Need help deciding which TV to buy

[annunaki]

I would also suggest a Toshiba LCD. The 42LX177 would be a very nice set. It has been one of the highest reviewed LCD's in terms of performance number in Home Theater Magazine.


All LCDs exhibit a green push in color accuracy. However, Sony seems to set most of their televisions up with a slight red push (along withe the slight green push) in nearly all reviews I have seen regardless of the set's orientation (LCD, CRT, etc.). It must be a "Sony thing".

 

[gus6464]

I would also suggest a Toshiba LCD. The 42LX177 would be a very nice set. It has been one of the highest reviewed LCD's in terms of performance number in Home Theater Magazine.


All LCDs exhibit a green push in color accuracy. However, Sony seems to set most of their televisions up with a slight red push (along withe the slight green push) in nearly all reviews I have seen regardless of the set's orientation (LCD, CRT, etc.). It must be a "Sony thing".

I noticed that LG pushes blue.

 

[Kilim]

Adter reading up soem more, visiting various stores, I think I narrowed it down to the Samsung 61F and 69F.
Now just to decide if the 69F is worth teh premium or just save some cash and get the 61F instead.

 

[solomr2]

I was at my local BB this afternoon and they had the Samsung HP-T5084 on sale for $2180. I managed to talk them out of charging tax and delivery, so I will be receiving the set on Tuesday for the total cost of $2180. Plus with the 10% coupon (which I forgot to bring) I will get another 10% off.

Looking at this set side by side with the Panasonic, even though the sets are not properly calibrated, it just looked a little better than the 700U, so I pulled the trigger.

I am still looking for another set for my family room, but I need to get a matte screen for this troublesome room due to the amount of direct light in this room. I don't tihnk I'll be getting another 1080p set, a 720p will work for this need. Does anyone know of a decent 720p plasma with a matte screen?

 

[Kilim]

I ended up getting the Samsung 4069F.
Looks great so far and I am still trying to figure out how to fully tweak it.
Got a Pricematch at BB cuz I couldn't wait for the shipping time if I get it from Amazon.
Now I am wondering if I should have got the XBR4 instead lol.
(I still have until Jan 31 to exchange/return it )

Watching on my livingroom in the middle of the day was no problem at all to with the 69F atm.

 

[annunaki]

I noticed that LG pushes blue.

Every brand has their issues

They may do it to make the white bluer, which appears brighter.

 

[solomr2]

Every brand has their issues

They may do it to make the white bluer, which appears brighter.

Samsung pushes blue also, but they give you a lot of picture controls so you can adjust to reduce it and get it pretty close to neutral. I'm not sure why they do these things, but I guess they either don't know how to get the colors completely balanced, or they try to compensate for some kind of weakness.

 

[gobats]

Need help in deciding which TV to buy

Great tips and insight as always with this sight. However, as a novice in HD TV and a very limited Budget 600 -750.00, what sets would you suggest for a
slightly hearing impaired senior citizen?

 

[your_doc_2]

Sorry to jump in late on this this one but, the if you are a sports fan. The 71F gives you a better picture on fast moving action. I'm deciding now between the Samsung and the Sharpe D92

 

[solomr2]

Sorry to jump in late on this this one but, the if you are a sports fan. The 71F gives you a better picture on fast moving action. I'm deciding now between the Samsung and the Sharpe D92

Better than what?

I'm sitting in front of my 50" Samsung 5084 plasma watching the Broncos and Bears in HD on CBS and I can assure you this is as good a picture as I've ever seen on any HD TV for sports and fast moving on-screen action.

While I haven't spent a lot of time in front of the 71f, I have an HD LCD at home besides my plasmsa, and I have also done a great deal of in-store viewing of several high-end LCD TVs, including the 71f and D92U, and in most cases I've seen more issues with sports and fast movement on LCD than I have on plasma.

I suggest you take a look at the latest 1080p plasmas from Samsung and Panasonic and see it for yourself. I think you will find the plasmas have superior PQ and they are slightly cheaper at sizes near 50". Even the best LCD, the Sony XBR4 is only about as good as either of these plasmas at best, albeit it has aprice premium of several hundred $$.

 

[MDS]

What makes the Sony XBR4/5 the 'best' LCD? People seem to repeat that idea over and over but to my eyes they are hardly superior to any of the others. They are also plagued by the same issues as other brands yet you get to pay a much higher price.

 

[solomr2]

What makes the Sony XBR4/5 the 'best' LCD? People seem to repeat that idea over and over but to my eyes they are hardly superior to any of the others. They are also plagued by the same issues as other brands yet you get to pay a much higher price.

