Originally posted by chemguru:
According to THX recommendations, for a 60" wide aspect screen, 7.8ft is the optimal viewing distance for 1080 HD content. My couch is just over 8' from my screen, and my eyes are happy. =]



THX's recommendations are slightly faulty when reduced to the average TV-sized level. If you took them literally, the maximum viewing distance for your average 27" television would be just 3 feet for HD content. But try doing that yourself; you probably won't like it at all, and it surely won't be optimum.

THX numbers are not necessarily the "best" for picture quality, but the point at which you no longer start to lose detail in your picture. The two don't go hand-in-hand, you have to sacrifice some image detail for the best picture. If you're sitting just 8 feet away from a 60" TV you aren't losing any detail in the picture, but it's not the best looking picture you can have. The bare minimum for image appearance is two times the width of the screen, which would be 10 feet for a 60" screen, 15 feet would be the preferable distance.

2003 Mazda6s 3.0L MTX Webpage 2004 Mazda3s 2.3L ATX