<p>We are treating ourselves with a smart tv for Christmas This is the one we are getting. Panasonic - VIERA - 42" Class - LED - 1080p - 120Hz - Smart - HDTV We have wifi in our home for our laptops, so I don’t think I need the hdmi cable…or do I? I have gotten two answers from the customer service reps and I am trying to just order online today. Thought I would get the best advice for the wise people here. Thanks…any other suggestions or advice appreciated as well.</p>
<p>If you’re hooking up a cable box you’ll need a hdmi cable- or any other box for that matter. I bought a couple from amazon at a very low price when we recently bought our new tv.</p>
<p>The HDMI connects the tuner box - or tivo - to the TV. You can also use hdmi to connect a blu-ray player and one of the newer generation receivers if you want to send the sound to stereo speakers.</p>
<p>Ditto what the others said - assuming this’ll connect to a cable box, uverse box, or Satellite box as the source of programming, that’ll typically be done via an HDMI cable although some of the cable, etc. boxes, particularly older ones, don’t have an HDMI output on them so make sure you check on that. If the cable box doesn’t have an HDMI output you should check with your cable company and try to get a newer box that has it so you don’t compromise your new HD TV with an old cable box.</p>
<p>If you’re planning to use this TV only for internet viewing, or only for over the air antenna viewing, or a combo of both of those, and not connect it to cable/uverse/satellite, and if you don’t plan to connect a DVD player, gaming system, etc. to it, then you probably don’t need an HDMI cable.</p>
<p>If possible due to its location, and if the TV supports it, you may want to connect it physically to your wireless router with an ethernet cable rather than rely on the wireless connection since sometimes the wireless connection isn’t as robust.</p>
<p>You can get HDMI cables pretty inexpensively from Amazon and some other places. Don’t buy one from ‘Monster’ as they’re ridiculously overpriced and don’t perform any better than much less expensive ones.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies…seems like we’re on the right track. Just going to try to live without cable, since there are so many internets options that are free, plus use our amazon prime.</p>
<p>Also, could someone tell me if we need a new dvd player to go with it? </p>
<p>Don’t really want a blu ray player since we have a large dvd collection that we would like to utilize. Our current dvd player is pretty old, it even has a vcr included on one side. </p>
<p>If we do need one, could someone please tell me what I should look for? Thanks</p>
<p>You do not NEED a new DVD player, but you would probably enjoy the improved visual quality that a Blu-Ray player will provide. Please note that a Blu-Ray player will still play your DVD’s, but given an HDMI cable and a Blu-Ray disc it will also provide the full 1080p resolution you paid for - I think standard DVD is only 720p.</p>
<p>As far as features, I have yet to find any that are really worthwhile, depending on the rest of your home theater set-up. I would avoid Sony, as they tend to be slow, and would avoid anything Wal-Mart sells, as it will be a 2-year old design assembled by the cheapest possible workers and packaged in a new case. Otherwise, whatever has an HDMI (which should be all of them).</p>
<p>I don’t think much matters about blu-ray. Most of the money goes into extra features you won’t use like which internet services it connects to. Ever heard of Vudu? You can get netflix through your blu-ray player - but you can get it through just about anything including your smart tv so why bother? </p>
<p>The blu-ray reviews notice differences in picture that you won’t care about and which only show up if you’re watching movies that are really well transferred or made for blu-ray. </p>
<p>An advantage of blu-ray is it tends to up-sample dvd’s so they look somewhat better.</p>
<p>Good players can be had for under $100 now. Don’t know any models because they keep changing.</p>
<p>
Size matters - go bigger if you can, you won’t regret it. ;)</p>
<p>You should get a Blu-Ray player. </p>
<p>Now that you have an HD TV you’ll get used to good resolution and demand it - i.e. you get used to it and going back to lower res is a let down.</p>
<p>You can still play your old DVDs in the Blu-Ray player so they’re still of value but any new DVDs you might buy you can get the hi-res Blu-Ray ones. Additionally, most Blu-Ray players ‘upscale’ the resolution meaning that when it plays your non-hi-res DVDs it essentially increases their resolution by extrapolating between the lines and providing that additional missing info with the net effect that the old DVD will look better on the Blu-Ray player than on the non Blu-Ray player.</p>
<p>On top of that, Blu-Ray players are pretty cheap now so why not? I suggest getting a brand name unit (Panasonic, Sony, LG, Samsung, etc.) and make sure it’s one that does upscaling. You might even want to get a ‘smart’ one that does streaming if it streams some content your smart TV doesn’t stream - i.e. maybe get a different brand than your TV and see if there’s some different content. There’ll be overlapping content, like Netflix and Huluplus, which they all seem to have, but some content may be different and since you’re planning on mostly using streaming content additional content might be appealing.</p>
<p>You’ll need an HDMI cable to connect your new Blu-Ray player to the TV.</p>
<p>I agree with the above poster - if you haven’t already bought the TV and can swing it, bigger is better.</p>
<p>The other consideration is surround sound. You might to consider that at some point so you can have explosions and birds singing behind you.</p>
