If you’re anything like us, you’ve probably started to think vaguely about what goodies you’ll buy during the inevitable last-minute Christmas Eve shopping frenzy. While you contemplate which colour socks and underwear to purchase, spare a thought for Blu-ray and HD DVD — two of the hottest tech brands for this Christmas and next year. …

The technical doctors at Hitachi claim to have found a cure for some of the annoying ailments that have traditionally plagued LCD technology -– poor contrast, restricted peripheral vision and slow response times. The new Picture Master models, available in 32-inch and 37-inch screen sizes, claim to be the first LCD screens to feature the latest generation of In Plane …

Crave remembers when the Christmas period was predominately a religious celebration — back when there were no iPods and humans actually gave a toss about each other. Not any more though. Today it’s all about giving and receiving, with an emphasis on the receiving. So given our editor’s request that we each choose our ultimate Christmas present, I’ve gone for …

Evesham hasn’t just thrown down the gauntlet for competitively priced LCDs, it’s mounted its trusty steed and thrust a lance into the budget screen market with a range of TVs at prices that are, well, medieval… Crave had only just scraped our jaws from the floor following news of the PC company’s cut-price ‘Full HD’ 1080p screens before the latest …

The early price of digital recorders left most people clinging to their VCRs and praying for a pay rise. But, in only a few years, prices have plummeted and now it’s not just DVD recorders that are stocking the budget shelves but hard disk recorders too. The Goodmans GHD8015F is the first hard disk recorder we’ve seen that costs less …

My boyfriend is driving me insane with his constant nagging about researching TVs. He wants to purchase a new TV, he thinks LCD is more likely, but would buy plasma if that was the best for what he watches, and he wants a 40-inch screen. He wants the best television for watching sport, more precisely football! So you can’t blame …

Aunt Ethel hasn’t seen you for 12 months. As she plants that dry kiss just in front of your ear and clutches you to her lavender-smelling bosom, you are already grimacing at the prospect of four days cooped up with the old dear. Escape is not an option, but you, cunning reader, can extricate yourself from the embarrassment of a charades …

We’re all obsessed with downloading gigabytes of movies, music and TV — the problem is where to put it all. You kit yourself out with a PC sporting a huge 250GB hard drive, but within weeks it’s so full of movie trailers, MP3s and BitTorrented TV programmes that you need to offload some of your media. So you score an …

Convenience is the key word when it comes to home-cinema systems. Nothing drives your significant other nearer to mental collapse than yet another horrendous tangle of cabling. The solution? Space-saving designs that are easy to use and, more recently, the introduction of ‘convergence’ features that allow you to access a wider range of media from separate sources. JVC’s latest range …

High definition may be breathing new life into nature documentaries and sports programmes, but it’s films that are really being resuscitated by the new technology, especially now that ‘Full HD’ (ie 1080p) content from next-generation DVD players has arrived. Crave seen an influx of hi-def projectors that bring high-definition performance to the big screen — sending film enthusiasts into a frenzy …

LG has given Crave a sneaky first look at a range of AV playback equipment inspired by its beautifully crafted Chocolate phones, also known as the Black Label series. We spotted them during our behind the scenes tour of LG’s Corporate Design Centre in South Korea, and though we weren’t allowed to take pictures (the TV pic is a CNET.co.uk …

I am currently looking to replace my old Toshiba 32-inch CRT TV. In my new house the screen is too small, as the viewing distance is somewhere around 5m. For such a viewing distance, is a) a 40-inch screen size okay and b) would 46 inches be too big, in your opinion? The three products I have in mind are …

The penultimate day of our trip to Seoul brought us to LG’s design centre, specifically the Lifestyle Research Group (LRS), where we bore witness to some cunning new equipment. Among the coolest was an as yet unnamed plasma TV constructed almost entirely of natural materials. LG’s heavies restricted us from filming, but we’ve knocked up this sketch to give you …

In the latest of a series of delays afflicting next-generation high definition devices, there could be more hope of seeing the Second Coming than Toshiba’s long-awaited HD DVD player this Christmas. Our faith had already been tested when the previously delayed April release was set back to the end of this year. The standard HD-E1 (£470) model was supposed to …

If you want to invigorate your TV brand’s recognition, dear reader, all you need is a vaguely Italian-sounding moniker — think Sony’s Bravia, Toshiba’s Regza or Panasonic’s Viera. The marketing men at Fujitsu have weathered a brainstorm and come up with a new high-end range of screens under the name Aviamo. Bene! The Aviamo range has three screens: 55-inch and 65-inch …