Cheap HD television

Home: What can you expect to pay?

While there used to be a premium paid for a television set with HD ready status, by the beginning of 2009 virtually every television was HD ready. No premium need be paid, and therefore the television with the cheapest price is now the cheapest HD TV. The only exception is travel companion and handheld portable televisions. Few of these sets are currently HD ready.

The lowest price you can expect to pay for the following technology types is,

LCD - Around £100. 15 inches in size. Resolution 1280x800.
Plasma - Around £500. 42 inches in size. Resolution 1024x768.
LED - Around £900. 32 inches in size. Resolution 1920x1080.

LCD and plasma display types currently dominate the market place. With LCD easily the winner, with the amount of models on sale, at a ratio of around 6:1 versus plasma.

The new kid on the block is LED. Technologically superior to LCD, it provides a thinner design, and with a higher and clearer resolution rate. LEDs will also reduce your electricity bill versus the other tech types and is therefore a greener television. Lowering your personal environmental damage, reports have suggested that LED uses in the region of forty percent less energy than LCD.

Presently LEDs do not come cheap. You are paying the same premium for this new technology, as it was required when plasma was released in the early 2000's. You are typically paying double the price of a similar sized and spec'd LCD or plasma screen. Judging from the price history of LCD or plasma screen, I would predict LEDs to become affordable to every man in 2-4 years time.

Most manufacturers will want to profit from their recent LCD model development, before lowering the cost of LEDs.