Help needed deciding which HDTV to get. (1 Viewer)

[Andrey_Sea]

Hi,
This is my first post and sorry it is a little long, but I have a lot of questions .
I have been reading quite a bit here for the past couple days, but am still really confused about which equipment to buy.
My setup so far:
19 by 13 feet room
Viewing distance is mostly 9-10 feet from the set, but can be as far as 14 feet.
Another restriction is the door which is only 29" and on the second floor, so things like Samsung HCL652WX 65-Inch will not fit through it ( Samsung Dimensions: 59 3/4(W) x 62 1/2(H) x 32(D) ).
My budget is initially set at $3,000, but can stretch a little if there is a really good reason for it. My wife will appreciate it to be closer to $2,200 though, and I don't think she likes the idea of a front projector, too small of a box and not sexy enough for that kind of money.
We are mainly watching DVD disks from Netflix and don't watch any TV really, which may change when there is more HDTV programming available.
So far I like the following TVs:
Sony KP57HW40 57 inch
Toshiba 57HX81 57 inch
Mitsubishi WS-55819 55 inch
Pioneer SD533HD5 53 inch
Other considerations (in order of importance):
Bigger screen is better.
Would like it to last at least 5 or more years.
Picture quality matters.
I like the look of Sony and Pioneer the best.
Additional Questions:
Since I will mostly be watching DVD how critical are features such as component video and progressive scan on a DVD player? Should I upgrade my DVD player since it only has SVHS as its highest quality Video output? If I should upgrade it, then which DVD player would you suggest?
I was thinking of buying the TV at local Magnolia HiFi store and getting a warranty which comes with their setup. Do you think it will be sufficient for a good picture? I like playing around with electronics and computers but would like to avoid opening the tv box, is there anything I can do myself to tweak the set I buy?
My current setup is good in terms of Audio, but is really out of date in terms of video.
Audio:
Receiver - Pioneer D509S
Speakers Front - AR S50s
http://www.acoustic-research.com/s50_content.asp
Center - AR SC2
Rear - AR S20s
Video:
Sony 27"
Panasonic A115 DVD (NO COMPONENT video outputs, only SVHS)

 

[David-T]

I ended up purchasing a Mitsubishi WS-55909 a month ago, not realizing that it was going to cost us a lot more to get the picture the way I like it. You need to watch the sale ploy of feeding the best picture to HD television. I ended up chewing out the sale person out that sold us the set. As far as a HD broadcast it looks fantastic. I ended up hooking my old Sony DVD player to our regular television in our bedroom, because I did not like the jagged edges and all the other artifacts that it created on the WS-55909. I ended up purchasing a Marantz DV6200 Progressive Scan DVD player for about $500.00, which does a pretty good job, but if you can swing it in my opinion I would purchase a Progressive Scan DVD player that contains either the Silicon Image or Faroudja chip set, since they do a pretty good job of converting interlace to a progressive. I also ended up purchasing an external line doubler since I did not like how the Mitsubishi internal line doubler worked on regular satellite broadcast. I ended up buying another Mitsubishi television, because of two reason – 1) The guarantee of upgradability and 2) our old Mitsubishi was 15 years old and is still working when we sold it to our neighbors.

 

[David-T]

I should have also mention that progressive scan and component video will also be better than what you are currently using. Just hook up your current DVD player to the HD set when you purchase it and see if you can borrow a progessive scan dvd player to compare the two. On a progressive scan dvd player you will have to hook up the dvd player to the component video in order to get a progessive output, if I am not mistaken.

 

[Roger DW]

Pioneer SD-532HD5 rocks- 480i, 480p, 1080i. RGB input plus 2 component inputs (and many other non-HDTV inputs). I have the DTC100 DirecTV HD receiver hooked up to the RGB and a Pioneer progressive scan DV-434 to a component input. Still have a component input free for ATI video card coming out soon with HDTV-out. No problem using 72-point convergence, image looks perfect and great.