CRT TV advice, please (1 Viewer)

[Bart H-worth]

This looks like the board to go to for good info, so I thought I would give it a shot. I have just bought a new house and am building my entertainment system right now. The house has a built in cabinet. I had originally thought about removing it and going with a RPTV, but I think I will just keep it and go with a direct view that will fit.

I have a good audio system and come from an "audio background". Not surround, but a high quality stereo/sub setup.

For the TV, I have about 39" width to work with. I will be using DirecTV and my Sony DVPNC685V for video. I may get a Bravo or Samsung upconverting DVD player later. I want the TV to have HD capability and would prefer DVI connections. The obvious choice is the Sony 34" XBR widescreen. Unfortunately, I just can't bring myself to pay that amount. I do like the widescreen format, as I am concerned with DVD performance and think the modified picture looks better on a 16:9 set than a 4:3 if you change the aspect ratio.

Sorry for such a long post, but here are some TVs and prices I can get - what do you recommend? Oh, anf the room is about 14' x 14' with a viewing distance of about 110". There are windows only on the wall that the TV is on, so none are on the front of it. There are woods outside those windows.

• Sony KV-34HS510 - $1600
• Philips 34PW8320(?) - $1400
• Toshiba 34HFX83 - $1750
• Zenith and JVC also have 34" widescreens, but I don't know a good place to buy - any sugg?
• I might consider a 30" widescreen XBR for a similar price as the above, though I think it would be too small. I can also get Toshiba, Philips and Samung 30" WS for about $900
• Maybe I should just get a Samsung 32" HDTV for $799 and live with that a few years?

Thanks in advance for any advice or other info you might be able to help me with.

-Bart

 

[Chad B]

Hi Bart,

I have a customer who has a Sony 34HS510 and is extremely happy with it. Before calibration, it looked promising. Extremely sharp and detailed, plenty of light output, and a great set of features. It calibrated exceptionally well, and it now has perfect color fidelity, nearly perfect grayscale tracking, good convergence and geometry for a big direct view, and it holds it's brightness well from bright to dark scenes. The only thing I wasn't overjoyed about was a very small amount of edge enhancement I wasn't able to eliminate.
I also have a customer with a Samsung 32" HD. I calibrated his main set, which is a Mits 65", and I took a quick look at the Samsung. It has some serious issues, and I haven't researched yet to find out if they can be improved with a calibration. The 1080i input has severe geometry (picture size and shaping) problems, and the set appears to have a very weak power supply. This is evidenced when the picture size dramatically changes with the average picture level. We turned down the contrast, and that helped a little. It also had some red convergence problems.
I haven't had experience yet with the others, but I might be calibrating a JVC 34" soon.
Hope this helps, and happy shopping!

Chad

 

[Bart H-worth]

Thanks for your experienced opinion, Chad. I do see Sony as the benchmark on mainstream TVs.