1080p 37" Vizio has a killer picture, low price, but some issues. 3.5 Stars
Written: Jun 30 '09
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| sslabs's Full Review: Vizio VO370M LCD HDTV |
It sucks not getting what you want. You see, I’m a picky videophile and a devoted plasma man. Currently plasma sets are the minority, and consequently there are fewer choices when going plasma. To make matters worse, there are no late model plasmas under 42 inches. This made shopping for a smaller flat panel for a small bedroom a painful ordeal, I had to go LCD. So what did I want? Being a smaller bedroom set, I wasn’t going to spring for a high-end model. So it was all about getting the best bang for the buck. First on the list, full 1080p resolution and 37 inches in size.
Some will argue that at this size, the difference between 720p and 1080p is negligible, that means nothing to me. I consider 720p TVs old news, and it’s being phased out as I type this. Next on the list, I wanted a 10 bit panel, not the 8 bit panels found on the vast majority of LCD TVs. What’s the difference? 8 bit panels can display about 16 million colors and have only 256 levels of gradation per color. A 10 bit panel can display just over a billion colors, and is capable of 1024 levels of gradation per color. I also wanted a response time under 8 milliseconds if possible.
I wanted at least 2 HDMI inputs, 2 HD component inputs, an optical output (for 5.1 sound to my sound system) decent blacks, and bright whites. And it had to do all this for cheap. I wasn’t willing to spend much more than 6 bills (not including taxes) so the search began. The bad part about wanting a 37 inch set is that currently, this size isn’t the best value. The best bang for the buck are 40-42 inch panels, that’s the sweet spot.
All the major name brands were immediately eliminated. The prices for 37 inch Sony, Samsung, Toshiba and Panasonic 1080p sets were all one to five hundred dollars over what I wanted to spend. So my attention turned to the lesser known brands. I only found one set that met all of my requirements, it was the Vizio VO370M ‘Eco’ model. A dirty little secret of flat panel TVs is that there are only a handful of companies actually making these panels. Many of the brands you see are simply getting a name slapped on them and of course proprietary signal processing in some cases. Vizio is one of these companies. To the best of my knowledge, they don’t actually make any flat panels.
It’s very likely that this panel is actually coming from electronics giant LG. The LG 37LH30, a panel a few months older, seems to be the same as this Vizio. It’s the only other 37 inch with the same resolution, size, response time of 5ms and 10 bit panel. I couldn’t find any real reviews on this unit so, and it wasn’t up for display at my local walmart (still isn’t) so I made a blind purchase.I purchased the Vizio VO370M nearly a month ago for 597 rocks. I then had to bend over for the corrupt/bankrupt state of California and cough up $52 tax, and a $25 recycle fee. Does that money actually go straight down the toilet? Probably.
Unboxing good thing here, the packing is minimal and simple. The box was small enough to slip right into the back seat of my car without much fuss. The TV sits in a large form fitting plastic bag, sporting foam pieces at either end. The only real thing to do was attach the stand which is more like a small foot. Kudos to Vizio, a keyed kind of stump on the TV only allows the foot to go on one way. I then connected cable to the tuner, my blu ray player and connected the power cord.
Set-up Next it’s time to turn the set on. Immediately I was greeted by a start-up screen that guided me through a basic set-up. The first thing the TV prompted me to do was to scan for channels. I liked that as it scanned, I was informed with a large bar so that at any given moment I knew how far along things had progressed.
Even better, a tally of analog and digital channels was being kept as well. I had no idea that my basic crappy cable was also piping in a boat load of digital channels and a few HD channels as well. There was a lot to scan. In the end over 60 analog channels and 120+ digital channels were found, it took roughly 4-5 minutes to do this.
Next it was time to play around with the picture settings. Right out of the box, things weren’t too bad, but something was a bit off. The picture had a slight yellow cast. The guilty offender was the set being in a preset picture setting. All of the preset options like cool, neutral and warm have a yellow-ish dingy looking color cast. Change to custom and it all goes away. Even better, in custom you can tweak the primary colors to your liking.
The layout for color, contrast, brightness and other various settings is good but not great. Things could have been grouped a little differently, but it’s a nit-pick. Making changes is usually a simple affair. Changing channels is slow and I’m not sure why in this age of very advanced digital products. It’s a three second count between digital channels, that’s unusually slow.
Picture quality: I’m very happy in this regard. The picture is very bright, and whites can be intensely white with certain material. Detail is very sharp, I was worried because some LCD TVs have a very soft look about them. Where I’m happiest, is with the color of this particular panel. The reds are very red and it can reproduce very deep blood and brick reds. Some entry level LCD panels have reds that are orange-y or have a slight pink cast. Blues and greens are always very pleasing.
I was surprised that with HD material, this panel can faithfully display fluorescent colors. During a HD NBC broadcast of the Prefontaine Classic, the crowd and even some runners sported some crazy fluorescent clothing that really pops on this set.
The color/shade gradations can be fairly smooth, but it depends on the material. Some HD content can be very compressed (low bit rate) but it’s generally very smooth. Black and white material (PBS 1080i, Sin City blu ray) looks great, and it was nearly impossible for me to detect any kind of color cast. How are the blacks? TV nerds talk about this all the time. Why? Because early plasma and LCD TVs could not produce a true deep black. They could do a grey, then a dark grey, and in the present, most flat panel TVs give the illusion of a good black.