<p>If you are looking at size, an important thing to consider is the size of the bezel around the picture. We had a 42" TV and were very happy with it but the panel started going nuts this summer and we replaced it. We found many of the newer models have such small bezels that a 47" TV was shorter and less than an inch wider than the 42" we had. We bought an LG and are happy with it, but I don’t have any real preferences about brands.</p>
<p>Thanks…I have learned so much the past few days. Who knew buying a tv was so hard…it use to be only a decision on size! </p>
<p>Speaking of…I think my husband might have talked to you all about size…he would like bigger, but for the size of the room, not sure we can swing it…</p>
<p>I have found a blu ray on amazon that looks good and it’s so good to know that our dvds will play on it. </p>
<p>As I understand, we will download apps to the tv to be able to watch amazon, netflix, and listen to pandora. The only ? I have now is…will we be able to watch live streaming news from our local news station? Or will I need a cable to attach my laptop to the tv for it to be able to play? I looked at their website and they don’t have an app. Will I be able to surf on the tv to find it?</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>For your local stations you s/b able to receive them over the air with an antenna unless you live in an area with poor reception. You can even receive the broadcasts in HD and it’s free (other than suffering through commercials). Plan on connecting an antenna to your TV for this - just like the old days.</p>
<p>You probably won’t be able to get streaming from a local station on your TV via the internet but that depends on the TV. If you want to get content via your laptop and play it on the TV you can do that. First check to see if your laptop has an HDMI jack to connect to the TV. Some do and some don’t. Of course, you’ll also need a corresponding HDMI cable for it. Before worrying about this just get the TV, the Blu-Ray if you’re planning on that, an antenna, and see what you end up with for content.</p>
<p>If you get a smart DVD player to supplement your smart TV, consider getting a different brand. I have an LG TV and a Samsung blu-ray. The content and Internet apps are non-overlapping–although both have the same basics, e.g., Netflix, Hulu, etc.</p>
<p>For sports fans, the problem is that even if you have an antenna, some events are cable-only. One of these years a company like Google or Apple–with billions of cash lying around–will do something like bid for the Olympics or the NFL, and put it on the Internet. That will be, so to speak, a real game changer.</p>
<p>If you want to further enhance your cut-the-cable experience, you might even consider getting a computer to connect to your TV, which aside from allowing you to do computer stuff on your TV, will also allow you to stream some content not supported by most smart TVs or DVD players–e.g., flash content. Plus you can play your PC games. </p>
<p>There are even computers, “rack mounted” or “living room”-- they’re sometimes called, that have a physical profile similar to a DVD player, making them easy to fit into entertainment furniture. For example, about $500, [Acer</a> Aspire Revo RL100 reimagines living room PC | Crave - CNET](<a href=“http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20070811-1/acer-aspire-revo-rl100-reimagines-living-room-pc/]Acer”>Acer Aspire Revo RL100 reimagines living room PC - CNET)</p>
<p>By getting a computer with a built-in blu-ray you would cut down on space requirements and defray some of the costs of the computer.</p>
<p>We just replaced our 15 year old big butted tv and giant armoire with a sleek Smart 42" Lg and a pretty, space saving console. My H and I are still figuring out all that it offers but we love it so far. We were told we needed a blue ray with this for some reason so we bought a samsung for 99 dollars.</p>
<p>I ordered a free trial of netflix last night and started enjoying it right away. Using the internet was fun, too.</p>
<p>The LG is kind of cool with their Wii-like remote control that senses where you’re pointing it. This helps for ‘typing’ on the TV and some other remote control functions. The LG has a great picture as well.</p>
<p>The LG is great but it’s annoying you need the wave-around remote to select certain things. Lose that thing, break it, etc. and you have a problem. They should have a way to do things with a regular remote.</p>
<p>I wonder if a wireless keyboard works.</p>
<p>With the LG, you can do anything with the regular remote as you can do with the magic remote.</p>
<p>Additionally, there is also an LG remote app for IOS–iPhone or ipad–which allows you to do anything either of the remotes that come with the TV will do. The iPhone/iPad app also has a touchpad that allows you to move a cursor around just like the magic remote.</p>
<p>With the lg remote app plus the Comcast xfinity app, my iPhone approaches being a universal remote for my entertainment center. </p>
<p>There are also apps for other brands, Samsung, for example.</p>
<p>And, although I’ve been thinking about attaching a computer to my TV, I just found out there are boxes for under $100 that will run the latest Android OS, and output HD to an HDMI input. Some are as small as a thumb drive. (Google XBMC) This one, for $88 has built in wifi, so you can connect a wireless keyboard. Using the browser you can stream, do cloud based word processing, and run any Android app on your TV. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.amazon.com/G-Box-Midnight-Android-Box-Streaming/dp/B009BWC3J4/ref=sr_1_33?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1355091883&sr=1-33&keywords=htpc[/url]”>http://www.amazon.com/G-Box-Midnight-Android-Box-Streaming/dp/B009BWC3J4/ref=sr_1_33?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1355091883&sr=1-33&keywords=htpc</a></p>