If you read and/or participate in AV forums you come across a lot of complaints about defects with various TVs and the names people have assigned to them to describe the problem - like clouding, banding, blobs, red/blue/green push, etc.
I've never been able to see any of these so-called defects in the store but now that I have one in my home I think I have a bit more insight. I've had my Toshiba 52LX177 for a full day now and have done nothing but watch various programs in SD and HD, DVDs, and even played a simple little hand-held game on the TV.
- 'Clouding': In some instances, when the screen goes completely black/gray for a second between scenes or if you shut the cable box off while the TV is still on, you can see small light colored areas in the upper corners of the set where the background is not completely solid black or gray.
My conclusion: non-issue. It is absolutely not visible during any normal viewing of anything - even very dark scenes. If this represents 'clouding', I can live with it.
- 'Green push': A few complaints about green push with the Toshiba. I thought I saw a tinge of green in Alton Brown's hair on a food network program and I definitely saw green in Rambo's hair when I watched Rambo yesterday. The Rambo scene is the one near the end when he is flying the helicopter with the rescued POWs.
The catch is that his head is right next to the instrument panel which has that lime green screen like an oscilloscope. Now it could very well be that the processor has a tough time distinguishing between the light cast from the instrument panel and the black hair on the top of his head as being two distinct objects and the green shadow bleeds into the black hair. However, it was only a few seconds and I really couldn't tell if it was supposed to be like that or not; either way I didn't feel like it was big deal. I watched various programs all night until 6 am and that is the ONLY instance where there might possibly be green push. Another non-issue in my book.
- 'Banding' or 'Blobs': None that I have noticed in any scene.
So I think there will always be little things that make a set less than perfect but unless you get one that has a very pronounced and obvious issue that ruins the image completely, I think we can just take these issues with a grain of salt as nothing is perfect at this point.
Feature and picture quality wise I am quite satisfied so far. My only issue is whether I could have gotten away with a 46" instead of 52" at 11-12' viewing distance. HD channels look perfect but some SD channels are very slightly blurry (especially with moving text on screen) and a smaller screen may mask that a bit. Of course it could just be may ageing eyes...