Hi everyone
I,m thinking of treating hubby to a new telly for christmas
the question is do I really need to we have a telly with a freeview box at the moment ,When everyone turns digital  I don,t know if it will still work or not or if existing dvd player will work
If I buy one of the tvs with combined freeview and dvd recorder will I have to change to a digital ariel as well.
So many questions I hope someone has answers I.m totally technically confused by it all
Help

Hiya, it's so confusing isn't it, dunno why it can't stay as it is, LOL  Anyway i'll try and explain it as i understand it :-)

If you have a tv and a freeview box now, well that'll still work when the change over happens (as long as the box works ok with your aerial now)  At the moment you can watch your tv without switching the freeview box on if you wish but when the change over happens the analogue signal an ordinary tv uses won't be available.

If you buy a combined tv/dvd/freeview box and it's going to be connected to your existing aerial (which sounds as if it works with freeview already) then this should work as well.

I'm thinking that your existing dvd player will work as well.

Paula :-)

Thanks Paula for your reply I,m going on a foray to find out about them all this week.
I must be starting to think about christmas at last can,t put it of forever can we.

The only difference for most people is that you won't get the 5 channels you should currently get from your normal aerial (council Telly as it has become known in our neck of the woods :D ). If you have a normal 'analogue' TV you will need to attach a digibox or Sky box to get digital TV. Your DVD and video will work perfectly well with the old tv but you won't be able to record one channel and watch another at the same time. I think this is the same on digital tv but not sure. If you don't get freeview in your area you can get a freesat card if you pay for a Sky box but it doesn't give as many free channels as Freeview.

If you decide to get a new tv and you buy one that isn't marked with the digital 'tick' then you will still need a freeview box or sky, the ones with the tick have the set top box bit built in but are a wee bit dearer.

I've just bought 3 of these TV's, one to replace our 15 year old main set which was on its last legs, one for my parents and a bedroom one that my parents gave us  money to buy for xmas, I'm sick of looking at them on websites, the argos catalogue has a fairly good guide about what all the features are.  :D

You've explained it loads better than me Dakkobear. 

Know what you mean as well about thinking of Xmas Pavlova, i keep meaning to get myself into gear but i know i'll be rushing round on Xmas Eve telling myself next year will be diffrerent :D

Paula

if you can hold on the OLED tv's will soon be out. Thats Organic light emitting diode display.

Its an electroluminescent and so needs no backlighting. The display depths are as little as 3mm, has a longer life span, less power consumption and a lack of heat. Sony should be first to market the displays of around 11 inches and Toshiba are planning a 30 inch model which might come out next year.

These though are very expensive to produce.

If you wait longer and its going to be a long wait but SED or surface-conduction electron-emitter displays will be available. They are said to have a higher contrast and faster refresh rates  and will a superior picture quality to LCD or Plasma. Developed by Canon and Toshiba.

Also look for the amount of inputs your tv has in the way of scarts, HDMI and so on. You may also wish to plug your computer into your tv and again make sure it has the input to do so.
You also hear alot on HD and the in thing is Full HD which  is 1080p but the difference between 1080i and 1080p is small. You also may also hear the term HDMI 1.3 which is able to supply more colours to your tv but thats a little missleading as dvd's are not coded correctly for this as are current dvd players.
Also keep clear of dvd players with blu-ray and HD. These are still first gen players and rumours are saying that formats might change so the first gen players may not read later developed dvd's. You also have the war from film companies and electronic firms on who will win the battle. However LG do produce a player that reads both.

A little tip is get a TV with a digi tuner built in. They are far better than most seperate boxes. You can buy a seperate tuner and recorder and some have twin tuners so you can watch one and record on the other.
Some TV's also include the use of recording from a SD card which plugs into your TV but the quality of playback is no way near other recordable standards.