Panasonic VIERA X1 Series TC-L26X1 26-Inch 720p LCD HDTV

From the Manufacturer (April 23, 2009)
The 26-inch Viera TC-L26X1 LCD 720p HDTV is ideal for lovers of music and videos. The iPod Entertainment Kit lets you control and play back your iPod (not included) music and videos. Also the Viera Image Viewer provides a better way to share your digital photos,just put your SD memory card into the memory card slot, and your digital photos are instantly displayed. With Viera Link, you can control your compatible Panasonic DVD recorder, Blu-ray Disc player, home theater sound system, and HD camcorder, all with a single remote and helpful on-screen menus.

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Panasonic VIERA X1 Series TC-L26X1 26-Inch 720p LCD HDTV...

The 26-inch Viera TC-L26X1 LCD 720p HDTV is ideal for lovers of music and videos. The iPod Entertainment Kit lets you control and play back your iPod (not included) music and videos. Also the Viera Image Viewer provides a better way to share your digital photos, just put your SD memory card into the memory card slot, and your digital photos are instantly displayed. With Viera Link, you can control your compatible Panasonic DVD recorder, Blu-ray Disc player, home theater sound system, and HD camcorder, all with a single remote and helpful on-screen menus.Very good 26" LCD television and is just the right size in our guest bedroom..... I believe that Panasonic beats them all hands down.... we replaced our very old CRT TV with this new light weight LCD and it does not take up as much space as the old unit did........ in my own opinion, this Panasonic LCD has the best picture and sound over the other brands, and I did a lot of comparing before buying ..... I really like the timer feature too...... the set-up menu and features are very user friendly. The remote is not lit... has no internal light... but I don't think any of them have an internal light..... not a complaint, but the remote has more stuff on it than I will ever use.... I have owned my 42" Plasma Panasonic for over 2 years now and I am very satisfied with it too.... The plasma has a little bit of a better picture, colors are more vivid, than a LCD has but a plasma also cost more money too.... and a plasma weighs more and uses more power than a LCD TV... This TV only comes in glossy black, the frame and base, which looks very nice but shows every speck of dust. I even called Panasonic and complained about that.....for not offering an alternate color like silver or gray.... I think that most all of the other brands, under 42", also come in only glossy black this year..... oh well.... my wife doesn't mind the glossy black..... Last month I purchased the TC-L32X1 for our bedroom and we liked it so well that we bought the TC-L26X1 LCD in the 26' size for the guest bedroom...... this TV also comes with a dock for plugging in your ipod but I'm not into any of that stuff so I can't say how well it works.... sorry... I have also posted a picture of our new TV here and that's my soda pop can next to the TV so you can get an idea of the size, etc.... and the President just happen to be on the news when I snapped the picture..... I recommend this Panasonic TC-L26X1 LCD TV...... they are very nice and well worth the little extra money over the other brands......

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Panasonic VIERA C12 Series TC-L32C12 32-Inch 720p LCD HDTV...

The Best Way to Watch Movies at Home. Ever. With superior video resolution as well as audio playback, Blu-ray Discs are six-times better than DVDs. Not sure which players are BD-Live enabled? Or of what BD-Live even is? Visit your newly redesigned High-Def Headquarters to find out more and get in the know. This TV was just recently released as of the time of this review, and it's one of the best TVs under $500 you can find on the market. I did a LOT of research looking for what I wanted in a TV. I've been wanting a nice flatscreen for a while now. I've been holding out as and quality has been improving while prices have been dropping. I finally settled on this Panasonic.

I wanted a TV for primarily movies (Hi Def and standard or upconverted Def) and video games (Hi Def and standard def). I do not have a cable subscription and am not curious in HD cable services. That being said, I wanted a TV that would double as a humongous PC monitor. I'm pleased to say this TV meets and exceeds my needs so far. It's a big upgrade from the 20 inch tube TV I was using before the VIERA.

