Product Description
The Parker House Richmond 65-Inch TV Stand With iPod Dock’s gorgeous French Revival style is an asset to any decor whether contemporary or traditional. A key convenience feature of this TV stand is the iPod docking station in the top of the unit which allows you to keep your iPod charged. This beautiful unit also offers generous compact storage: A top center drawer with a drop-down front allows you to store a stereo and the lower center cabinet is perfect for DVD pl… More >>

Parker House Richmond 65 Inch TV Stand with IPOD Dock

For a big screen home theater, we recommend the 65 inch LCD TV and a powerful sound system for maximum Wow effect. You can get LCD, or you can save some money and get plasma. But plasma requires a darker room for the best picture. So the question is, how do I get my home theater room to be nice and dark like the movie theater?

You can buy room darkening drapes that work well from Walmart. A consumer reviewer said “I have these room darkening drapes in my room because my husband works nights frequently and he needs complete darkness. I also use these in my kids rooms so they’ll sleep when it’s daylight outside (and not wake at 6am…lol).”

The store brand for these is Eclipse brand. There are several types of the Eclipse, and each package says the drapes are room darkening, but results vary. The more decorative drapes do not work as well in keeping the light out. The Eclipse thermaweave (in dark blue and olive green) work great and block the light. “The eclipse thermaweave curtains DO block the 99% of the light as they state. Now the way we do it is we buy one panel per window, then we put thumb tacks all around the curtain and tack it up around the outside of the window. We use our curtains that match our bedroom suit that we use over these curtains because they aren’t very decorative looking. But I can fully say we have zero light that comes into any of our bedrooms when you tack it up.”

So if your big screen is a plasma set, you can use room darkening drapes and get a great picture.

Also you might want darker paint on the walls, to help keep the light dimmer.

The biggest picture and best experience now available from regular stores is the 65 inch LCD TV. But it is large. You might not want a 65 inch LCD TV in your bathroom, for example, unless of course if you live in Vegas.

If your television room cannot accommodate the 65 inch lcd TV, a popular smaller set has been the 52 inch size. 52 inch lcd tv is a great size. But the Samsung website may have a clue to the future of LCD size developments.

The Samsung website can display the current models from new to old, and the newer models on top, if you first click on the “display all” button and then click and click on “Newest” using the arrows next to “Sort by:”. You can see that the manufacturer shows the 55 inch as newest, specifically the LN55B650 55″ 1080p LCD HDTV and the LN55B650 (they have the same suggested retail price of $2,800) then a bunch of 46 inch sets as next newest, then 40 inch sets, and so on, with the 52 inch sets way down lower.

It could be that new 52 inch sets are in the pipeline, but I wonder: Will the 55 inch will get the most attention from the manufacturers and, as a result of efficiency of production, be about the same price and replace the 52?

Even though the 55 inch is new, the price today is not that much greater. A leading retailer has a Samsung 52 for about $1,500 and a more-or-less comparable 55 for about $1,900. Fearless prediction: This $400 or so gap will close. This last weekend, big discount box store had a 55 inch Vizio LCD for $1,150 after a $300 coupon.

If you know about which size models are ascending, you are invited to leave a comment below.