Recommendations

See easiest to use 37" and above iDTVs
See easiest to use 32" iDTVs
See easiest to use 26" iDTVs
See easiest to use 20"and under iDTVs
For a summary of our general findings on iDTVs, see iDTVs pros and cons

Our tests are focussed on finding the easiest to use iDTVs, but of course we also tell you about their picture and sound quality. We have now tested a range of screen sizes from around 19” to 42”. Thirty-two inch TVs are still the most popular, followed by the small (19”) ones, then the big (37” plus) sets. What might suit you should depend on the size of your room and what you watch – apart from what you can afford.

• If you watch in a fairly small room, keep to a smaller size TV. The best viewing distance for a 32” screen is about two and a half metres and for a 42” screen you need a viewing distance of three and a half metres or more. Closer up and you will start to see a poorer picture – due to the limitations of standard definition (SD) broadcasting.
• If you mainly watch standard broadcast TV and only the occasional DVD, 32” is quite big enough and you would be wasting money on anything larger.
• OK so you are a critical viewer of DVDs and expect to watch high definition (HD) programmes – in a large enough room you would enjoy up to a 42” set.
• Bigger than 42” – we don’t test as they are certainly not necessary for switching to digital. Good for watching a lot of Blueray discs on and/or a lot of HD TV, but the quality of SD services is likely to be disappointing.

You can make recordings from most iDTVs by connecting a VCR to one of the TV’s SCART outputs. But doing it this way means you cannot record one digital channel while watching another. To do this you need a digital TV recorder. Or, there are a few iDTVs that include a hard drive digital TV recorder. We have now tested a few of these. Use the iDTV product search to select 'LCD and DTR' to see reports on them.

For the digital TV recorders that did best in our tests, see recommended digital TV recorders.

For test reports on products that are no longer manufactured, see discontinued products.

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