The LCD TV is nice looking and has a variety of cable inputs. Both the remote and menu systems are top-notch and useful. This TV puts out true 720p resolution and has 4:3 ratio (standard, full-frame) and zoom scaling as well. For TVs 32 inches and under, 1080p (while nice) is not necessary, as you'd be hard pressed to notice a dramatic difference with your HDMI or component sources. The picture is super sharp, and the image control obtainable with this TV is pretty impressive. You can really play with the picture and color. I was laughing at the efficacy to essentially reproduce that 60's Technicolor supersaturation if you want. It really brings films to life. You can make up to 4 preset color choices, too- One for films, one for sports or live action TV, one for video games, one for kid's cartoons, etc, etc.

There is 1 stuck pixel on the TV. This is to be expected, and is not noticeable unless you're looking for stuck or dead pixels from about 18 inches away. I cannot look the pixel when watching, though, exclusively when I'm up close on the screen. This is not an issue at all. You cannot pick out 1 dead pixel on a TV of this resolution. 1 out of over 1 million pixels, the rest are flawless.

I've just gotten this, and haven't fully tested completely the bells and whistles, like the SD card port or the VIERA Link HDMI software (waiting for 1080p media player, coming in the mail). PC to TV was effortless and looked great. Even my old PS2 looked pretty good, albeit jaggy. I think that's more the game than the TV, though.

I almost went and got a $300 or $375 no-name tv at Walmart or Target, but I'm glad I paid a bit more for a higher-quality product. This Panasonic is really, really, well built, and is a near-perfect 32 inch TV. I'm more than happy with my purchase. As I test it out more, I plan to update this review, but so far, I'm loving it! This Panasonic is a great TV at an affordable price point, and 32 inches is complete for most small to medium sized rooms.

Also, if you have any certain questions, post 'em and I'll do my best to answer.

**UPDATE**

I've had the TV for a while now and still love it. I got an upconverting Sony DVD player (model DVPNS710HB ) that puts out 480p, 720p, and 1080i upconverts of standard DVDs. I bought a $3 HDMI cable from buy.com (skip the $100 monster cables, trust me) and the picture is fantastic. The trick is that since the TV displays 720p, by switching the DVD player to send the data in 720p, you get a native resolution that lets the image look its best on the TV. While the TV has a scaler built in, having the DVD player scan and scale and then transmit via HDMI produces a signifigantly clearer picture. Some of the DVDs I have that were shot on digital video look very, very close to HD programming. My digitally remastered James Bond DVDs look signifigantly better than through a component DVD player. I was impressed.

As for the other features- the SD card reader is slow for my tastes. It takes a couple of seconds to load each picture. Of course, I have a VGA connector hooked up, so its much more convenient to load the pictures to my PC and view them thru windows. HQ images look AMAZING on this TV, though. I had always shot digital pictures at high resolutions, but couldn't really see them as they were meant to be seen, only having a 15 inch LCD. With the early TV as my monitor, my pictures now look 100 times better.

Another cool feature- through Viera Link, the HDMI Sony DVD player works with the Panasonic remote- no programing needed. I simply went into the Viera Link menu and selected the HDMI DVD player, now my DVD player will initiate and interrupt when I power on the TV and I can control it all from my TV remote. Very cool.

I'll post some more updates if I have anything else to say or if anyone has any questions.

Tags: Panasonic VIERA C12 Series

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LG 32LH30 32-Inch 1080p LCD HDTV, Gloss Black...

Think there's no such thing as an affordable 1080p TV with great features as well as technology? You'll think again when you take a look at the LH30. It delivers a stunning picture in Full HD 1080p and LG's innovative Core Technologies deliver an enhanced audio and video experience. With the LH30, affordability does not mean compromise. It means getting a great HDTV---period. See for yourself.The LG 32LH30 32-Inch 1080p replaced a 720p 32 inch Samsung which I returned because of erratic sound quality. The LG provides a clear picture for upscaled DVD movies and over the air digital signals. The speakers provide excellent sound for a small living room although the addition of a house theater system would substantially increase movie enjoyment. Standard definition signals reproduce a stable clear picture. Colors are very great and the set provides sufficient tools to tweak the picture for personal preference. I have not used it for bluray as yet but HD from satellite is very good. The features of this unit described on the Amazon specifications list accurately describe its features and can be relied upon. I am not a hard core cinema/video buff but I cannot imagine that this unit'll not satisfy most viewers who want a well priced midsized flat screen high definition TV. My five stars are based upon what I expect in similarly designed and priced units for a

