EngadgetHD lays it out clearly in ‘Millions miffed at poor quality from holiday HDTV purchase‘.

While it’s no surprise that the mystery surround HDTV is further complicated by glossy marketing and a lack of technical support all around, a recent report claims that “about 19.5 million consumers” who purchased an HDTV over the holiday break are now complaining about the quality. Apparently, the “plug and play” approach that has become quite common on today’s electronics didn’t work out so well with HDTVs, leaving customers baffled that their TV wouldn’t magically display the clean, crisp imagery they viewed on the in-store displays when making their purchase. Customers are still having a difficult time understanding that special programming packages, set-top boxes, and / or OTA antennas are required to receive HD content, taking the wind out of their presumably puffed sails.

I went shopping at BestBuy for an HDTV flat-screen two-months ago and asked all my questions. One, in particular was…

So how does all the non-HD channels look once I”m all setup? Answer: “Oh, well, yeah, they don’t look anything like what you’re seeing here. (chuckle)”

Translation: Once you get this entire system home, with this special cable, and this new cable box, and if you tune to these stations at the right time, etc… It’ll look great, maybe.

While I don’t blame the sales person (who was very forthcoming actually), I do blame the manufacturers who really have tried to slip a fast one over on us consumers, when instead, they should have made it much, much simpler, or made a very serious effort to educate us about how it all really looks/works.

There is NOTHING WORSE for your brand to promise one thing, then deliver something else. That’s the only sure-fire way to a consumer’s wrath.

That being said, I want a new TV badly still. Mine is over 10-years old and the picture is fuzzy like my dog.