LCD TV Recommendations?

[Joe Mendelson]

Hello all -

I am about to purchase my first LCD TV for a new mix room I am bringing on line. Up til now, I have been all CRT, all the time in my other rooms. This new room is just too small, thus the need for the flat panel. I would prefer LCD due to the lighter weight, but would consider plasma if it meets the following criteria:

1. Looking for the model with the best looking SD video. Most of these tv's, both the LCD's and plasmas, do a pretty crappy job of displaying SD. Like, for example, the fancy 50" Panasonic plasma I have at home. So if anyone has found a particular model to be particularly adept at this still-critical function, please advise.

2. I like the speakers on the side, rather than on the bottom. I do lots of listening through the TV's speakers when I mix (for TV), and I would prefer the (minimal) stereo spread of having them on the side of the screen, not the bottom. This style of speaker placement seems to have..gone out of style on the newer models, so I may have to live without this, but it would be nice.

3. Smallest amount of video signal delay. Last time I ventured into this world was about 2 years ago. I bought a very big rear-projection DLP set that clients loved, but it had about a 4 frame delay. Not Good. I know all these 'HD', 16x9 sets have some amount of delay. But in this case, less would definitely be more. I will be sending component signal from a mojo, which allows for whole frame offsets (when using non-quicktime, avid video). So it would be nice if the amount of delay, when sync-checked, was an even frame number amount!

Any recommendations?