At 6:05 PM -0400 7/11/04, Manfredi, Albert E wrote: > > >> And what's with this 2:1 premium for >> a standalone box versus integration. The case and power supply are >> not 50% of the cost of these boxes...nowhere near. > >I said *at least*. There's a big premium in making boxes stand-alone, >which includes power supply, connectors, switches, the case, >inventory and shipping costs, separate safety tests, and so forth. Sorry, but I don't buy your argument. Yes a stand alone box may have a few components that are already in place in a TV, but volume does make a huge difference, even for connectors et al. For example, they had a 20" flat CTR Receiver for $129. This was not your usual discount special. It had front panel jacks for audio and composite video in, rear panel loop through jacks for audio/composite video, a third composite video input, an S-video input, and component video inputs. By the way, the split between CRT and flat panel displays in the computer department was nearly 50/50 ( a slight edge to LCD panels, especially in the stand alone display area). The cheapest PC (E-machines) was $499 with a 15" CRT and $799 with a 15" LCD display. Over in the Big screen area there were a few interesting new toys. Lot's of close-outs on widescreen direct view CRT displays...these do not seem to have much appeal any more. LCD and DLP displays dominated, with the price dropping again on DLP. They had two new RCA DLP rear projection sets that looked pretty good. Both were equipped with ATSC and cable tuners. The 50" model was selling for about $2899, while the 61" model was selling for $3399. It is exciting to see sets with this level of picture quality starting to sell in the $2-3K price range. Regards Craig ---------------------------------------------------------------------- You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways: - Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at FreeLists.org - By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word unsubscribe in the subject line.