LCD TV - Are they reliable ?

Trust me Soix if you used your display for other than watching television. As a PC monitor or game display...you'd quickly realize why some use LCD. You'd have image retention all over the screen. Don't get me wrong ..I still love my plasma, but the LCDs do have their advantages as well.

If I stuck a good LCD in that bright room..you'd also realize how dim a plasma can be in certain areas.

The other advantage is noise. I've never heard one LCD buzz...I've heard many plasmas do it.

Good points Gmood -- wasn't thinking about PC/gaming. As with most things audio/video there are always trade-offs.

A related point, it's amazing that almost every non-videophile's house I go to has their HDTV's contrast/brightness/color levels cranked up to eye-piercing levels. And they think their pictures look "great" because they're so bright. When I make a few adjustments to make the picture look somewhat natural and give it some depth they think it looks horrible. Given that, it's probably good that many people are opting for LCD rather than cutting the useful life of a plasma in half. Much cheaper to change a bulb in the long run I would guess.

I believe in 'infant mortality'....that electronics are far more likely to break during 'break in' than later.
Most stuff has a very hi MTBF and is reliable. I therefore NEVER buy an extended warranty, knowing that it is likely to break during warranty and be good for a good while if it survives.
I had a hi-end CD player purchased new...DOA and no extended warranty.
Need an Example? Bryston uses premium parts and build, have a 20 year (gasp!) warranty and do an extensive factory burn-in....weeding out all the defects B4 shipping

I normally don't buy them either. I did for my Hitachi 60" LCD rear projection and it has paid for itself with a new light engine and a bulb replacement. I plan to get another bulb replaced before the warranty expires.

Plasmas run hotter(stick your hand behind some models and it seems they can melt the paint off the wall it is “Plasma” in that TV remember being heated)

Weight is about double(for example my 52” without stand is about 53 lbs vs. 110 for a comparable plasma)

Seems most plasmas Pull about double the power and actually are about equal to a 1990 36 inch 300 lb CRT!

And yes they can and still do”burn in”(some models better than others), and they do break just as easy as anything else...

Plasmas are glass by the way and can crack as well pretty easily if a corner is dropped during installing on the wall etc...

For the simple fact people seem to inflate any one issue by 10 to make one seem superior to the other, generally a plasma is rated between about 18,000 and 20,000 hours from a chart I saw on a tech site, and a single LCD bulb is rated for about 25,000 to 30,000 either one should last with normal use from 20 to 27 years at somewhere in the 4 hour per day range..

Most will use it for 6 hours on a Saturday and 1 or 2 hours a day during the week so you do the math... I mean people with 1979 color TVS still have them working today.

Also a 300 dollar LCD bulb if it does pre-maturely go in 5 years is still far cheaper than replacing a whole plasma grid for 1000 plus.. Most people don't hear about the plasma problems because they don't end up fixing them and just throwing away and replacing them, but they do instead hear of the extra LCD bulb replaced once in a while!

Which by the way probably has more to do with something just like getting a Light bulb at your hardware store and 4 in the box 3 will last the full rated life, and that one single might burn out pre-maturely do to manufacturing or quality issues.

Simply stated with the technology today decide what you want, they all end up about the same, if one brand has an issue its probably more or less due to something they are doing in the manufacturing so stay away if that brand has a history of course, but not this is not necessarily inherent to the actual design of being a plasma or LCD///

As for picture quality and features, no doubt 5 years ago Plasma had an edge, that gap has been closed to nearly non-existent today, I have seen new LCD’s with like 30,000 to 1 contrast with incredibly deep darks, and yes will work in lighted rooms where the plasma counterpart will not.. Final note LCD with any video games is still obviously a safer bet.

I believe even Pioneer(not 100% sure) earlier this year sees the issue with plasma technology vs. the competition now and did stop along with Sony making Plasmas and went to 100% LCD future models..

And by the way I work in a company with about 1000 computers, we replaced all the screens with LCD panels, this was 6 years ago.. None have failed or turned funny colors and they are on generally for 24 hours a day... We just put in ORDER boards that are 50 " plasmas 3 years ago, every single one of them GHOST and have color burn issues, and a few have already been replaced.

One other thing, I believe LCD has been around for about 30 years or more.. Many aircraft displays for instruments, calculators, Rugged military useage, and several other devices have been in consumer use for years without failure, plasma hit the scene about 1997 with the 30,000 dollar 50"… I don't think you see to many portable plasma screens running around do you? Battery power alone would not even run them, nor do we need them too, and a couple small shocks to the plasma screen and its done.. LCD seems much more durable, look at a laptop, I have one 10 years old same LCD screen, and one that’s 1 month old, same LCD screen.. They have been trusted for many many years.