I appreciate the belittling comments about the Falcons, but truth be told the Falcons were coming off a brutal 6 game stretch playing against FOUR teams coming off their bye weeks, including the Bears, @Dallas, Wash, and @NYG, and four of five games on the road. Given all that, there's no reason the Giants shouldn't have beaten an injury plagued and road-weary Falcons team handily.

PS-Marquette lost to #6 Louisville (@ Louis) by 4 points, without James.

While I agree with your assessment of St. Mary's (yes, they deserve an at-large regardless of what happens in the WCC tourney), I think you kill your argument when you say Marquette should not even be considered for the tournament. Unlike St. Mary's, which is heavily dependent on one player, Marquette is still a very very talented team, and strong enough to deserve an at-large. Yes, they're not going to be as good as they were with James, but you can't just eliminate their record with him. Maybe they lose two seed spots in the tournament, but no way can you leave them out for one guy's broken foot.

I own Samsung's 52" A650, and absolutely love it. Still not as good as top end plasmas, it's still a significant step up from either an LCD or a mid-range plasma. My only complaint is "120Hz" technology, and unless they've totally redesigned it since the 650's, it's probably still garbage. First thing I did when I got my 650 was turn it off, since it makes all video look like DV, in the worst possible way.

I'm curious what else is new on these sets compared to their predecessors...

Is anyone else shocked that the difference between those who own a PS3 vs. a standalone bluray player is only 1% (5% v. 4%)? I know this poll is just a small sample of people, but know of maybe 1 person who owns a standalone bluray player, and far more who own a ps3. And the fact that there are more people who own an hd-dvd player vs. a ps3. Something about this survey seems wrong.

"when the network isn't clogged."
Paul, I think you answered your question right there. Are you connected via wifi or ethernet? If you're doing wifi, you'll find it pretty hard to get good video streaming from your MC pc to the xbox, since other peripherals are using it as well. Your best option would be to get two wireless routers, one for your peripherals (laptops, etc.) and one dedicated for your 360. That way your wifi signal won't be degraded for your 360. Try googling that.

As for streaming netflix, this is pretty sweet. Too bad I still haven't made the jump to vista. :(

Count me in the plasma camp as well. I've never quite understood how LCDs managed to capture the market the way they have. When it comes to color accuracy, black levels, detail, speed response, my 720p Panny plasma blows away my LCD tv, as well as my friend's 1080p DLP. Unless you're exclusively watching 1080p content, it's not even close between Plasma and LCD. If and when Plasma technology dies, lets hope there is a successor out there better than LCD, otherwise the market will have taken a big step backwards.

I own an oppo, hd-a3 and a ps3, all hooked up to a Panny plasma 37" 720p display. For upconverting purposes I would say the oppo and hd-a3 are very similar, so at half the price of the oppo, the hd-a3 is a pretty good buy, especially since you're able to get in on some pretty good hd-dvd sales (most cheaper than regular dvds now). That being said, one rather large drawback with the hd-a3 is the slooooow bootup time. Even if all you want to do is eject a disc, you'll have to wait the 30+ seconds it takes to bootup first. Audio quality is excellent, and video quality is on par to what I get with my ps3 blurays.

The telling sign here for me is that this shows just how tiny the hidef dvd market is, when an officially dead format can still hold the top title and 35% marketshare. What this tells me is that Bluray's victory hasn't caused the huge rush of shoppers to come running in over to its side now that there's an official format to back (as many had predicted). Until the BDA's manufacturers find a way to get these prices down, Bluray's numbers will remain a tiny tiny fraction of the overall home video market.

Ah... who doesn't love the betamax facial, very original. Except betamax only played betamax tapes. Do you yell at people who buy upscaling dvd players like the oppo (a great player btw) for $200? And just curious, how many of you have actually had to replace your DVD players because they just keep breaking? I can't actually remember any of mine breaking down and having to be replaced. Excuse us for wanting the hidef dvd experience without having to drop $400 for a ps3, we'll be just fine upscaling our current collection with an hd-dvd player, and finding great liquidation deals on the hd-dvds that will surely be dropping in price everywhere (many are selling for cheaper than sd-DVDs). Sony PS3 fanboys let out a huge sigh of relief that their fancy machine actually turned out to be worth the money, congratulations! You gambled and came out on top, no need to shove it in everyone's face when all we want is to enjoy the new hi-def experience in whichever way we can get it, whether it's cheap hd-dvds, blurays, or downloadables.