Poor picture on new 32" Samsung (1 Viewer)

[RoyB]

My girlfriend just bought a new 32" direct view flatscreen HDTV-ready Samsung set at Costco. She hooked it up to digital cable and the picture seems quite grainy and "over-processed" compared to my JVC. Even DVD's seem grainier than normal. The picture just doesn't seem crisp and clear. Any ideas??????? Any similar experiences?????

 

[Evan Hartnett]

Have you calibrated it at all yet? Out of the box the Samsungs usually look bad but once you set the contrast, brightness and sharpness it'll look a lot better. Turning off VSM also had a good effect on how everything looked when I had a Samsung (you have to get into the service menu though).

 

[Mark_Carpenter]

I would say that sharpness is a big factor on picture quality. Out of the box chances are it's at max, you may need to turn it down until you get a good picture. With DVDs i find it looks fine at max settings, but with digital TV i need to turn it down to around half.

 

[Adam Bluhm]

How does it look through DVD playback?

 

[John Gooby]

I bought the Samsung TXM3281HF at Costco, I had similar problems out of the box. Adjusting the settings in Custom by turning the sharpness, brghtness, and contrast way down. Here are someone else's Avia settings, mine are slightly higher...

Contrast 36
Brightness 38
Sharpness 10
Color 26
Tint 55/45

Also Turning off SVM helped on some of the shows that seemed "overprocessed".

 

[RoyB]

Thanks for the suggestions...I will definitely adjust the settings and have a look.

How does one turn off the "SVM" or "VSM"? Are they the same thing? Clueless...

 

[Jack Briggs]

Yes, they're the same: "scan-velocity modulation" or "velocity-scan modulation." And some say "2:3 pulldown" while others say "3:2 pulldown." And I say "to-may-toe" and you say "to-mah-toe." ("Hello, hello, hello/I don't know why you say goodbye, but I say hello." c 1967 John Lennon, Paul McCartney.)

On that set, Roy, one must disable SVM in the service menu.

 

[RoyB]

I know that I had to coerce my TV technician before he'd give me the procedure for accessing my JVC's service menu. Does anyone know the procedure for Samsung??

 

[MikeyWeitz]

TV off--mute-1-8-2-power. make sure you write down ALL the default settings before you mess with them. New Samsungs have the SVM turned down already. I wouldnt mess with the service menu if I were you. If you dont even know how to calibrate it with avia or VE, you are asking for seious trouble.