OT: HDTV confusion

I'm a little confused about some things about HDTVs, and I'm wondering if anyone could help clear up some of these questions for my future purchase of a set for home use.

I shoot with the Sony Z1U at 1080i, and I see a lot of sets that seem to go as high as 720p or 1080i...true or false: if I had a set that did 720p, I wouldn't be able to view footage off my camera. I would have to get one that supported 1080i input, correct?

How do broadcast HD signals work if they are 1080i or 720p? If I had a 720p set, what happens if I want to watch a channel that does 1080i? Is there some kind of conversion that happens within the set itself?

What about 1080p...I read on cnet that it's not really that important unless you're buying a TV that's 50 inches or larger. I'm looking at sets that are 37" - 42"...is it worthwhile to spend $200 more on a slightly larger set that will do 1080p (Olevia 242TFHD $999) vs. one that does 1080i (Olevia 237T $799)? My budget is $750-$900. How about future considerations...I don't want to have to replace this in a year or two.

Thanks in advance! This is harder than I thought!

Casey

There are 18 different versions of HDTV in the ATSC standard table. 720p and 1080i are the ones that are very common, but there are many others. In order to be certified by the ATSC a set must be able to reproduce all those formats. You can send any of the signals you mention to your set and it will scale the image. How well it does that scaling is part of what separates good from bad sets.

[en.wikipedia.org]

This Wikipedia article has a table that lists them if you are interested.

As for 1080p. You are future proofing if you buy a set that will do that. Currently there is no television delivery method that will take advantage of that much bandwidth, and may not be for some time. It would require doubling the delivery bandwidth or halving the data rate to do that over the current delivery infrastructure. DVD's, Video games, and what you shoot and play yourself will be at that rate pretty soon.

Production equipment is currently available in 1080p.

-V