Hi John
More expensive, depends what you call expensive! Our 32" Panasonic WS TV cost us around £1500 in this country, I have done quite a lot of research regarding the prices of TV's in OZ and my opinion is that they are about the same price there as is most things I have researched if you want good quality products, for instance, I was looking at Washing Machines and fridges this morning and after converting found much the same price as UK really, our friends have just come back and say the same, if you shop around of course, like here.

At the end of the day its always down to what YOU are willing to pay.

Gill

JT,
Try the search field and put in "Television" or "Satellite".
Found all sorts of info in previous threads.
(some contradictory)
This one one posting which had a lot of techie stuff:-



22 Apr 2002 09:13

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Re: Will your UK TV work in Australia ? - yes, it might
Hi
As etlniwd suggests, you need to check if your UK TV supports "PAL B/G" instead of the usual PAL I.

It's not just the sound, in some cases you can't get the picture either. Here's the detail:

PAL I, used in the UK, is 625 lines, UHF

PAL G is 625 lines UHF but with a different audio frequency. Most channels in Oz are PAL G, so an older UK TV and even some quite modern ones will only display the picture. A cheap modification can be made to get the sound working in your UK VCR or UK TV by a TV engineer in the know.

PAL B is 625 lines, VHF with the same audio frequency as PAL G. If you move to an area in OZ like Brisbane, (but not the Gold Coast), where some TV channels are VHF, then your standard PAL I UK TV won't get these channels at all, and modification is really out of the question.

If your TV is "multisystem" (Panasonic and Grundig make some), then it should support all of the PAL formats, and also SECAM and NTSC.

Regardless, you can still use your UK TV by connecting to an Australian VCR (available cheaply as low as $199), and connect it to your TV using a/v cables such as Scart, composite or S Video cable, and you quickly get used to having to use two remotes - one for the tv for volume and one for the vcr for the channels. If you get cable, satellite or an Australian games system over here, these will all work fine too as long as you connect using these a/v cables. If you instead tried to connect using the normal ariel lead and tune in, you will not get the sound unless you have had the TV modified.

If however your TV does not have any audio/Video or Scart sockets on the back, i.e. it ONLY has an ariel lead - then I would definitely not recommend bringing it, and it will have zero resale value here. You might consider bringing it if you intend ONLY to connect it up to a UK games system or perhaps a UK VCR for playing tapes only.

Note, IF you are buying a DVD player - DVDs and DVD players bought in England are Region code2. DVDs and DVD players bought in Australia are region code4. (region 1 for USA). Although the TV systems are the same for UK and Australia, the DVD player will not allow you to play a disc from a different region - and most shops will neglect to tell you that discs from another country won't play. DVDs are cheaper out here by the way! The answer is to have a modified player that is "Region Code Free" or "Region select / auto select" or "All regions". Just don't buy a player that is locked on one region! which is what most retail stores will only sell. Many players can be modified, which no doubt affects warranty and costs around £60-£100 I think. Much easier to buy a code free or selectable region player - and sometimes the very cheapest players from Hong Kong or Taiwan are code free. But you can get upmarket players like Pioneer or Sony that are region free as well by purchasing mail order - just search for "code free dvd" on the net.

I've got various info up at http://emigrate.hotshopping.com.au
Tim

I've got one of those and don't want to have to sell it.
I think it can be used for cable/sattelite or through a VCR.I'm planning to take it.

G

Yes, from what we've read you can use it for cable/satellite and thru a VCR, reason is it doesn't use the TV's tuner but the one in the set top box.

We've also read that OZ terrestrial TV is crap anyway!!Mind you we dont think much of UK terrestrial!! Don't know what we would watch if we didn't have satellite!!

We would love to take ours as well but are still in two minds about it really, will have to see.

Gill

Gill
Trouble is I'm not sure what they are worth second hand and mine is less than a year old.
I'll have to find out

G

the main reason for me asking is because i need a new TV now.
i dont expect to have my visa until at least july time.

so i need to find out what ones will do PAL B/G and the VHF stuff.
hope to find a "world wide" system so i can take that instaed of buying new whne i get there...
also saves wasiting a new TV here !
cheers all
john

We brought a philips 36"with us to Vic and have not seen anythink bigger here than a 32"they are a bit more expensive than UK.They seem to go more for backlite or projection tv.
If you have one bring it but I would not buy one to bring it and plasma tvs seem to come down in price each month.

Have you thought about getting a project and screen? Australians are really big into home cinema and the prices, although a little more than a TV are still pretty good.

It's the only way to watch DVDs and it takes care of all the different aspect ratios as well.

I brought my project system over from the UK and it all works fine here no problems at all.

So much so, that a number of new houses are now being advertised as having its own multimedia room !!

You must get Austar or Foxtel pay tv to see anything anygood
on Australian TV.
It seems to be the same in the USA.
Next month Foxtel goes Digital and most of their shows are in widescreen.
Corrie Street never looked better.
If you dont want Paytv but want to watch in widescreen you must buy a set top digital box $250.
Then you pick up the digital signal and most of the shows are in widescreen.
Hope this helps?

totally off-topic, but just to let you all know that digital tv is a con.... analogue is better quality overall. Digital audio is better, but not video.

Don`t get sucked into the hype.

how do you come to that conclusion?

from working in digital tv broadcasting for the last 10 years.

tv is mostly broadcast via satellite. sats have (normally 4) transponders on them for channels. I`m not an engineer but iirc each transponder took one or two analogue channels. You can`t make analogue any worse or better than it is.... it just is what it is....

So imagine the broadcasters delight when digital reared it`s head.... they can control the bitrate of each channel and therefore squeeze (literally) more channels onto each transponder... which saves them money as they don`t have to rent out as many transponders from Eutelsat etc.

Digital video is brilliant when it`s first done.... but as soon as someone starts squeezing it down with compression... that`s when you get your jaggies just like with a blown up Jpeg.

You must have noticed Animal Planet and Discovery... who I found to have among the worst compression rates.... on Crocodile Hunter especially.

Have a look at any faster moving things on digi tv (water, grass, tree-leaves, cars) and you`ll see that the digi tv can`t keep up and it goes blocky (depending on the bitrate/compression). Sports channels have better bitrates because they have to, but for most general channels the bitrates are variably controlled by some Windows software, taking some extra bits off a movie channel which doesn`t have much movement in that 5 minutes and giving it to Crocodile Hunter on Animal Planet.

Where digi is good is that it`s signals hold up better through weather.... your picture will either be there or it won`t (lovely green blocks). With analogue the picture steadily got grainier, easier than with digi (ie rain, which digi isn`t affected by as easily).

Basically digi tv was marketed as being much better quality for the public.... bollocks. It saved the broadcasters millions, and made them millions by charging for more channels on the transponders they had spare.

dont know much about bitrates and transponders but i know i have a better picture and sound with sky digi than i did with analogue tv.

i'm a happy man.

Sky Generally have a higher bitrate so you don`t notice as many jaggies or slo-mo moments.

Try some of the other channels on sat, like Discovery/Animal Planet/etc.... keep an eye for any fast moving parts and for shimmering around the main moving characters.... the compression is trying to figure out which bits are most likely to move next and pre-empt it (keeping static areas on `freeze`)... but it doesn`t always work... which is why sports have to have a high bitrate/low compression (but sometimes you can still see shimmering).