TV Reviews

Let's admit it: not everyone is ready for HDTV yet. We thought we were, but after dragging home a 34" widescreen HD set and running analog cable through it, we were disappointed with the picture. All we wanted was a good set to replace an LCD front projector that was too clunky and noisy to watch DVDs and LDs on anymore. This set gets used 99% of the time as an everyday beater and in the few days since we exchanged the HD set, it does very well -- not as many PIP or POP options as the one we took back, but good enough for someone who'd never had it before. The V-compression 16:9 mode is very effective for DVDs and provides an excellent picture with a 480i DVD player. Haven't watched a laser disc yet, but should be better that the lousy job of upconverting that the HD set was trying to do. Beware -- better have a nice, strong TV stand to put it on. It's a heavy sucker!

This television really does have a superior picture to most of what's out there. (unless you step up to a good quality plasma screen). The only issue I've had is with one corner of the set that gets some weird colors once in awhile. From what I was told, this occurs because of the sensitivity of the set to the magnetic north and that if I turned the set, the problem would likely go away. Besides that, dvds look perfect, and playstation 2 games are great looking on this set.

This is a good, reasonably priced antenna for pulling in weak or distant FM stations. I have one at home and one at work, both attached to Proton RS-330 radios. The Terk AM Advantage is better for AM stations, but the tower is OK if that's the only antenna you buy.

Roz

[] This powered antenna helps boosts reception of AM/FM radio stations. Installation was a snap, and Terk includes all the accessories you need to connect the antenna to your tuner. The gain control is on the antenna itself, and is useful for improving the clarity of some stations. I recommend this antenna for those who would like an inexpensive way of improving their radio reception.

Unlike others who have reviewd this product, I did not expect an FM antenna to improve AM reception. It just doesn't work that way.

As for Fm reception improvement, for a passive antenna system, this one performs well.

I have an AIWA mini-shelf system which gives out great sound but during my recent move to a new house I lost the radio antenna, I bought the Terk Receiver and I could not ask for a better sound from my radio. I highly reccomend this to anyone as a replacement antenna whether you have your original antenna or not!

I bought this TV based almost entirely on the quality of the picture; it blew everything else away. I'm still very happy with this.
However, the software is less impressive.
The picture quality is undoubtedly a product of algorithms ensuring good contrast and range, and the picture can be further tweaked to viewer preferences. So far, so good.
It would seem to me that it would be fairly easy to write code that would determine the aspect ration of the picture being fed into the TV and adjust the picture accordingly. This could be overidden by the viewer. Similarly, it should be possible to access the inputs and determine which one had a signal. Instead, one has to mess around with the picture size and inputs which involves finding the remote control....
I don't know whether this is a problem with all modern TVs or not, or perhaps most users are not so fussy about bits of the picture disappearing off the edges. With this model, this aspect of its design could definitely be improved.
While I don't use the internal speakers, I have tried them out; the quality of sound is really very good for a TV.

I bought this TV a few weeks ago and so far I am happy with it. I haven't had a chance to hook up Satelite or Cable to it yet, but I will be doing that in the near future.

I bought this TV along with a Panasonic home theather system and it provides the best home theather experience I can imagine for my bedroom. DVDs in progressive scan using component cables (I use monster video 2's) look absolutley stunning - just like in the movies if not better - but only from far away. You have to be at least 80 inches (about 6 and 1/2 feet) away from it. The closer you get to it, the more the pixels become apparent.

This TV also has a very slight ghosting problem. Although you can't see it from a far away distance at all (80 inches or so as I've mentioned earlier) it becomes apparent when you're close. All LCD TVs have issues similar to this from what I have seen, so I would recommend an LCD TV only to those who will be watching it from a good distance. The rule of thumb is to watch from a distance of 3 times the size of the diagonal, so for this 26" LCD TV you would wanna be at least 78 inches away. This happens to sound correct given that in my personal experience this was really the best distance to look at it from.

