I’m not sure everyone has noticed, but we have a very small TV. Some of you definitely have—you’ve joked about how overdue we are for a bigger set. As the resident man of the house, I have to admit I agree. Our little 26-inch TV made sense in our old house, where the den was so narrow I could practically change the channel with my toe.
Now that our current living room has more space—though we do miss the cozy feel of our first living room—we often say, “We really need a bigger TV.” Subtitles, news tickers, or having friends over make that tiny screen painfully obvious. We can’t read small text without standing up and walking halfway across the room. Despite how much TV we watch, we kept postponing an upgrade.
We heard that February and March are the best months to buy a TV—after the holidays and the Super Bowl retailers often lower prices—so we waited for the right moment. After researching, talking with my brother-in-law Martin (who did a lot of homework himself), and checking prices, we narrowed our choices to two Target models: a Vizio and a Samsung.
Both were 1080p LCDs around 40 inches. They were energy-efficient models, costing roughly $17 a year to run—the lowest we found was $15 for a different LED model. The roughly 40-inch size wasn’t scientific; it felt right after we measured and discussed wanting something larger but not overwhelming. Both TVs had solid 4+ star reviews across Target, Amazon, Walmart and other sites. In the end, which did we pick?
We chose the Vizio—it was $100 cheaper and 2 inches larger. The listed price of $449.99 wasn’t our final outlay, thanks to a few discounts and gift cards.
Here’s how the savings stacked up:
- Target had a temporary price reduction from $479 to $449.
- Our Target credit card gave us 5% off, lowering the price to about $427.
- We received an additional 5% off HDTVs coupon for cardholders, reducing it further to roughly $406.
- We applied a couple of leftover Christmas gift cards, bringing our final out-of-pocket cost to $356.
Not bad, considering our much smaller TV cost about the same five years ago. We expect the old set will either move to another room or be sold. After about 15 months of squinting and tracking deals, we finally brought the new TV home. Even Burger was excited—apparently the box art featured a woman from the news. Seriously, Vizio? A colorful underwater scene or a charging bull might have been a bit more dramatic.
Before setting it up, we compared the old TV to the new one to appreciate the upgrade. Here’s our old set:
It looks tiny in photos, but the difference is clear. We brought out the new TV for a side-by-side comparison and, yes, it already looks better. It also made us realize we’ll need a larger media console. We’ve been thinking about building something or retrofitting a thrift-store find, so stay tuned.
Here’s the view from the couch with the new TV on. Now you can actually read what we were watching—Cougar Town is legible without effort. The photo is smaller than real life, so in person small text like subtitles are now easy to read. Big relief.
We tethered the TV to the wall using the included safety cable, screw, and heavy-duty anchor. We may mount it permanently once we decide on the ideal height and figure out what will sit under it. For now the cable prevents tipping and gives us peace of mind.
This upgrade feels like the start of refreshing that part of the living room. We want a taller, more substantial piece of furniture with extra storage to better anchor the TV. Until then, we’re just happy to give our squinting muscles a break and enjoy having the Cul De Sac Crew back in our living room.
Anyone else upgrading their TV lately or watching anything good? With the book shoots wrapped, maybe we’ll actually have time to catch up on television. We’re current on The Walking Dead, so please don’t spoil that for us!