Tags: LG 32LH30 32-Inch

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Samsung LN40B630 40-Inch 1080p 120Hz LCD HDTV with Red Touch of Color

With the Samsung 40-inch LN40B630 HDTV, you're investing in a high-quality LCD TV that offers top-of-the-line picture quality with 1080p high definition resolution. Enjoy the sharpest details and vivid color with an 80,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio for more realistic images and Samsung's Wide Color Enhancer 3 technology for a more natural rendering of colors. It also incorporates some innovative features to reduce the motion blur and image judder, which traditionally plague LCD HDTVs when displaying fast movement. This B630 series HDTV combines an ultra-fast 4ms (millisecond) response time with Samsung's Auto Motion Plus frame interpolation technology, which utilizes a 120Hz refresh rate helps assure crisp, easy viewing of sports, video games and movies.
Being the first to review the 2009 Samsung LN40B630 on Amazon was purely an accident in that I actually bought the new Sony KDL-40V5100 on April 2nd. At that time, the Samsung B650 had just come out, but its high gloss panel would not have performed well in my brightly lit room. My high definition projection TV had kicked the bucket after 8-years, but I rarely enjoyed watching HD because the daylight glare would wash out the picture. The Sony's non-glare screen performed well except when the picture would black out during dark movie scenes. I discovered that many of the V5100 series have had this glitch and Sony had no fix for it at that time. To Best Buy's credit, they cheerfully exchanged the Sony under their 30-day return policy and delivered the Samsung B630 model which has a non-glare screen and is similar to the fashionable B650.

My expectations of the new Samsung were that it would perform much like the Sony. I could not have been more wrong. The B630 was like viewing another huge leap in a television experience, while the Sony seemed to be of past technology. The depth and breadth of Samsung's visual color tones are astounding and mesmerizing. A perfect example of that came from viewing scenes of the Caribbean Sea. The Sony could not match the Samsung's Wide Color Enhancer 3 processor with its three dimensional qualities and vibrant tones of turquoise, sea green, cobalt blue, coral pink and white sand clearly seen under the sea. It literally was like being there.

The Samsung's dynamic contrast of 80,000-1 was visibly superior to the Sony's 50,000-1 and convinced me that Samsung's contrast rating was more than a marketing numbers game. The viewing angle of the Sony was horrific when moving away from center by seeing flesh tones morph into green. Samsung's viewing angle was far better by maintaining the proper color tones, but it did lose contrast and brightness. Of course, a slight turn of its swivel base helped to alleviate Samsung's viewing angle issue.

The downside to Samsung's advanced technology was that every movie appeared as video and lost its magical cinema quality. Sony was superior in dealing with this issue. To address that problem, the backlight and contrast settings have to be toned down to soften the picture and to preserve a film's attributes. Most importantly, an adjustment to the 120 Hz Motion Plus feature must be done in order to keep movies from appearing surreal. While many recommend turning the 120 Hz off, I found video blurring far annoying and placed the Auto Motion Plus to a custom setting of 6 for blur and judder reduction. That seemed like a good compromise without losing much of the film's realistic movement. Experiment with every adjustment to find your best settings and calibration instructions are easily found on [...]. It all came together beautifully for me and hopefully this information could be helpful to you.

One bad design feature was the power and channel functions on the TV itself. You cannot look where they are unless you have light shining directly on them. As long as you use only the remote control, it might be a non-issue. By-the-way, in case you were wondering how effective the non-glare screen was on the Samsung B630; it was perfect. I experienced crystal clear high definition TV -- Day or Night.

Tags: Samsung LN40B630 40-Inch

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