Solid 32" LCD TV with above average picture quality!
Written: Feb 07 '07 (Updated Feb 07 '07)
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Pros: Great picture quality, DVI-I input, reasonable price, ATSC and QAM tuners
Cons: "Red push", only 1 component input, channel changing slow.
The Bottom Line: I would have given it a 5 for picture quality, but the red push is a bit annoying. Other than that, it's a SOLID tv!
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| alanp's Full Review: Sharp Aquos LC32D41U 32 in. LCD TV |
I was in the market for a smaller LCD TV for the bedroom and I ended up getting the LC-40C32U, which is the Costco version of the LC-32D41U, other than the color (silver vs black) the two sets are identical. I wanted to make that clear since this review is technically for the LC-32D41U.
Just a little more background on how I ended up with this set. First of all, $1000 was the absolute most I wanted to spend. At the time of purchase, lots of the other name brand TVs were out of this price range, namely Sony and Samsung. I at first bought a Vizio 32" LCD for $200 less than this Sharp, but that promptly was returned. As a side note, there really wasn't anything terrible about the Vizio given its price, but since I already own another Sharp Aquos (see my review of the LC-37D5U), I saw a night and day difference in picture quality of an off-brand vs Sharp, and that difference was worth the extra $200 I paid for this TV.
So enter the LC-40C32U. Just to get boring technical specs out of the way first, this TV has all the features a typical consumer could want. Here are the features I found important and useful.
- 2 HDMI inputs
- 1 component input
- 1 composite/s-video
- 1 DVI-I input
- NTSC/ATSC/QAM tuners
- optical and analog output for audio
- 6ms refresh
- 1366x768 native resolution. Though there are more and more 1920x1080 TVs out now, I think that would be an overkill for a TV this size. But to each his own.
- You can store up to 16 "favorites" channels.
- Sleep timer in increments of 30 min up to 2 hours.
- Very light and easy to setup (less than 40 lbs)
- Nice functional universal remote, but the shape is a little odd.
Pros:
- A very study TV. Though the cabinet is plastic, it felt solid, much more solid than the Vizio I had.
- The first thing I noticed was that the details of dark scenes is very good! I took this for granted on my other Aquos, but since I had a chance to sample the Vizio TV, I now really appreciate the capability to see details in darker scenes on an LCD TV. In fact, I'd say this TV does an even better job than my LC-37D5U in darker scenes.
- SD picture quality is decent. Lots of people say watching SD content on an HDTV is dumb, but since most of the programs out there are still SD, it good to know that this TV can produce a decent SD picture.
- Regular DVD content is also very good, much better than SD broadcast content. If you've never seen HD content before, the SD DVDs might be able to pass as HD to you =) But seriously though, this TV scales 480 content very nicely to the native 768 resolution. Also, the deinterlacer on this TV does an OK job with 480i content but jaggies can still be seen. Chances are, you'll want to just use a progressive 480p DVD player, or of course an HD-DVD or Bluray player! ;)
- HD content on this TV is incredible. Like I said, I already own another HD Aquos, but it still doesn't cease to amaze me when I see HD content. This TV is no exception. Broadcast HD shows like 24 and CSI are amazing. Up until now, I've only watched 24 on a DVD (regular DVD, not HDDVD). I watched 24 for the 1st time in HD after I got this TV.... WOW! I even did a comparison with my older larger Aquos, and maybe it's because the pixels on this TV are smaller, or maybe it's that this TV is a year newer than my older Aquos, but for some reason, the HD picture looked even sharper on this TV.
- The DVI-I input works great as a computer monitor
- The 6ms refresh spec isn't far off, I've seen no ghosting when playing Gears of War on my Xbox360. Speaking of Xbox360, the 720p and 1080i signals coming from it are amazing as well, even more so than the broadcast HD content. I can still see some compression artifacts once in a while in the broadcast HD programs (not the TVs fault), but with the Xbox360, the picture is absolutely clean.
- The virtual surround sound actually works pretty well. My bedroom isn't that big so perhaps that has something to do with it, but it really feels like the sound is coming at me from all directions.
- Not that I use closed captioning much, but for people with hearing problems, this TV will be great for you. You can customize the close captioning until your heart is content! Font size, type, background color, foreground color, opacity, all can be customized!
Cons:
- There is only one coax cable input on the set so you cannot use all 3 tuners at the same time, it depends on what kind of signal you feed into the single coax input.
- I personally wish there was more than 1 component input
- There is more than just a little "red push" on this set. I already noticed a slight red tint on my LC-37D5U, but the redness of the picture on this set is more apparent. The red push on this set is tamable if you set the color temperature setting to high (more blue) and turn down the "color" setting a bit. After tweaking it, it's acceptable, but still noticeable.
- No individual RGB settings, only a generic "color" setting. If there were, I'd probably be able to get rid of the "red push" even further.
- While this TV shows on screen program information for digital channels, it only shows it when you're change the channel to a digital station, or when the program information changes in between shows. There is no way to bring up the info otherwise, you have to change the channel and change it back to see the program information again.
- Changing channels is dog slow. Sometimes it can take a few seconds after you push the channel button until it actually changes.
My bottom line. This tv is great! I acknowledge that there are other LCD TVs that can do better, but they are more expensive. Sony comes to mind immediately. Given the price, I think this is probably the best bang for the buck in terms of quality and features.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 900
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Epinions.com ID:
alanp
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Reviews written: 27
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