Whether you're buying a widescreen TV, A/V receiver, cables, or a hot new pair of speakers, going by the technical specifications alone can be the worst thing you can do.

The best way to compare home theater components is with your eyes and ears. All to often, the "tech spec geeks" out there will rule out a high quality piece of gear because of some misinterpretation or obscure idea that tech specs are the only measure of a products quality and value.

What's worse is that many these "spec geeks" have friends or coworkers that rely on their opinion to find out what's good or bad. People that go by tech specs alone are missing out on many great products, and narrow their home theater knowledge into a world of misintepretation.

Truth be told, it is actually hard to find a bad home theater product these days. The boom of home theater over the past 15 years has weeded out the so called "crappy products". What's left is a lot of high quality HT products that offer more every year.

Technical specifications are important, but not more important than actual performance. In many cases products that should, by technical specifications be among the best, end up performing less than the specs would suggest.

Proving the Numbers Wrong
Any spec geek will usually judge a good piece of gear by a few certain specifications and general HT assumptions. An example of this is that many HT spec geeks will judge an A/V Receiver by wattage, inputs, and surround capabilities.

Compare these two receivers:

Based on the basic tech specs alone the only difference is price, but when sound quality is compared, a consumer would almost always hear better sound from the $600 receiver.

Why is this? Because generalized specifications used by marketing departments and spec geeks won't tell you the whole picture. It's only when you get down to the obscure technical specifications that one would realize that the more expensive receiver uses better amplifiers which, in turn, provide better sound quality.

There's no easy tech spec to say what type of amps are used, which is why you can't go by tech specs alone. Only by listening to the actual performance of an HT product can a proper review be made.

What's A Consumer To Do?
With so many "good" products out there, consumers are left to find which products offer the most "bang for your buck". This can be hard to do if you go by technical specifications alone, but it can be easy when you rely on your eyes and ears to review products. Do yourself a favor and only read the tech specs after you've narrowed your choices down.

Trust your eyes and ears to judge potential home theater purchases, and let the HT spec geek windbags live in their own perfect little world.

HTadvice.com Announcement
Coming out just in time for the holidays, HTadvice.com is launching its 5-step guide to shopping, aptly named the "On Shopping" section. This shopping guide will give you the info you need to find those HT products out there that offer the most bang for your buck so you'll never have to rely those crazy spec geeks anymore.

Check back at HTadvice.com on November 20th to view the new "On Shopping" section.