This set, during most material creates the illusion of nice deep blacks. That illusion is destroyed with dark scenes, credit rolls and on CinemaScope movies with black bars in low light and at night. Light leakage on this LCD panel is present, and it’s pretty bad. In a dark room, it sticks out like a sore thumb. Even worse, light leakage when viewed off angle is downright atrocious. For a 2009 model I expected better. The only good thing I can say is that in the sweet spot (seated front and center) the blacks are never grey. Even with completely dark scenes, the blacks appear like black t-shirts being hit with a flash light. So things never look grey, but rather like black with some light leaking through if that makes any sense.
More bad news, back-light uniformity isn’t the best. More light leaks in the bottom and corners and it’s exaggerated when viewed off angle. Vizio lists the set as having a 178 degree viewing angle. That’s laughable. Sure you can see something at extreme angles, but the image will be totally washed out. It happens in as little as 45 degrees off angle. So a more accurate number where picture quality is concerned would be a 90 degrees total viewing off angle.
One other flaw that is difficult to detect is a slight pink/peachy cast in very specific conditions. There are lots of commercials on TV that make use of bright white backgrounds, some of which have strong vignetting. When going from light to dark, I see a faint pinkish cast. It’s difficult to photograph, but fairly easy to find if you know what to look for. Most mortals will never see this. Another issue, very white clothing and white lights tend to blow out too easily. Warm lights and very light areas that have some kind of color don’t seem to suffer from this.
Picture quality: PASS but barely. If you relish true dark blacks in a dark room at night, and you demand black bars that are truly black, skip this set. If you want friends not in the sweet spot to see a great picture, pass on this set. If you are on a tight budget, and you can deal with this you’ll be rewarded with a fantastic picture most of the time with HD material. Standard definition material looks like trash, I won’t sugar coat it.
Sound well, it’s average and nothing to write home about. To be honest, traditional speakers in such a small enclosure cannot physically do much so I don’t expect much. Vizio includes a simulated surround mode from SRS Labs called TruSurround HD. It can make the sound more spacious, but on dialogue the sound can have a sucked out hollow quality. So I keep it turned off because of this.
Remote control Already some have said that the remote is cheap, even flimsy, but I disagree. The remote is bare bones, but there is nothing cheap about it. The remote has a glossy finish to match the TV, the most used keys (volume and channel) are large and distinct feel to them. More points for having direct keys to all the inputs for quick access to all your components. It’s easy to get to any input, my only gripe is that there is no button to directly address aspect ratios.
Pro and Cons at a glance
PROS
Full 1080p resolution is sharp, HD cable and blu ray look fantastic
beautiful and accurate color on a budget model
5 millisecond response time when 6-8 is common for budget panels
user menus are easy to use and navigate
there is a five band EQ for sound when SRS is off
all inputs can be custom named
optical output to pass 5.1 sound to audio equipment, RCA stereo analog as well
PC input supports many PC resolutions including 1920x1080
All HDMI inputs are V1.3 (no mention of deep color support)
Picture controls are good for such a cheap TV
Whites are incredibly white and blacks look deep in most situations
TV sips the juice. Only 110 watts average and .34 watts in standby (according to Vizio)
Connectivity HDMI x 3, HD component x 2, composite x 2, 1 s-video 1 PC
Lip sync to deal with matching up video and audio timing
Supports 24 frames per second (via HDMI/blu ray)
For the hard of hearing, closed captioning can be customized, font size, color, transparency
Parental controls (V chip 2.0)
User manual is thorough and easy to understand
CONS
standard def TV looks horrible
DVD picture quality is nothing to get excited about
Changing channels is too slow
light leakage is excessive
off angle light leakage is very poor
image washes out at moderate angles
light uniformity is poor
matte screen gives the screen a plastic-y, hazy appearance if strong light is present
picture settings like ‘color’ are global (effect other inputs) this can be a deal breaker for some
When switching to HDMI, TV does not auto detect which input is active
TV does not turn off when no signal is detected (I waited a few minutes)
back-light and dynamic contrast controls have zero visible effect
bright whites tend to blow out, vignetting or white to black transitions have a faint pink cast
No direct button on remote for stretch, zoom and full screen
TV cannot force widescreen material (2.35/2.40:1) to fill the screen
TV ships/defaults to a preset color temp that gives a very faint yellow/green cast
Final Thoughts
This is a solid buy for the price, with my only real gripes being light leakage visible in low light, and poor off angle performance. My next flat panel purchase will be a Panasonic Plasma (12th gen) panel. I’ll be happy to skip the pricey high-end LCDs and all their issues for less money. In the 42 to 50 inch range, I suggest the same for my fellow videophiles.
My current Vizio VO370M settings
All of these settings came to be in the old fashioned way. I simply played with the settings over several days while watching HD cable and various blu ray discs. My personal tastes are for strong colors, but not going so far that people look like clowns. I also tend for neutral colors, maybe leaning a tad toward a cool color temp. I prefer brightness only until the darkest areas begin to show they are becoming lighter, that happens at around 52-56 range. I like a contrast-y picture, but not so much that it tends to bloom or blow out badly. The following settings are my ‘center’ and I will tweak at times if certain blu ray discs or HD broadcasts appear dark or have low saturation.
Range 0-100
Back-light: N/A I see zero effect on all settings
Brightness: 52 to 56
Contrast: 65
Color: 31
Tint: 0 (center)
Sharpness: 1-7 range, set at 3
Noise Reduction: OFF
Color Enhancement: Normal (off and reds can seem orange-y)
Advanced Adaptive Luma: Low
Backlight control: DCR (effect not visible)
Color Temperature: Custom
color range 0-255
RED: 138 GREEN: 120 BLUE: 140
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 597
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sslabs
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Member: Tony Flores
Location: Calistoga - Napa Valley Wine Country
Reviews written: 99
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