Projection-TV Reviews

This product comes with great features, but the unit does not hold up with quality components. I purchased this TV in Nov 2001 and 3 weeks later the TV would shut off by itself. After a short period you could turn on again but the same problem would occur a few minutes later. After being in for warranty repair for seven weeks and several new parts the unit was declared unrepairable. Maybe I got a lemon but I would not recommend.

We recently purchased this RCA 61" "Monster" and love it. Everything is so easy to use. The picture quality is super even without digital television. We have it in our living room where the "ideal" setup is not possible and still the viewing angles are great no matter which chair/couch you are sitting on. You have to move all the way to the side of the TV before you really notice a loss of picture. We shopped around for a year before making the purchase and found that this TV had everything we wanted plus lots of convenient extras for a low price compared to it's competitors. The front jacks are great and make hooking up video camera/video game consoles so easy. We are very happy with our purchase and expect to enjoy this TV for a long time.

Extremely poor picture quality, just about impossible to adjust the color quality on this tv. Totally disappointed with my purchase of this TV.

Just got the unit and I must say, it is not bad at all. I have a bigger and better Sony unit in the main living room and this one is just as good as the Sony unit I own. And the price is about half of what I paid for my Sony. Plus I had a toshiba TV before and they DO make solid products, in my opinion.

It is a piece of junk, not only ugly in appearance, but the picture quality is worse than our 20 year old 27 inch model. My wife and I would love to throw it out, but since we just bought it, we are stuck with it for awhile. We have been letting it sit while we go to watch the older,smaller model. If anyone wants a good deal, please let me know by e-mail @ hutchgolfs@aol.com.

This unit is not only a great looking HDTV but the features are great. The HD Digital Auto Convergence is easy to use and saves the time of manually trying to set it. PIP has great options, the Aspect ratio options a also great. The menu and remote are very intuative to a beginner. Overall great product!!!

This is a good value for $999 with only one real issue, which is a problem with a greenish tint in very dark areas of the picture.

I had the original set replaced, and the new one has the same problem. You can't make adjustments on this, it's not an issue where you can adjust the tint control and make it go away. I've been informed that this is most likely a grayscale tracking issue and that having the TV professionally calibrated may fix this. I'll check into that after the TV has a few more hours on it.

The TV has a very sharp, detailed picture. In brightly lit scenes the colors are very vivid. I was pleasantly surprised about how good the picture was given the low price of the TV. In addition, the TV doesn't take up much space. It's only 18 inches deep, which is about as deep as a regular 27" direct view. If you have limited space and can't afford a plasma or LCD set, this TV is about the slimmest you'll be able to find.

Just to clarify. Colors look very good and the TV does not have an overall greenish tint. The problem is with the fact the TV doesn't generate a true black, so you end up with a greenish tint on a shadow area for example, while the rest of the colors in the scene look fine.

If it weren't for the green tint issue, I'd probably give the set a 5 star rating based on the price/value factor. It has a great picture otherwise and at $999 I don't think you could beat it for the screen size. Due to the fact the TV only gets used about twice a week to watch a DVD, and also to very limited space, I've decided to keep it. However if space weren't such a concern I'd probably send it back and get the 46" Toshiba widescreen rear projection set.

I'm normally not one to take the time out of my day to write a review for something but I feel that if my bad experience here might save just one person from blowing their money the time is well spent. Everything that everyone else has said about this being a piece of junk is true. I was fortunate enough to get less than three months out of it before the screen turned into an hour glass shape and the colors got screwed up. I called one of the "service centers" nearby and they said they were no longer dealing with APEX because they would not honor his service bills and parts took forever to come in if they did at all. I've talked to Apex numerous times when I finally get through to them and they also lie to me and will constantly try their hardest to hang up on me. I'm about two seconds from working to turn them into the BBB. There has to be some kind of consumer protection we can use.

I purchased this tv about a month ago and so far it hasn't disappointed me. I have to admit I didn't think the picture would be that good but with a good set of monster cables it's not half bad. It's not as good as some of the top of the line models but for the price I paid it's excellent. The sound is awesome and I haven't even hooked up my surround yet. The only problem I've had with the tv is when I use my dvd the picture jumps during the title screen when using the component hook-up but it clears up once the movie starts. Overall I would recommend this tv to anyone who wants a hdtv but doesn't want to pay 2 grand.

great tv for the price
sound is very good, picture is sharp especially with dvd,
does not take lot of space and is very easy to use
this is the 2nd apex tv i have bought
and i am very satisfied customer. all you need with the tv is the home theater system to enjoy the theater experience at your home. the tv's picture quality is next the sony projection hdtv and is $$less then sony.

