badbonz0007's Full Review: Sony BRAVIA KDL-52XBR2 52 in. HDTV/VCR/DVR Combo
Have you ever tried to go shopping for a television set with your daughter? Will we have and it took us longer than usual because every time we turned around she was looking at something else such as swing sets and other toys that caught her eye. She kept saying oh Daddy look at this, oh Daddy look at that, all the while I was trying to read the signs of all the different television sets that they had to offer. We tried all of the Electronic Stores from Sears, to Costco, to Best Buy, and even Circuit City while they were out of business. We ended up at Costco, that is where they had the best deal that we considered. For only $2000 we found this 52 inch Sony Bravia LCD flat screen TV, mixed amongst all of the other brand names such as Sharp, Samsung, Toshiba and other names that I do not particularly want to mention. There are a lot of things to be considered, as we soon found out, such as they refresh rate, and that is the numbers that you will see alongside of the HZ letters found on the box or the advertisement. This particular set as a refresh rate of 240 HZ. Usually the higher the number the better the refresh rate, the normal refresh rate that you will probably see on these LCD TVs is 60hz and also the mega pixels has the same meaning, the higher number there the better the picture. Nowadays you have to prepare for the future when purchasing a television set such as this. Even though you may not use anything that is Blu-ray compatible now, you will probably need it in the future. So, with that in mind we decided to prepare for the future and purchase a more expensive model than what we really needed right now. The higher refresh rate will probably add $1000 to the price of your new flat screen television set.
Description
This particular model has TV/VCR/DVR combination all mixed in one. The actual width of this is approximately 56 inches by 5 inches deep by 33 inches in height and weighs 102 pounds. This has a silver outer frame and comes with a black stand. You can purchase a wall mount for this, but that will run you over $200. In either case the wall mount or a console to sit in on will cost you more than $200 to set this up. That is in addition to the $2000 that you are going to spend for the television set. The other thing to remember is a fact that you cannot fit this inside of a regular automobile you will have to have a truck to deliver it and it will take two people to carry it.
Features
This particular LCD TV has a response time of 8 ms per frame and the actual viewing screen is 52 inches. The other thing that you have to watch is the contrast ratio and of course the higher the number in this department the better this particular model it has 1300 to 1 ratio. You can play regular CDs or dvds in this TV, but it will accept Blu-ray compatible. This has HDMI capabilities and has a resolution of 1920 to 1080 mega pixels. This also has an HDTV integrated receiver, which include a broadcast format of 1080P (HDTV), 1080i (HDTV), 720P (HDTV), 480P (EDTV), and 480i (SDTV). This television set gets its format support broadcast from 1080p (HDTV), to 1080i (HDTV), 720p (HDTV), 480p (EDTV), 480i (SDTV). What is very nice about this particular model is that it has a built-in tuner with the qualification of ATSC-NTSC-QAM. It has a 16.9 aspect ratio and an enhanced 4.3 to 14.9 interpolated aspect ratio. The image quality is the best I’ve ever seen, it has a combination image filter of 3DYC/3D digital, and a display resolution of 1920 by 1080 pixels. When watching this television it has almost 180° viewing angle. So this means that no matter where you stand you should have a decent picture. A lot of TV sets that you are used to owning would usually get very hot after being ran for a while, but not in this case it has an adjustable color temperature sensor to prevent from overheating at or running too hot.
There are a lot of different input and output connectors, that way you will only have to plug things in, instead of the old style, digging out the screwdriver and screwing a wire onto these connections. This has an S-video X 1 component x 2, composite x 2, HDMI x 2, audio RCA jack x 4,1 x T-sub (RGB PC), these input connectors are all located in the rear of the television set. There is only one output connector located on the rear and that is one audio RCA jack. The input connections that are located on the front of this television are few and they are a composite x 1, HDMI x 1, and an audio RCA jack. The output connectors that are located on the front are just the same, but it is an audio mini jack with one headphone jack.
As to the audio and the way it sounds, this comes equipped with virtual surround sound and a variable fixed excellent MTS stereo sound with an automatic audio leveler. On the front of the outer edges on the size you will notice two small 11 W speakers that will blow your mind. In this case, size does not matter the smaller the better. A couple of the other nice features about this particular set is the fact that it has picture within a picture, and a V-chip parent control and a way to set this in case you fall asleep while you are watching TV. A lot of places make a big deal about the energy star factor when purchasing an appliance, I am not sure what this would have to do with the television set but this is Energy star compliant. But, of course this would not be a state of the art TV without your multi brand remote control that comes with batteries and your different onscreen languages that you can choose from, these include English, French, Spanish, with all channel labels included.
Experience
When we first got this TV home we did notice that we had a big mess to deal with Styrofoam and plastic all over the place, so I would highly recommend removing all of this to give yourself some room to work around because it will take two people to install this. Once you put the stand on the bottom of this and plug in and connect the cable wire you will notice that it does some kind of pre programming setup once this is done you will notice the most beautiful picture that you have ever for seen on a TV. It was as if everything came to life when the picture finally did come in. We have been using this for just a little bit, and I highly recommend hooking up the surround sound with some extra speakers, it is an excellent opportunity to enjoy theater sound in your own home. Such as, if you were watching a movie or show with an airplane on the screen, it will sound as if the airplane was going in one ear and out the other with this surround sound. This crystal clear picture and vibrant colors that this has, puts all of our other television sets to shame. The only problem that we had found was the fact that it was a little bit on the bulky side, but once we got it set up and decided where we’re going to put it, there is where it sat, like a king on its thrown it gets your attention. Probably the best thing that we did notice setting aside that the picture quality and clarity were excellent, was the sound. If you do a test compared to your older TVs throughout your house, you can turn this one up halfway and that is the loudest that your other TVs will go. Any higher up you will probably blow the speaker on one of your other TVs, with this one you do not have to worry about that, there is no distortion when turning it up to full blast.
Warranty
As usual this only comes up with a 90 day store warranty or a one year overall warranty period.
Conclusion
With the way things are changing in today’s market I would highly recommend spending the money and purchasing the best that you can buy, so that in the future you will not have to change over to a different type of television set. We’re making the change now for just that reason, we are extremely happy with the color and sound that this television set puts out, we had discussed with each other about getting a plasma TV or a LCD TV, but the LCD won out over the plasma TV. My wife and I are so happy with this particular set that we are thinking about purchasing a smaller copy of the same version for our other family room. You can purchase the lower refresh rate models if you are sure that you are not going to play any Blu-ray dvds. It can save you up to $2000 on the bigger models. On this particular model it could cost you as much as $1000 more than what you really need, but if you are trying to prepare for the future, then spend the money now because in five years $1000 might be the equivalent to $2000.
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