What makes it the best? Well, a very good black level, good colors, good featuers. To my eyes, it looked like the best PQ I've seen on LCD, but that is highly subjective. I wouldn't say it is significantly superior to other leading LCD panels, and certainly not worth the price premium. Honestly, if you see it side by side with other good panels, you may or may not notice the differences, depending on what you're watching and whether you're actually looking for the specific differences. It is certainly not flawless, and in my opinion it is not better than the leading plasmas. At best, it may match plasmas in certain PQ characteristics, but I still prefer the plasmas I mentioned for PQ.

 

[cmb5286]

samsung lcd ftmfw
no but seriously i picked up a 46" lcd and haven't ad any problems with it
HD cable looks phenomenal, Xbox 360 as well
as a monitor it functions pretty damn well
granted some of the SD stuff looks alright
but all in all a great purchase

 

[annunaki]

What makes the Sony XBR4/5 the 'best' LCD? People seem to repeat that idea over and over but to my eyes they are hardly superior to any of the others. They are also plagued by the same issues as other brands yet you get to pay a much higher price.

I agree. After looking at the Smasung 71 and the XBR4 side by side I would actually take the Samsung (if I HAD to go LCD) as the color was more accurate and I love the amount of control one gets. i wish they would have had a Toshiba LX177 in to view along with ith those two. From what I have seen in reviews it has great black levels and decent fine tuning abilities specifically with 120hz.

 

[MDS]

I think the black level of the 52LX177 is fine. You can tell that it's not pitch black when the scene changes to an all black screen but it is good enough for me.

I'm not so sure about the 120 Hz (ClearFrame). Analog channels and some of the digital channels look very poor to me and even hurt my eyes a bit because the image is very soft and seems to be ever so slightly out of focus. The text on the guide does not look crisp and bothers me sometimes.

Now it could be my own eyes or it could be that the TV doesn't do a great job of deinterlacing 1080i from the cable box (cable box converts everything to 1080i) or the cable box itself does a lousy job of converting to 1080i. I turned off ClearFrame and I swear the picture improved a lot. I watched Sniper on a regular analog channel last night and it looked very good - no motion lag and no shimmering.

 

[hasslethehoff]

If you're using this new tv for gaming, movies and pc usage, i wouldn't recommend getting a plasma:

-burn in can still be an issue, and while panasonics do a good job using pixel shifting technology, its not worth spending all this money and having a burned in image if you leave something up for a more than like a half hour or hour or so
-also if your room is really bright, plasmas have glass/plastic screens which reflect a good amount, whereas lcds do not

Also I would put LCDs over DLP televisions because of the clarity, while you can go much larger for the price with DLPs, the good clarity on a quality LCD still outshines a decent picture with a larger size.

About the newer LCD's 120hz refresh rate:
-hardly noticeble if you're just an average viewer of tv, it's extremely hard to tell the difference
-if you're an avid sports watcher this might be important to you, but you really won't be missing much if you skip out on the 120hz and save the money


Sony and samsung are definitly the two best LCD pictures out there, either of them you can't go wrong with

 

[solomr2]

Plasma burnin is not an issue anymore. I spent 3 hours on Xbox 360 with my son the other day on my new Samsung plasma and there wasn't a single hint of burnin.

 

[gus6464]

Plasma burnin is not an issue anymore. I spent 3 hours on Xbox 360 with my son the other day on my new Samsung plasma and there wasn't a single hint of burnin.

I accidentally left my Panasonic Plasma the other day paused on COD4 for about 2 hours. When I came back I had some image retention but after changing it to the cable for about 2 minutes the IR went away completely. Burn-in is hardly an issue anymore.

 

[cccsdad]

At the risk of sounding dumb, what is TBE?
Also what about the new sharp 46" D92U, has Sharp resolved their banding issues. What about the Mits 46244 ?

 

[MDS]

At the risk of sounding dumb, what is TBE?
Also what about the new sharp 46" D92U, has Sharp resolved their banding issues. What about the Mits 46244 ?

TBE you are referring to is probably 'triple ball effect' and is a cute little term coined by the avs forum for the case where a moving tennis ball appears as 3 balls. I think it was mainly Samsung LCDs that exhibited the phenomena.

I saw a Sharp D64U in my friend's house when I went home for Christmas and I could see the banding when he would switch channels and the screen was momentarily all gray. It's very difficult if not impossible to see it during normal scenes.