THis is all you need.

http://www.plasmahouse.com/PANASONIC-TH-50...TH50PHD8UK.HTML

Youll need external speakers though, as this is just a monitor.

*edit* Posted too late.

 

My $.02 is that if you're going to spend the money for one of these large sets, you probably plan on keeping it for a number of years. Even though at the moment 720 might be perfectly fine for the application you're choosing, 1080 will most certainly be the standard by the time you're halfway through the set's lifespan.

 

well, 1080p probably won't because spectrum is just too expensive. You'll probably never see a 1080p broadcast because it requires double the spectrum.

the only way you'll see 1080p is if they decide to ditch MPEG2 in favor of VC-1 or H.264. Problem is that would make it incompatible with current HDTV tuners.

 

More awesome input, I'm glad I bought the Sammy, and can't wait for it to be delivered on Saturday.

Do you guys have a preference on Home Theatre? I'd really like to buy Samsung in order to keep everything looking the same, but I'm open to ideas, and any input would be greatly appreciated.

 

go to avsforum.com, head to the speaker forum in audio area, look at some threads for moderately priced speakers, and try to go listen to them in a store. home theater in a box systems are generally poor. They are sold for little money and the speakers suffer as a result. Stay away from bose at all costs.. so over priced its a joke.. I would expect to pay ~$200 for a nice receiver, and $400 for some decent speakers at LEAST (check out Athena Micra-6 on amazon if you just want a decent packaged speaker setup). This is the lowest I would go.. below this price I wouldn't even bother. I spent $873 on my latest HT setup including discontinued speakers at over 50% off (msrp on the products a year before I purchased was about $1750).. and it still is nothing special. You get what you pay for with speakers more than anything.. bose excluded

 

yea, avoid bose. they sound "nice" because bose decides to amplify certain frequencies and ditch others, making the sound everything but "true to life". Oh, and the components suck. Paper speakers for over $1K? They're kidding, right?

I have a nice Technics receiver with an external surround processor (I think it was the first DTS receiver sold actually) and I love the sound. All in all it was $600 but today it would be less. I have JBL Northridge series speakers all around (that's their mid-range series I think, Studio being better). Center is dual 5", mains 8", and surrounds 4", all with titanium dome tweeters. Sub is 10" with 150W. All in all, the speakers were about $1K, and that was with buying discontinued mains on ebay. You can get good ones for less, though. JBL has a decent package for like $600, sub included.

And, yea, avoid HTIB (home theater in a box) systems. Generally, everything sucks in them. You can get speaker packages, but avoid receiver/speaker packages.