The Change Mariner

Changing Face of TV Sets: More Options, More Compact

NYT:

... While the average TV set lasts about 11 years, families typically buy a new set every three or four years, industry officials say. Over all, Americans are expected to buy 30 million televisions this year, at a rough average of $400 each.

"Let's face it, the big-screen TV is the fireplace, the hearth of family in our society," said Andrew Shulklapper, senior buyer for televisions at Circuit City, one of the biggest electronics retailers.

For all of the technical mumbo jumbo, the two most important changes in the television market are quite simple. In image quality, big-screen televisions (those with screens larger than 36 inches, measured diagonally) are no longer markedly inferior to smaller ones. Perhaps more important, a big-screen television no longer has to be a behemoth in the corner.

That change in overall size extends far beyond the expensive flat-panel sets, which are mere inches thick and use either a liquid-crystal display (L.C.D.) or plasma technology. While an analog rear-projection set with a 50-inch screen might weigh more than 200 pounds and be almost three feet deep, digital projection sets might pack the same screen size into a unit weighing less than 80 pounds and measuring barely 18 inches deep. Moreover, the digital projection set will probably cost thousands of dollars less than a flat-panel display.

Many electronics experts agree that the thinning of the television has wrought a striking change in the way families shop for TV's. Suddenly, they say, women who might have objected to their husband's or boyfriend's big-screen fantasies are softening their objections.

"Now, the consumer purchase process has evolved simply from a male-centric decision process to one that is being driven equally if not more by the female, given that you can now integrate the TV into the room as art, rather than the big black box," said Tim E. Baxter, senior vice president for marketing at Sony Electronics' consumer division. "Now I am giving back an entire corner of the room that was dedicated to the TV."

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