I purchased the Toshiba 65h80 in April 2001. The picture when connected to a quality dvd player was incredible! Then in March 2002, I powered on the set, and almost simultaneously heard a pop sound, then the picture totally went black, the power indicator light began to blink, and a lound clicking sound came from the set's speakers. Since it was one month before the warranty expired, I was in luck, so I thought. I took 3 weeks for a tech. to locate and repair the unit. 2 months later the same problem occured. Since the second malfunction was so close to the first, Toshiba repaired again at no cost to myself even though the warranty was expired (1 year). 7 months later the unit experienced the exact same malfunction as the previous 2 times. I paid for repair out of my pocket since Toshiba said they were no longer obligated, even though the nature of the problem began before the warranty was expired. The unit went out again! The service technician said the unit would require a new board. A new board was ordered, and after waiting two months with no response from Toshiba, the tech, contacted them, and was told that the board could not be made because it was not feasible to make only one board. Even at the expense of others Toshiba still would not meet their obligation! In 2 1/2 years of owning the set, I got approx. 1 year of viewing, nervously! $3,200 of hard earned dinero down the drain. Boycott Toshiba! Forever!!!

I ordered this item September 20th. It came around October 30th. It had a picture for all of 2 hours. Then all I was able to get was colored lines running up and down the screen. Toshiba sent 5 technicians out on different occassions. The TV was drilled, taken apart, played with and put back together. Still did not work. Finally Toshiba approved a new signal board. Signal board was installed and the picture was better but horrible. Now it is December 2nd and I still have NO TV! Toshiba is a horrible company. I will never do business with them ever again. It is worth paying an extra 2K to go with a Sony.

As someone who has spent many hours comparing big screen TVs in person, this one is the best value and has just about the best picture quality I could find. I have had no problems with this TV and would suggest it to all my friends. DVD picture is outstanding, directv picture is incredible. This TV has provided months of enjoyable movie and TV experiences. Beside great picture, this TV includes a menu for manually configuing the projectors from your remote without having to touch the unit, making maintenance easy. Other menu options contain easy to use and understand options. Everyone who comes over is literally awe struck at the quality of the picture. Friends who have big screen TVs of other brands love this one more. This TV has met and far surpassed all my expectations and desires. I am completely satisfied with my purchase. This thing is huge, so be warned. It was almost to big for us, but after watching Star Wars Episode 1, we were left with our jaws hanging. Incredible! We had a guest come by with little children, one of which banged into the screen which had no affect on the TV. Another friend accidentally hit the screen relatively hard, but again, no affect. I have nothing but praise for this TV.

I purchased a Zenith r50z26 new and the TV was stuck in HDTV and could not choose standard or DVD format. I called Zenith and I was very rudely told to call a local TV repair shop. I did so to find out the local TV shop that Zenith recommended knew nothing about HDTV's. I called Zenith back and was referred to another local TV shop. The repair man came out and said there was a bad chip in the TV that they had to take it to the shop to be fixed. It has now been 2 weeks and the repair man told me it should be 7 to 10 days. The repair shop still can not fix the TV. So I called Zenith back to ask how long I would have to wait and I was told "You have to wait as long as it takes" I replied "Why do you customers get such poor service" and I was hung up on.

BEWARE
G .GILL
(VERY UNHAPPY)

I was very tempted to buy this unit, almost clicking the "Add to Cart" button, when I noticed the reviewers had listed it as 1 star. Quickly reading the review posted by a very helpful purchaser, I decided not to buy this unit. Now back to the drawing board!

Excellent TV Never thought a projection TV could be so clear. I use a S-Video cable for our DVD and Cable box. The picture is awesome. When friends see the TV they can't believe it's a projection monitor either. Set up is easy and with the rollers anyone can move the TV.

I don't know whay happened to the other owner of this TV but I've had nothing but good luck when talking with Zenith.

5 stars for this baby :)

The furniture company delivered the television to me, and not one hour later, the television had mysteriously developed a dark band running vertically down the right-hand side of the screen. This was not always noticeable, depending on what the on-screen display was, but against bright colors (the sky, etc.) it showed up as a yellow stripe. This did not improve "The Matrix," it just made it seem as though Neo occasionally was jaundiced. As if this wasn't bad enough, the quality of the image itself was poor. I would describe it as out-of-focus and as grainy. My DVDs looked like VHS tapes on this television. In fact, they look better on my old 27", non-HD, non-projection Zenith, and when the furniture company came to retrieve this Samsung turkey from my house, I told them my old set would be just fine.