For those looking for a home theather experience, don't let the relativley small size (26") fool you. Since the TV is widescreen watching enchanced for 16:9 DVDs elminates the black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. The size of the image itself on such movies is roughly equivalent to a 32" 4:3 Aspect "Square" TV, since on such a TV you have the black bars which take away from the size of the image.

This TV does a GREAT job of making you think you're at the movies, especially with the back lighting and picture settings on TV set to "Movie". If you get the settings right, it looks as if you're looking at a projector in the movies. Having a home theather system with surround sound and a subwoofer (5.1) also enchances the experience a lot. I've watched Signs, Snatch, and Rocky IV on it, and I was absolutley delighted with the quality of the experience.

I highly recommend it for anyone looking for a home theather TV to watch DVDs or HDTV Movies on. But remember to reserve some distance between the TV and where you will sit or the quality of the picture and thus home theather experience will suffer. 80" is my personal minimum.

I'm a reformed Sony owner. I got tired of replacing Sony's that prematurely failed. Fool me once, shame on Sony. Fool me twice, shame on me. Goodbye Sony TVs. But before I got this unit I briefly tried the Panasonic CT27D20.

The Toshiba is excellent. The DVD picture when contrasted with my antenna shows how bad an antenna connection is -- oh well we mainly just rent movies anyway. The 32 inch size seems very adequate for widescreen DVD images. The 27 inch was a little too small. Of course, 36" would be better.

I would buy this TV again based upon its current competition from Panasonic, Sony, etc. in the 32" market. But I would like to see it include front video inputs and a volume limiter. Since we mainly use it to watch DVDs the volume limiter is a non-issue (our Panasonic DVD player has a volume limiter.)

In the 70's Sony televisions far outclassed everything else. Their pictures blew away the competition at the time. But things have changed. Sony now has nothing over the competition and their reputation is clouded by quality issues. I think Toshiba, and JVC, may be the current rulers of the tube-tv market. JVC is Panasonic's upscale cousin and Sony has slipped from its throne.

...You'll absolutely love this set! While the picture quality is a just a hair less beautiful than the WEGA, you get SO much more for your money. Priced comparably, the Toshiba 32A50, IMHO, has as good a picture, better sound, better resolution, easier to use adjustments, and far less technical/geometry issues...I recently purchased TWO Sony WEGAs (the 27in. kind) and returned both of them because of problems with horizontal and vertical integrity. Even the qualified technician who attempted to adjust it (and 5 others from their warehouse) said it was unacceptable.

The Toshiba's colors, contrast, and sharpness are all outstanding! Plus, there is far less dot crawl than the Sony -- keep in mind that I did not have the XBR model -- Now, I have to admit that I really did like the flat screen of the Sony and I do notice the difference on the Toshiba...that is, a lot more reflection/glare, etc...but, all the other qualities of this set make the tradeoff well worth it. Plus, the chassis is black! What idiot decided that your television's box had to jump out at you whenever you turned on the set. I don't care to have the box and the picture compete for my viewing attention everytime I turn the TV on. Black fades nicely into the background, where it belongs.

I cannot wait to hook up a DVD player to this set! I specifically went looking for a TV with component video imputs, and found a great deal on a loaded set.

You won't be dissapointed either. Best of luck with your own search...

The picture is very good; however, the sound quality is not very good--intermittently, it gets louder and softer by itself, and sometimes there is a lot of "noise."

This is one of the better combination TV-VCRs I have seen. Panasonic and Sony also both make good 13inch TVs. Toshiba's combination TV-VCRs often gets overlooked. However, this is an excellent set and performs equally well. The picture is crisp and sharp. The built-in Digital tracking 4 head VCR makes VHS tapes look very good. You get front A/V (RCA type) inputs with a TV/game switch. The VCR has good high-speed fast-forward and rewind performance. It also has time-shift recording capability and a built-in head cleaner. The front panel features a useful headphone jack. The 'Black' cabinet design is uniquely handsome and looks better than other competitor models.

