A budget-friendly system for a small room
Small space, small budget — that was the challenge facing me. No longer satisfied with the modest 13" CRT (tube) TV in our library/guest room, I wanted to replace it with something better. I wanted an A/V system that would show broadcast and cable TV channels, as well as DVD movies, with the best sound and picture possible. It had to fit in a 24" by 27" area, but our finances dictated that it had to cost no more than $1,000!


For some, the simple solution would have been to add a DVD player to the TV already in the room. Our library's TV was so old it only had an RF input, which meant anything I hooked up to it would be limited to the low-resolution images an RF coaxial cable could transmit. The TV also had a picture tube that was beginning to deteriorate. Rather than adding a DVD player now, and waiting to replace the TV, I preferred to upgrade to a brand new system.

Choosing a TV
I knew that the biggest part of our budget would be spent on the TV. Although there are still bargains to be had with small CRTs, there's a tradeoff in limitations. Most of the CRTs I looked at with a screen size under 20" had only an RF input and a composite video connection. Composite video cables combine all the video information being sent by the DVD player to the TV and send it over a single cable. Since some data is lost in the process, composite video cable delivers a good image, but not as good as more sophisticated connections such as S-video (which sends the brightness and color information separately, and thereby can include more of the source information) or component (which further increases the amount of information sent by separating out the color data into two discrete streams in addition to brightness).

Component video connections were the ones I really wanted, as they are the only ones to deliver enough information to take advantage of the progressive-scan feature found on most DVD players. Progressive-scan displays an entire frame of video at one time (instead of splitting it into two interwoven parts). The number of frames per second is doubled, resulting in a smoother image flow, with crisper detail.

I looked at some CRT TV/DVD combos. Most had outputs to external speakers, making it possible for me to get a better sound by running the audio through a receiver. None of the combos had progressive-scan, though, so I wouldn't be able to get the best possible picture quality from my DVDs.

Clearly, the small, relatively inexpensive CRT sets and combo units weren't going to work for me. I needed to check out other kinds of televisions. Of the three newer technologies, plasma and DLP screens were way too big; only LCD panels came in sizes small enough for the space available, and priced within my budget.

The Sharp LC-15S2U AQUOS TV with side mounted speakers was the best fit for our available space.

The Sharp LC-15S2U 15" AQUOS LCD TV
At around $750 I found what I was looking for with the Sharp LC-15S2U AQUOS TV. The 15" LCD TV had component video inputs, and could display progressive-scan images. There was still a small trade-off; the TV had a 4:3 aspect ratio (like traditional TVs) as opposed to a 16:9 aspect ratio (a better fit for widescreen movies). Still, it was light (about 8 lbs.), compact, and gave me a lot of options. I could either use the stereo speakers built into the sides of the TV (which had a pretty good sound) or run audio feeds to a receiver and speaker system for even better sound.