What’s It Going To Take To Get You Into This New LCD TV?

December 17th, 2006 Davis Posted in Technology, Movies, TV |

It used to be that if you wanted to make the worst possible consumer “investment”, you’d buy a new car and drive it off the lot. While it might give you that new car smell, the first mile you drove would pretty much cost you somewhere between 20 - 30% in resell value. This hasn’t really changed all that much, but there does seem to be at least one consumer purchase that’s turned out to be an even worse investment then a new car. The big screen TV.

Pretty much the minute you buy a new TV it starts to depreciate and it looks like 2007 isn’t going to put a stop to this trend. According to research firms DisplaySearch, iSuppli and Displaybank, they expect prices to continue to fall somewhere between 30 - 40% next year.

It seems like just a few years ago we were arguing about which was better the LCD or the Plasma, but with prices on the LCD’s continuing to fall to basement levels and with screen sizes continuing to increase, it appears that the market has found a clear winner with the LCD for this format war.

Analyst’s are now predicting that the 70 inch flat screen LCD may become the norm in the near future and with more price cuts in store, consumers may be better off by waiting to make their next big screen TV purchase for these new price points to emerge.

A few years back, I purchased a 60″ Sony Wega for my own entertainment needs and while the set itself has provided an enormous amount of pleasure, if I would have waited just 2 years, it would have knocked $1,400 off of my purchase price. With the resell value on my TV being about half of what I paid for it, I’ve lost about 25% a year on my entertainment investment. This isn’t to suggest that I have any regrets, nor is it to suggest that you approach an entertainment purchase in the same way that you would an investment purchase, but it is worth considering before you plop down a couple grand on the centerpiece of your home theater system. I’ve gotten a lot of use out of my TV and I still love it, but you can bet that as soon as the new 70″ flat screen LCDs become affordable that I’ll be selling my Wega on Craigslist and looking to trade up for a larger flat screen.

To a certain extent, it does sting a little bit to think of how much I’ve blown on a television, but at the same time I’m thrilled to see prices continue to fall. The more affordable these TVs become, the more that we’ll see advancements in HDTV technology. While the price cuts may impact the resell value of my own TV, I’m happy to see consumers benefit from the price competition and the efficiencies that are continuing to work themselves through the home entertainment market.