New 57H81 (1 Viewer)

[Will]

Has anyone purchased a Toshiba 57H81?
According to OneCall, it's in stock at http://www.onecall.com/PID_12485.htm

 

[Bill Millar]

I would like to know, is this Model the latest model or is there a new 57 16X9 coming out?
Bill

 

[John Morris]

Bill: Toshiba has two new 16:9 lines out or coming out shortly. The xxH81 and the xxHS81. If you are considering the 57" models, the HS series will only be around $360 more but may only be sold at B&M stores while the H series are available everywhere!
DUH!!! HX not HS... must have had Sony on my brain? And to think I've been shopping for one of these for 3 days now...
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Take Care,
merc
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DFAST, 5C, DVI, HDCP, SafeAudio, Macrovision and Lewinski!!!
[Edited last by John Morris on August 09, 2001 at 09:55 PM]

 

[Craig Robertson]

actually, the two model #'s are XXH81 and XXHX81, where the first two X's are screen size, for example: 65H81 and 65HX81. the H version is the standard line and the HX version is the Cinema Series. there will be a smaller availability of the Cinema Series line, since most discounters will undoubtedly carry the standard H line.

 

[Will]

Lots of people have purchased a 50H81. Anyone have a 57H81?

 

[David Kirley]

Our 57H81 arrived last tuesday.A minor problem with flashing horizontal line when I first turned it on, but it hasn't happened since wednsday,so hopefully it was some burn-off in the crt's.A slight bow in the crosshatch pattern at the bottom of the screen,hopefully once I figure out the service menu that will be an easy fix.
Last night we watched Vertical Limit DVD with A Pioneer 434 Progressive scan ( actually a line doubler) and the picture was astonishing!!!! The clarity, smoothness, color rendition were fantastic to put it mildly.I have never seen a movie that looked this good on a RPTV before, anywhere! WE haggled back and forth before buying this set to maybe get the 34" Panasonic HDTV that has an absolute fantastic picture as well, but almost $750 more in price than the Toshiba.Well we are glad we went with the Toshiba, due to fact that were are getting the high impact of the big screen as well as razor sharp imaging.
But all DVD progressive scan movies are not equal,some better than others. On some material it made little difference between interlace and prog.But evan in interlace the picture looks pretty darn good.
On 500 Dish the picture is Very good to poor depending on the feed (funny how all the home shopping channels ALL look great), but there is NO RED PUSH on any of the S-video connects.
The only draw back is the highly reflective screen, but we watch all our movies in very low light conditions so this won't be a big factor.
Based on what I have observed you won't find a better deal in this range than the Toshiba.

 

[Will]

The only draw back is the highly reflective screen,
but we watch all our movies in very low light conditions
so this won't be a big factor.

That's a shame since supposedly one of the reasons
to get an RPTV instead of an FPTV is that it can be
watched with more ambient light. Can the reflective
screen on your new 57H1 be removed?

 

[Pete B.]

That's a shame since supposedly one of the reasons
to get an RPTV instead of an FPTV is that it can be
watched with more ambient light. Can the reflective
screen on your new 57H81 be removed?
Yes the screen can be removed Will. Go here for detailed instructions with pics: Link Removed

 

[Michael St. Clair]

Last night we watched Vertical Limit DVD with A Pioneer 434 Progressive scan ( actually a line doubler)

Whoa! Run the 434 in interlaced mode, and let the set do the doubling. The Toshiba does 3:2, and the 434 does not, so you would want the set, not the player, to do the work!

 

[David Kirley]

Yes the screen is removable at least according to a post on hometheater spot forum,it is not that bothersome so I have not done it. We have watched movies in low light for years, evan before we got into home theater, so this is nothing out of the ordinary for us.
On some movies the sets doubler looks better than the Pioneer, but not all.

 

[Marc Alexander]

David Kirley wrote:

but there is NO RED PUSH on any of the S-video connects.

David, how did you measure that there is NO RED PUSH. This seems highly unlikely. Most all sets ship with at least some red push (I would consider +5 as excellent, but +10 to +20 seems to be the norm).
If you indeed measured 0 by using AVIA, then this is indeed great news!

 

[David Kirley]

I use VE as a set-up, but red push is very obvious when you see it. Dark purple instead of black and, no natural colors and so on. I could not measure it on the toshiba but there are no noticable effects of red push as I have seen on so many other set's.

 

[Will]

I guess the BIG question in my mind is how good is
the line doubler and how it compares to the awesome
line doubler of current Pioneer Elites which have
been out for about two years. The initial impression
of David Kirley is promising:

On some movies the sets doubler looks better than
the Pioneer, but not all.