I had the same delima too. After looking for about 4 months and sitting down with some serios RPTV I decided to go with the RPTV and play video games on my regular tube in the other room.
The reason for this is that HDTV with DVD look awesome. There's no lines of resolution so you can sit as close as you want. (properly calibrate the TV). Having a home theater that actually feels like a theater brings whole new experience.
I push the RPTV because it's also so close in price to HDTV tubes. It costs $2500 for a 36" tube and $3200 for a 55" mitsubishi platinum plus (one of the best rpts available).
As far as posts that claim cable looks like crap on rptv is not true. Cable looks like crap on all hdtvs. The interlaced lines of regular set hide a lot of debris. All your seing is the truer image... for now.
I know it's a tough decision so I tell you the process I did.
1. I sat down in the store with TVs i've finally narrowed down to. 2. I brought like 5 DVD and previewed the same segments on all the TV 3. Most important- leave the sound off 4. Try to calibrate the set close - no sharpness -black blacks - vibrant colors 5. Repeat test as many times as needed 6. Think on it to see which set you'd prefer 7. Use this site, htadvice.com, and audioreview.com to see what other people say to look for and product review 8. look at cnet.com to lookup the cheapest price to see how much the markup really is at the store. Some of the pioneer set I was looking were marcked up $2000 (that ruled them out) 9. buy from a place you can return it (like tweeter). If anythings wrong you'll glad you didn't do mail order.
