside bezel on my Hitachi that borders the actual display screen. I have never had an issue with the black levels of my Hitachi while I am watching it (as opposed to staring at it trying to imagine whether it could be darker) - if something is supposed to be really dark, it looks accurately and suitably dark, as the image might be in real life. While I honestly can't say, if price was the same, I'd pick a Hitachi again over a Panasonic or over the image quality of a Samsung (I'll pass on a Samsung in light of less robust quality and often suspect customer service), that is largely because I sometimes like the more artificial look of the other brands of plasmas with extra-vibrant colors and super dark contrast levels. It's pretty subjective, though, and with content that is bright in color, such as an animated film like Monsters, Inc., the colors pop at you vibrantly and you'll never think the Hitachi is dull and lifeless. It's just not beyond lifelike, as its competitors tend to be.

I've seen Hitachis in stores next to a variety of other plasmas and LCD HDTV's and while it doesn't always compare favorably with other first tier manufacturer's flat screen HDTV's such as Pioneer, Sony, Toshiba, Sharp and the afore-mentioned Panasonic and Samsung, I think it does edge out LG flat panels, both plasma and LCD, and beats any of the second and third tier brands like Philips, Olevia, Vizio, Westinghouse, Insignia, etc....

If you're looking at one of these Hitachis in the store or have picked one up already, first thing you should do is turn off the noise reduction which I believe is on as a default setting and which results in a grainy image. That alone will make more of a difference than any other setting in improving the image quality. I've got the following settings on mine you may wish to try:

- Picture mode: Day (Normal)
- Contrast: 95%
- Brightness: 55%
- Color: 59%
- Tint: 0 (neutral)
- Sharpness: 56%
- Color Temperature: High
- Black Enhancement: High
- Contrast Mode: Dynamic
- Noise Reduction: Off
- MPEG - NR: Off
- Auto Movie Mode: Off
- Black Side Panel: Off

-Setup --> Screen Saver --> Image Power: Max

Some people express a lot of concern about image retention (ghosting or burn-in) on plasmas, and while that was actually a real issue in plasmas manufactured several years ago, most plasmas made after 2007 have measures to prevent it. In fact, this Hitachi is so effective at removing any image retention that I've never noticed it in the nine months I've owned my Hitachi, even after freezing on an image for an extended period of time. If by some chance you do end up with IR, the "wipe" function in the Screen Saver submenu of the Setup menu should take care of it.

In summary, I'm quite satisfied with my purchase and I've not seen anything within $150 of what I paid for my Hitachi that will compare.

I got in on the Sears deal as well, very nice tv for the money I feel and has a good picture.