When you stand in a large electronics retail store looking at the wall of Televisions available to you, you can really only judge what you are looking for by the screen size, and the comparison of the picture quality on the movie they are screening simultaneously on each and every screen.

The latest trend in TV's in our stores is LED - or to be more accurate LED-LCD.  These screens feature LED backlighting and are extremely thin.

For the last two week's I've been trialling a 46inch Samsung 8000 series LED TV, and the simple fact is, the picture is amazing.  The question is - is it worth the extra price?

Put simply, the reason to buy this TV comes down to the amazing blacks in the picture, the energy efficiency of the unit, the extreme connectivity and, last but not least the amazing thickness or lack thereof.

The reason's not to are limited really to price, the potentially shiny screen, and perhaps the lack of analogue inputs.

At around $4,000 depending on where you buy, the Samsung 46 Inch 8000 Series is probably between $1000 and even $2000 more than a similar sized Full HD LCD - straight away that makes it a very difficult decision, however, if you are planning for the future, you should see the many benefits of this device.

With 4 HDMI inputs your future HD Life is all covered.  Add to that the Ethernet connectivity and even WiFi (with an optional dongle) and you've got the future of IPTV covered too.  Then, to cap it all off, you have Multiple USB inputs allowing you to connect a USB Hard Drive for stored movies, and even a simple USB stick with photos, videos or music on it.  This 'extreme connectivity' as I call it is the top reason I would consider this unit for myself.  The ability to do simple firmware updates, use an Internet connection for IPTV, YouTube etc and to connect the TV to my home media storage means this TV would have a long life.

The other feature of this TV that will win you huge bragging rights among your friends and family is the amazingly THIN size.  I've tried to demonstrate that here comparing the LED from Samsung to a more standard sized LCD (Sharp Aquos).

The problem is you won't notice that when you are staring at them all in the store - Nor - frankly, will your friends notice it when they come round to your home unless you stand your TV in an area people walk past to the side.  Hanging this on the wall would be amazing - another great demonstration of how this TV sits apart from standard LCD's.

So, how is the picture.  Well, I'll be honest - I sat this unit side by side with a 46inch Sharp Aquos, and to my simple eye noticed only a few key things.  Firstly, the picture did seem sharper - the edges of things seemed more defined.  Secondly, the Blacks were amazingly Black - this is the key picture difference from what I could see.  Now many will argue that I should spend time calibrating these TV's, brightness, contrast, gamma ratios all those things - the problem is, the average user simply won't do that!

Watching Full HD content is mind blowingly good - but I would say that about almost any FULL HD Tv of this size - the bigger concern is the quality of the SD content and how the artifacts in the picture really show up on such a big TV!

So for me, the colours seemed slightly better, the blacks amazingly so - but is that enough to make you want to buy this TV - I think not.

However, once you use the TV for a longer period you realise this TV has some other great aspects that are less often promoted.  For example, the menu system.  It's like the difference between Windows 3.11 to Windows 7 in terms of design and user interface. The text is large, the colours are easy to read, the whole thing is amazingly easy to navigate.  This applys to the setup menu, source input choice menu, in fact the whole thing.

The EPG was a bit of a let down, as it seemed to take a while to 'receive the full guide' however that is not entirely the fault of this Unit.  The TV industry are working together to 'cross carry' and share each others guide so that no matter what channel you are watching, every channels EPG is available.  I did feel though this was slower than on my Sharp Aquos.

Some simple things which enhanced the experience that little bit more.  The Power on time was short, very short.  There is an active power consumption meter which shows how the unit is performing relative to 'standard TV's, and the Top third INFO display showing the current show EPG and next title information is excellent.

The question is - should you buy one?

Sadly, the answer is not that simple.  If money is no object, then YES - without question this is the TV of choice. If you're shopping in this price range, be sure to not just look at the design and picture - look at the connectivity and on screen User Interface.

If you are debating between paying $2000 and $3000 for a TV, perhaps consider the 6000 series LED's instead which pack most of these features, with the exception of the Wireless LAN option, DLNA certification, USB2.0 movie support, a second USB slot, and 200Hz motion support among other things.

If all that seems out of reach, be satisfied that your big screen LCD options are many and varied and you won't notice a huge difference in the picture - its the little extras that make the Samsung 8000 series great bang for your buck.