Picture quality is excellent. The remote control is one of the worst I have ever used. The button placement is confusing & the labels are almost useless. Programming the record timer is very confusing & not at all user friendly or intuitive. If you want a great picture, this is a great television. If you want an easy to use VCR or easy to access features from the remote, buy something else. I wish I had!

This is a very nice 2-head TV-VCR. Toshiba makes a very good 13 inch TV. One reason for the incredible picture quality is that the electron gun can keep very accurate control on a smaller screen size delivering crisper and cleaner images. VHS tapes look amazingly good. It has a headphone jack and front audio-video inputs. You get front-panel menu access, onscreen display (OSD) and channel recall. It has a Sleep timer and an auto clock set. Remote is included. The VCR has auto tracking, still, fast-forward and rewind. This is a good unit.

I saw this TV in a local store. They have a few model displays. THe sound system is not that good. Picture is really nice. But I'd recommend the Samsung LTN1735 and Toshiba over this one. They just seem more stylish and better. Samsung has HDTV too. Not sure about the Toshiba 17 In or 20" LCD TVs. Spend $20-40 you can get a better one. But this one is not bad, really. Its picture quality is better than Sharp's, in my opinion.

For some reason, it is listed separately as the model N1700W although they are the same monitor. After I ordered this, I found the 3/3 negative reviews on the N1700W listing on amazon, I was worried. However, this is an editor's choice at PC mag on 11/2003, it can't be that bad.

After the order at Amazon, I recieved it from J&R in just two days. Like some other reviewers say, the control buttons on the monitor is too sensitive, but I find the buttons on the remote quite easy to use. So I probably won't need to touch those buttons on the monitor again.

The picture quality is decent. At first, I find the color non-uniform, but it turns out that my video card is not set at the recommended refresh rate of 60 Hz. After that, the image is sharp and clear. As with most other LCDs, only the native resolution (1280x768) works best.

If you are like myself planning to use the DVI output, it doesn't come with the cable. Make sure you order one somewhere.

There is a rebate ending 5/1/04; but it only applies to certain retailers (J&R and others). Check carefully before you purchase. With the rebate, it is priced just a little more than some other 17" LCDs. But with wide-screen, and DVI output, and built-in speakers, and TV turner with PIP and composite video input, you don't find these everyday.

I purchased this LCD TV thinking that I could use it for a computer monitor as well, but it is really not designed for that purpose. Technically, I can plug it into the computer and get an image, but the image is exceedingly blurry because the resolution is that of a regular tv. There's no way you can read text that blurry. I had trouble getting information regarding this aspect from the documentation and online salespeople, so I thought I'd better post the info here. As a tv, it's fine, although the sound is not as good as my external 40W computer speakers. Also, it doesn't receive tv images without an external antenna or cable plugged in.

I bought this 1 month ago and I am blown away! It didn't even mention in the specs that it scales HD! I plugged my canblevosion box with HD and it works!! Also, the best picture I have seen with a DVD. remote was easy but not great but the picture was stunning!!!

I just want to know if in this video card thath uses DDR memory, I need to have that kind of RAM or the video card it self bring's it, because is a AGP memory?, please help. The information it doesn't help a lot, just to know that is good but don't give an additional info.

With the releae of the AGP 8X MX440's, the price for AGP 4X parts have plunged. Since not many people have a AGP 8X slot, and AGP 8X only increases performance by about 1%, there is no real point, especially for low end MX cards, which does not need the extra bandwith.
The MX440 has over twice the memory bandwith of MX420 with its 128-bit DDR(256-bit effective) interface.
64MB of memory is more than enough for today's games. 128MB is not worth it since you can always enabled texture compression for games that use more than 64MB of textures.
The only drawback is that this card does not support pixel shaders, which the Geforce4 Ti series have. While you wont able to see the pretty water effects and DirectX 8 tech demos of the GF4 Ti's, these features are not used extensively in any game.