Don't waste your money on this one.

I love the look of this TV and it fit perfectly in my living room but after trying twice, I'm scared of getting that third one. The first one worked for four days and then started flickering. Then it just went blue (no cable signal) but the dvd worked fine. I got the second one and it didn't even turn on. I did notice a faint burning smell for a few seconds... I must now decide if I should go with the third. I think the previous reviews have convinced me not to. Better go with another brand!

I bought the 4216 (platinum) in November and have had nothing but problems. Delivery driver unpacked TV only to power up with no picture. Amazon would not allow me to return TV and made me call Samsung for warranty repair. I would think twice about buying on-line for this reason. 1st warranty company came out to repair and had to take TV to shop and replace tuner. Returned TV and regular picture looked fine, but HDTV was blurred. 1st warranty company would not come out to adjust, so I had to call 2nd company and they came out and adjusted lines. It is now May and TV just popped and fizzed and now no sound or functionality. 3rd repair service in less than 6 months. I too heard Samsung had improved their products, but I do not see it. The picture is great when it is working, but for this $$$ I would go with the Mitsubishi if I could do it over again.

...been in the shop many times, total of 6 months, and have had techs come out over 20 times. Replace tubes and 2 other parts of different occasions. Panasonic wouldn't replace the TV and now it is out of warranty and is still broken. Panasonic has said sorry but you are out of luck. Called them probably 40 times over past year and a half, but of course they only have record of a couple. If you buy it, definately get the extended warranty. Didn't work since the first week I had it. Beaware of what you a getting in to...

I've owned the set for about 6 months (its now May 31st), and while I like the picture very much, I've had major problems with it. The convergence function never worked right and needed constant adjustments and there were times the picture would just drop out and pop back on. The thing to be aware of is that there arent too many warranty centers that know how to fix these, so mine ended up back at the factory after a few weeks at a local warranty place. Its now been two months and I still dont have the set back. The factory has given up trying to fix it and and have promised me a new one, only they cant get one for another month, so if I do get it as promised it will have been a 3 month repair with about 40 phone calls....... If you really want this set purchase it from a local store and buy their extended warranty so that if this happens you might get a replacement from the retail store much more quickly. This has been completely ridiculous. The technician told me that they have LOTS of problems with this particular model. You have been warned. Update on this review, I received a call from Panasonic this morning telling me they have given up trying to get me a new set and are going give me a refund for the purchase price plus tax. Its now August 8th and the I've now been told I will finally get my refunded purchase check by September 4th. Only buy this set if you want to be treated badly...

Final Update on 8-15-01, I was happily surprised to have a check from panasonic in the mail today for the correct amount plus tax. I decided to purchase a pioneer 610hd instead, and I am already much happier than I ever was with the panasonic. This did take a while, but at least panasonic did the right thing in the end when they couldnt find me a new set to ship.

I've owned this TV for almost two years and it has continually wowed me. Fed with DVDs, Directv, and HDTV it looks very, very good. In fact, it is one of the few models to display 720P without any conversion. This is excellent when watching any of the ABC shows in HDTV. Overall I am very happy with this set. It required a little bit of tweaking and there were two problems that were fixed under warranty but now it is stunning. I highly recommend this television.

After buying this "HD-ready" set in September of 2000, I used it as a regular large-screen TV for about 18 months until I bought an RCA HDTV tuner for OTA and DirecTV signals. I became acutely aware of bad convergence with the VGA input from the RCA tuner box. I had everything looked over by an authorized service center, and they discovered that a board was probably bad in the set. After months of trying to get this board from RCA (and they are really not even sure if it will fix the problem), I have called RCA/Thompson customer service repeatedly since May of 2002. They will not respond to our questions on reimbursing us for a part that could not be detected as being bad during the 1 year warranty period, much less as to when the part might be available. The authorized service center informed me that he would recommend against buying an RCA product worth more than several hundred dollars due to the frequency with which quality problems occur, and the prolonged waiting required to get parts. I have since bought a new Panasonic LCD TV with much better features and quality for just a few hundred dollars more than I wasted on this RCA MM52100. Although this set may have features that purport to show DVD and HD signals well, I was unable to partake of those features. Buyer beware!