One masochist notwithstanding, we're pretty sure you haven't sat down for days straight to watch the Summer Games from Beijing, but we're wondering if the superabundance of high-def Olympics programming has changed your perspective on the entire spectacle. Here at Engadget HQ, we've found ourselves captivated by more Olympics footage in the first week than we can ever remember in Games' past, and there's no question that having the events in high-definition caused us to keep flipping back. Is the same phenomenon happening at your house? Are you inexplicably anxious to come home and check out some of the world's greatest athletes in beautiful high-def? Tell us how the HD onslaught has affected your Olympics viewing (if at all).

[Image courtesy of Yahoo! Sports]

Just because there are 3,600 hours of Olympics coverage being beamed out in one form or another this year doesn't mean you actually need to watch all 3,600 of them. For one particular pain lover, however, he consumed 24 straight, and thankfully, he had the decency to write about it. Starting at midnight ET on August 12th, he flipped on NBC just in time to catch Alexander Artemev save the bronze for the US in men's gymnastics. 24 hours later, he watched the women's team disappointingly snag a silver in the same sport. Nearly every minute in between is chronicled in the read link below -- seriously, this is a read you can't afford to miss.

With just south of a hundred HD channels on carriers like DirecTV, and even dozens on the average cable operator, one may wonder if there's even a reason for turning to an SD station anymore. Here at the Engadget HD lair, there's only a few programs still shot and delivered in standard-def that we catch ourselves watching, but we'll admit, it's been an awful long time since SD programming consumed more than 10-percent or so of our viewing. Not too tough a question for you this week: do you still find yourself flipping to SD networks with the growing amount of HD content out there? If so, how much? And be honest -- is it solely due to your wife's obsession with America's Next Top Model?

[Image courtesy of Rickey]

After taking a look at the realities (or lack thereof) of dynamic contrast, reader caveman posed a question that we found quite intriguing. There's little doubt that higher actual contrast ratios on televisions generally lead to sharper blacks and better overall image quality, but where does a number stop becoming a factor of importance and start becoming an overpriced bragging right? In his own Neanderthalian words:

"I'm looking to buy an LCD TV soon and was wondering how much of a difference contrast ratio made? Where does the cutoff occur where a higher ratio just isn't worth the increased cost?"

Yeah, we know stipulations around set placement, surroundings, etc. all come into play here, but why not give Mr. caveman a glimpse into your own experiences? Have you moved from a low contrast set to a high and seen a noticeable improvement? Have you watched your buddy's G Platform plasma and walked away unimpressed? What's your take on the matter?

Got a burning question that you'd love to toss out for Engadget HD (or its readers) to take a look at? Tired of Google's blank stares when you ask for real-world experiences? Hit us up at ask at engadgethd dawt com and keep an eye on this space -- your inquiry could be next.

While carriers and broadcasters seem to be on a mission to deliver video-on-demand content that hard-working adults can view on their own schedules, it could be all for naught. According to new research gathered by Verizon, it's the youngsters who are generally controlling what's watched via VOD. Granted, the release suggests that it's the busy parents turning to VOD for more family friendly programming, but we all know who's pushing the buttons at the end of the day. Last month, for instance, the top ten free VOD titles watched on FiOS TV were shows specifically aimed at kids, and considering the convenience and inexpensiveness (can't beat gratis, eh?), we suppose we aren't too surprised to hear of parents choosing VOD to satisfy demands for Dora the Explorer 24/7. Still, we'd love to see a similar report using viewer data from all carriers of VOD -- surely the rug-rats aren't dominating the tube everywhere, right?