Welcome to Game Gadgets, a regular column highlighting technology from the world of gaming and a gadget obsession that goes hand in glove with our gaming obsession.

To all those gamers out there thinking about taking their gaming experience to the next level and purchasing a shiny new HD television, allow me to make that decision just a little bit easier for you. The decision to spend your hard earned is the easy part, but deciding which type is where it starts to get tricky. The first of many choices you're going to have to make when is whether to go LCD or Plasma.

LCD or Plasma?

Gamers of late seemed to have latched onto LCD TVs as their HDTV of choice, and rightly so. LCD displays have some distinct advantages over their opposition. One that can’t be overlooked is that LCD is much more power efficient than Plasma TV’s and on average seems to run much cooler, but this depends on the TV. Coughing up a few grand on a TV is one thing, but having to handover even more money every year just to run it may be a deciding factor for buyers.

The sizes of LCD TV’s range from 5 inches (who knows why they even have these?) up to 70 inches. If you're limited by viewing distance or can't stretch the funds to anything more than 32 inches, LCD is your only choice.

The colour on an LCD television can look vibrant and unrealistic when judging human skin tones, however because of the backlit technology used to display an image on an LCD, the colours can look washed in certain viewing situations.

Because LCD televisions are cheaper to make, manufacturers will release a larger selection of models, covering a range of configurations that allow you to choose the right television for you. This level of choice is fantastic for the consumer, but beware. A cheaper version of the same sized television might be lacking important features like the number of inputs (vital for a gamer!) or framerate enhancing technology like Sony's Motion Flow.

For a while now, plasma TVs have been ignored by the gaming community because of the fear of “Burn In”. This occurs when a bright (usually white) image is left on the screen for too long and gets burnt into the TV screen. This is not exclusive to Plasma displays’ as CRT and LCD can also suffer from this problem, but was more prevalent in early Plasmas. It is now almost a non issue, though it is still not advised to leave your TV on the same picture overnight.

Advantages of Plasma over LCD begin with the price of the two technologies; 720p plasma is generally cheaper than a 720p LCD. If you are after a bargain big screen TV, Plasma is the way to go. This price advantage is generally lost with the step up to 1080p.

For example a Samsung Series 4 720p 40inch LCD has a RRP of $1,869. The Series 4 720p 42inch Plasma Has a RRP of $1,649. A difference of and extra 2 inches and $220 dollars in your pocket.

Picture quality obviously depends on the manufacture and the features they have implemented into the TV, but on average Plasma vs. a comparatively priced LCD, the plasma will have the better picture and better black levels, this gives a more realistic picture over an LCD. Though in saying that, every generation of LCD gets better and better, and with backlit LCD’s we are now at the point that if you compare two top of the line TV’s the difference between them are so small you would be hard pressed to tell them apart.

Choosing Resolution

Pixels, pixels, pixels. As technology advances, it's usually a good idea to go for the latest and greatest to ensure that you're not buying into technology that will soon be out of date. Having said that, it might not always be the best decision to go for a 1080p television. There aren't too many 720p sets around anymore (Most manufacturers are moving to 1080p exclusivity) and they're definitely cheaper than their 1080p big brothers. If you’re going to use your new TV for just DVDs, gaming and TV, and cost is a serious factor, you may be better off sticking with a 720p set. Most native 1080p games are limited to Playstation Network or Xbox Live Arcade games, with only a few full retail games (mostly sport and racing games) being native 1080p. These are too few and far between (looking at you Sony with your 1080p promise) to be a compelling reason to fork out the extra cash for a Full HD set.

If you plan on watching Blu-ray then the decision is simple, make sure you get a 1080, full HD television.

Choosing a TV is a personal choice, it depends on how much you want to spend, which picture looks better to your eyes or even the look of the TV. The best way to make your decision is to demo and compare the TV’s in the same way you normally watch at home. If that’s usually in a darker room ask the sales assistant to turn the lights off, this will give a greater impression of what the TV will look like in your lounge room. Nothing compares to just going into a store and comparing a few for yourself, it will answer something this article or any review wont be able to.  Do I like this TV enough to buy it?