The simplest of tasks was to go to the appliance stores and scout out the TV section. Then look at all the brands and prices and choose from there. Simple right ? Wrong !

First of all, there are a myriad of brands now of televisions. What used to be only a predominantly "Sony" market is now filled with equally good brands like JVC, LG, Samsung, Phillips, Pioneer, Toshiba, Sanyo, Sharp and the less popular ones and never-heard (by me) brands like Devant, Konka, Rainbow, Sansui, Chongwang, Pensonic and the list goes on and on.

All I knew was that my parents wanted a flat screen TV and they depended on me to give a recommendation based on features and price. As I carefully looked and read each TV specifications, the respective salesmen also gave their sales pitch on features and why their brand is the best. This is where the hard part began.

Suddenly, I was blasted with terms like Trumotion, Bravia Engine, Series 4-7, T, V & W Series, HDMI, 1080HD, 720p, pixel ratios, megapixel rates and many many more terminologies that I had the salesmen explain cause I was at a lost.

To make matters worse, each brand have their own terminologies and models making it difficult to just compare and contrast each TV with the other brands. Heck, I even had a hard time comparing different models of the same brand !

So when I was asked by my parents which was the best TV, I couldn't give a direct answer. I said it simply wasn't that easy. It really depended on which factor. Like if it was in terms of parts, I'd choose Sony or Samsung. If it was in terms of price, I'd choose Samsung or LG. If it was in terms of top of the line features, I'd choose Sony or Philips. If it was in terms of sound clarity, I'd choose Sony or Pioneer. If it was in terms of energy efficiency, I'd choose LG. And the if's would go on and on.

In the end (around 2 hours of deliberating), we finally agreed to get the LG 32" flat LCD for its picture quality and discounted price. And our choice didn't disappoint.

What was disappointing though was that finally after choosing the TV we wanted to buy, this salesman representing another brand, kept on badmouthing the particular brand and model we got. It was like a desperate move on him for us to change our minds and buy his brand instead. I hope that despite the competitiveness of salesmen to sell and push their brands that they don't resort to sabotaging their colleagues' brand just to make a sale. After all, it's the customer who's right and it's our right to choose whatever appliance we want.