Forget LCD or plasma. The real flat-panel-TV question may be even more basic: How do you get the thing on your wall? As a growing number of buyers are discovering, mounting a flat-panel TV is a far cry from just drilling a hole and checking to see if it's hung straight. Indeed, even installing smaller screens can entail breaking holes in the wall, picking a separate mount just to hold it, and then dealing with the resulting thicket of wires and where to put them. So big are these hassles, in fact, that home builders are now touting flat-screen-friendly walls as a selling point. And why not? Even the pros and handymen who charge hundreds of dollars to do the job for you say they can use all the help they can get.

According to Pacific Media Associates, only two out of 10 flat-panel TVs ever actually make it onto the wall. Some of that, of course, is intentional; many people prefer to tuck their set away in a cabinet or use a simple stand. But from the very beginning, flat-panel marketing has been all about the vision of a TV that could be hung on your wall and admired almost like a piece of art. Panasonic even sells painting-style frames for its plasmas, including a $400 "baroque gold" model. But despite all the hype, even retailers admit that most customers underestimate the challenge of hanging the sets. "There aren't as many homes where you can just hang a TV on the wall as you'd think," says Mike Mohan, VP of home entertainment at Best Buy.

Obviously, it's not always TV hell to put the screens up, and people do expect the process to require some work. But for many, the instructions alone are a turnoff — forget about the prospect of knocking holes in the living-room wall. Some buyers will need both an electrician and an installer to come in. In Montclair , Calif. , Neal George had to buy three separate mounts before finding one that fit, only to discover horizontal beams that blocked him from running the cables through the wall the way he'd planned. He can buy a special plastic sheath to hide them, but for now he's wedged an Asian statue under the set. "That's another project," sighs George, who figures he's already blown 10 hours and $1,000 on the job.

For their part, the manufacturers say hanging the TV on the wall is just an option; they note that most sets come with stands so that consumers can watch the sets almost right out of the box, problem free, if they want. Andrew Nelkin, vice president of television for Panasonic, points out that all but one of its flat-screen models are sold with stands and says that the company has offered $200 rebates for customers who choose to have their sets professionally installed. Retailers, meanwhile, say shoppers who buy their installation services are less likely to return their TVs and claim they are making the installation choices more affordable by offering special discounts with certain models.