New Sony 34" KV34HS510 Widescreen $1,999.99 (1 Viewer)

[Bill Will]

Best Buy just advertised this set. Anybody seen it yet & what were your impressions?

 

[Bill Will]

The specs. & pictures (Front, Back, Remote & etc) are also up on Best Buy's website.

 

[Kevin_Kr]

Nice set, the xbr above it will offer you a 2 year warranty versus 1, adjustable drc, and better sharpness. For 300.00 more don't know if that s worth it or not?

 

[Jim A. Banville]

$2000 for such a small TV?! Add $1000 more and at least you could get a much larger, and cool looking, Gateway 42" plasma TV for your friends to drool over
Seriously, if I was in a small room, I'd spend that same amount on an under-$500 standard TV for everyday use, plus I'd set up a tiny $1100 Sanyo Z1 projector (16:9 aspect) on a shelf in the rear of the room for watching movies.

 

[SeanA]

The Gateway plasma does not do HD.

I bought the Sony 34" XBR for just over $2000, and am very pleased with the HD performance. Nothing short of awesome. I find myself watching the Stanley Cup just because it is in HD, even though I am not a hockey fan.

 

[Leo_P]

FYI, jandr.com has it here for $1,699.00.
I'm just waiting to lay my eyes on the new 34" XBR910. If the 910 really WOWs me I'll probably get it, if not I'll probably get the HS510.

 

[dan fritzen]

Leo any info on the 34" XBR910, I have the 34XBR800 and am curios what the differences will be.

 

[Carlo_M]

Saw it at Good Guys, and after monkeying with the controls (setting the brightness, contrast and sharpness levels down and turning off SVM) it looked respectable! Of course I had to turn everything back up to "display room hot" levels when a salesman came by.

I'm waiting on their 30" 16:9 model, slated for late summer/early fall. I need a bedroom set and 34" is a bit big (and the price is still a little steep). The 30" will MSRP at $1500.

 

[Jim A. Banville]

The Gateway plasma does not do HD.

I don't care what numbers Sony advertises. I seriously doubt that the smaller CRT on the 34" Sony is capable of "truly" showing significantly more resolution than the Gateway.

 

[Jack Briggs]

Well, I find this to be a damn fine set. And I'm not at all a fan of plasma panels.

 

[Jack Gilvey]

I'm waiting on their 30" 16:9 model, slated for late summer/early fall. I need a bedroom set and 34" is a bit big (and the price is still a little steep). The 30" will MSRP at $1500.

You might also take a look at this set . 16:9 30" viewable, completely adjustable as far as geometry, R/G/B, etc., supports 720p natively, no silly SVM, VGA input, and a finer dot pitch than any of the direct-view 30-34" sets I've seen (pixels are what I always notice most on direct-view HD sets). $775. Basically a Princeton AF3.0HD without the "Princeton". Alas, no DVI and has a slightly curved screen (not as noticeable to me as on the 38" RCA).

 

[Leo_P]

Dan, you can check out Sony's press release here.
I think the major difference from your XBR800 is the Super Fine Pitch CRT. From what I've gathered, the aperture grill is a limiting factor in a tube TV's resolution. Sony has found a way to "poke" more holes in the thing thereby increasing the pixel count.
Apparently, it's only gonna make HD content look better, though, since DVD's and SD won't benefit from the increased resolution.
To be honest, the more I think about it, the more I'm leaning toward the HS510. The only HD I'd be getting is OTA (and not very much of that, unfortunately) and the rest would be video games (a few of which are HD) and DVD's, so I wouldn't really be benefiting from the XBR910's technology much. When the time comes, we'll see if the ~$500 difference is worth it.

 

[Jim A. Banville]

Well, there you have it! If Sony's press release says it, it must be true The proof is in the pudding. I'd like to see an un-biased review of the sets actual resolution and at what LOW contrast setting (too dim for real world viewing would be my guess) is required to benifit from Sony's technological marvel

 

[Leo_P]

at what LOW contrast setting (too dim for real world viewing would be my guess) is required to benefit from Sony's technological marvel

You lost me there, Jim. What does contrast have to do with pixel-count? Like I said, it seems that only HD content will benefit and now it seems you're saying you won't get an improvement at all? I'd hate to drop ~$2500 on a TV set and get hoodwinked.

 

[Jim A. Banville]

Phosphors on the TV screen (the tiny spots that glows when the electrons strike them) "bloom" or increase in size as you turn up CONTRAST (white level). The beam spot must be TINY on a CRT TV of the size spoken of here to achieve full HD resolution. So tiny in fact that it can't be asked to glow very brightly before it "blooms" in size, obscuring the phosphors beside it, and thus reducing the visible resolution to well below the advertised HD number. Look, I'm no big fan of plasma sets either. In fact, I've NEVER seen the Gateway 42" plasma. It may be horrible. I just can't see spending $2000 on such a small screen as these Sony 16:9's, but then I'm far from rich I guess that's the premium price Sony charges you to have a "cool" widescreen TV when you could get a comparable TV with a larger 4:3 screen for half as much. The money which you saved could go towards a tiny 5 lb., "HD compatible" projector the size of a large dictionary that will give you an 8' wide, 16:9 (read="cool") image on your wall To each his own

 

[Aaron Cohen]

Damn, I paid 2500 bucks for the KV-34XBR800 last summer, and now this set's coming out with a potential 65% increase in resolution....bah! Hehe, ah well. At least they are replacing the tube in my television because it was acting up. The service guy ordering the new tube from Sony said that Sony had taken into account some problems with the tubes and had rectified them a little bit so I would getting an updated tube. Is it possible I will be getting one of these fancy new tubes?

 

[Leo_P]

you could get a comparable TV with a larger 4:3 screen for half as much.

Actually, the 40XBR800 (which I think is a steal at ~$2k) yields a bigger 16:9 picture than a 34" widescreen, but it's too damn BIG for me. I was then thinking about going to a 36" 4:3, which is borderline dimensionally, but it's got a smaller 16:9 picture than a 34" WS. Back to square one...
On a side note, while checking out the TV's at Best Buy yesterday I looked at a couple of plasma sets. They had 3 42" sets in close proximity. One was a high-def (1024X768) Sony, the other two, a Sampo and a Daewoo, were ED (480p). They were being fed DiscoveryHD. The Sony looked best, but not by much, plus it had red push BAD. The Sampo was a close second, the only thing was it was a little washed out (probably the contrast set too high) and it looked a little pixelated at times. The Daewoo had good color, but the image was a little soft. FWIW, the Sony was around $6k while the Daewoo and Sampo were both $2900.

 

[dan fritzen]

http://news.sel.sony.com/pressrelease/3407

read this, I bought the 34XBR800 in January, man I am kinda bummed now, this is cheaper and higher quality, why did I read that, only makes me feel like I wasted my money?