720p or 1080p for HTPC? Plasma or DLP?

[solbergg]

It's finally time for me to purchase an HDTV. I have decided that 50" widescreen is the sweetspot size for my living room. What I haven't decided on is resolution and technology. Since I will be using an HTPC with my setup, the resolution is especially important to me. From an 8-10' viewing distance, would the finer resolution be an advantage for a computer setup, or would it make the text too hard to read? Also, are there any differences related to plasma or DLP technology that would be advantageous to HTPC use?

 

[rwpritchett]

I have a 40" 1080p TV with an HTPC connected to it. The text and icon sizes can be adjusted, regardless of your resolution. The biggest problem you may encounter is if you plan on using the HTPC to view websites. Even though the text size can be increased, the html frame size on some sites don't scale with the text. I think you'd be fine with a 50" screen size, however, so my suggestion is to go 1080p if you can. Of course, you can always run at 720p with a 1080p TV if you feel the need, but the reverse isn't true.

 

[solbergg]

So there aren't any compromises downsampling to 720p? I keep hearing that you should run a display at it's native resolution, but I never hear what the reason is.

 

[cdpage]

I don't have a HTPC set up, but i can tell you that i have a Hitachi Plasma and a Wii. the Hitachi is an ODD resolution 1080x1024. Dumb i know.

Anyhow, reading text from the Wii on the web is rather annoying and i am sure it is because of that. so make sure what ever you get, you have Square pixels.

 

[robert_rcr]

check this it's a bit expensive but this is the best hdtv out there for that size PDP-5020FD