First post. Hello everyone!

I'm looking at purchasing an HDTV and I'm not sure that I need 1080p because of the viewing distance I usually watch at.

While looking, I've noticed that Plasmas that are 720p only have 1024 pixels across while LCDs tend to have 1366 or so.

So my question is this.

Do you lose some of the picture at the edges of a 720p Plasma vs an LCD (assuming the source coming in is HD etc)?

Thanks for any enlightenment on this!

That's only true at the 42" size for plasma. No, you lose no picture on the edges b/c of this. The image is scaled to fit in either case.

yes I should have made clear I'm looking at 42inch TV's.

Does that mean the Plasma is stretching the picture while the LCD is not?

no

I guess that makes sense, it'd be the other way around anyway...I wasn't thinking that through! You'd get slightly skinny looking things, not fatter things if you were squeezing the picture in.

I'm still at a loss as to how that works though...to be honest. Thanks anyway.

The display's circuitry scales the image that it's delivered to fit the pixels that are available. Scaling down to a lower resolution from a higher resolution source tends to be easier than going in the other direction.

Not all TV's processing is equal, they have varying quality. At any rate, the proportions of the image aren't affected unless you wish them to be (stretch, zoom, etc).

The image will be scaled.

The image on the plasma will be broken down into 1024 vertical lines. The picture on the LCD will be broken down into 1366 vertical lines. Both screens are physically equal width in inches, they just have a different number of pixels. The pixels in the plasma will be wider.