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Are DVDs HD?
DVDs have a resolution of 852x480. If you read the section above, it’s obvious that DVD resolution is not high definition. DVDs are a progressive scan format, so all of that pixel information is painted on the screen in one pass. That is why DVDs look great no matter how fast the action is. DVD resolution is often referred to as Enhanced Definition TV (EDTV). A lot of cheaper flat panel TVs have a resolution of 852x480. This means they can perfectly display all of the pixels of a DVD, but not an HDTV signal in all of its glory because they don’t have the resolution to display it.

Types of high definition televisions
Now that you know what the heck HDTV is, now it’s time to talk about what’s really important – what kind of TVs you can buy to sit in your living room. You can buy HDTVs that are fat, thin, or in-between. They range in price from under $700 to over $75,000. The following describes the types of HDTVs and their advantages and disadvantages.

Note: HDTVs are often labeled as HD-ready. All that this means is that the TV is capable of displaying HD content, but it doesn't have an HD tuner. If you just want to watch over-the-air HD programming, you would need to buy a separate tuner to decode the HD signals. If you are going to receive your HD content from your cable or satellite provider, their boxes have the HD tuner built-in, so you don't need a separate tuner.

Direct-view CRT
These TVs use the same technology as all of your old TVs except they are capable of displaying much higher resolution video like HDTV. Direct-view CRTs have the best picture, color, and viewing angle of all HDTVs. The only problem is that they are deep and heavy and only get up to around 34” in the widescreen version, and up to around 40” in 4:3 format. An HDTV in the old 4:3 format is great if most of your TV viewing is still broadcast in the standard format. A widescreen HDTV signal will still look great on a 4:3 set, but there will be black bars above and below the picture.

Despite the emergence of flat panel TVs, direct-view CRTs are far from dead. TV manufacturers are finding ways to make them thinner, lighter, and in bigger sizes. This is a great thing, because even the newest flat panels cannot approach the picture quality of a CRT.
Upside: Excellent picture and wide viewing angles
Downside: Big and heavy

Rear Projection
There are actually four different types of rear projection HDTVs: CRT, DLP, LCD, and LcoS. Each type has advantages and disadvantages, but they all share one characteristic – periodic replacement of the lamp that illuminates the screen is required. This might only be required every 5 years, but it depends on your viewing habits.

A CRT rear projection HDTV looks a lot like the rear projection TVs of the eighties and early nineties. They are big and boxy and kind of dominate the room they are in. The best thing about these TVs is that they are quite inexpensive as HDTVs go – around $1000. They also have the best picture quality of all rear projectors when setup properly. The downsides to CRTs is that they are huge, need periodic maintenance to calibrate the electron guns, and the lamp that illuminates the screen needs to be replaced every four to five years.
Upside: Sharp picture when calibrated, affordable, very large screen sizes
Downside: Huge size, bad vertical and horizontal viewing angles, needs to be calibrated, lamp replacement

Digital Light Projection (DLP) TVs are an engineering marvel. The picture on a DLP TV is produced by shining a bright light on a special microchip that has over a million tiny mirrors that reflect the light through a spinning color wheel. DLP TVs are much thinner and lighter than a rear projection CRT. Most are only 12-20” deep. They also tend to have thin bezels around the screen that gives them a clean look. When sitting on a table, DLPs look a lot like the sexier plasma and LCD flat panels. DLPs are known for very good black-level performance. A small percentage of the population can actually see the aforementioned spinning color wheel, which causes a rainbow effect that can be distracting.
Upside: No calibration required for sharp picture, large screen sizes, very thin
Downside: Expensive, rainbow effects for some people, lamp replacement

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