The TV has Arrived!!

We’re halfway there, at least for the moment! I was going to hold off on posting the results until both items arrived, but thanks to a certain party who has somehow found my blog I feel somehow obligated to add something here in the interim.

The TV has finally arrived, and it is really nice. I’m especially pleased by the way the screen handles light sources from behind and beside the seating area. No matter what kind of lighting situation I have tried to throw at it, we could always see a beautiful clear picture. Because the JVC is such a hulking dark monolith when turned off, we are looking for some way of obscuring the black hole when not in use. My wife wants to find some type of cabinet or hutch we can encapsulate it in, which I don’t mind the idea of either. We paid a few extra dollars up front for the (still not delivered) TV stand so that we wouldn’t have to pay any penalty (restocking fee or shipping) if we decided we didn’t want it. I really want this stand though, as I think it will look really good under this TV, and I don’t want to wait any longer than I have to. I’ve got the left, center, and right speakers sitting on the floor waiting to be installed over the TV, and getting a different TV stand means the vertical center of the TV may change such that the speakers will [gasp!] look poorly placed.

I had a moment of inspiration this afternoon when I realized that we could use a pair of curtains to close away the entertainment system. They would be of the type that attaches to the ceiling like they use in hospitals to divide rooms. I think they would look really good, but the wife still has to be convinced. Other areas where these curtains would be advantageous are sound absorption (the TV’s cooling fan is easily audible during quiet moments) and wire management (to conceal the wires for the speakers overhead).

I’m off to look for some alternative cabinets. Later!!

TV and Stand Day Approacheth!

The next phase is on the way! We ordered the JVC HD-61FH96 TV, along with an interesting TV Stand from South Shore Furniture. Before these arrive I will need to figure out how I will be attaching the front speakers to the wall, so that I won’t need to worry about it once the TV finds its final resting place.

All we need after this will be a Series 3 Tivo! While we wait for that, I will be trying to find out if Comcast has a DVR with more hard disk space that I can swap for. I’d like to be able to start recording our favorite shows in HD, and then enjoy the high resolution goodness on the new TV. Right now I have a hard time justifying that as we can only record about 12 hours of HD material, and we usually have the hard disk about 60% full. That leaves us somewhere around 4.5 hours of room for HD shows. We come close to recording that much at least 3 nights a week, and usually don’t watch it all until a few days later. Definitely need more room.