New TV time, but none are good enough !

"Andrew" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 05 Nov 2006 17:42:03 +0000, norm
wrote:

And by the way......isn't the picture quality on Freeview appalling ?

Depends on the source material and the bit rate it is being broadcast
at. Some things look horrible, but something like CSI Miami on Five
looks fantastic on my Samsung 32" LCD, far superior to what my CRT was
capable of.

I installed one of these for someone on Thursday. When it came out of the
box the contrast was full up and the colour almost so. (These turned out to
be the defaults.) Like that the picture was superficially impressive, but
when I tried to reduce the brightness, contrast, and colour to give a more
natural picture (and to make it possible to see detail in shadows and
highlights) the result was very disappointing. The white smudge that
represented all the bright tones simply became a uniform grey, as if the
tonal range was crushed. I certainly could not watch such a picture happily.

Bill

In article , Andrew
writes
On Sun, 05 Nov 2006 17:42:03 +0000, norm
wrote:

And by the way......isn't the picture quality on Freeview appalling ?

Depends on the source material and the bit rate it is being broadcast
at. Some things look horrible, but something like CSI Miami on Five
looks fantastic on my Samsung 32" LCD, far superior to what my CRT was
capable of.

Jeezz!.. you must have had a right clapped out set!...
--
Tony Sayer

On Sun, 05 Nov 2006 17:42:03 +0000, norm
wrote:

My 28 inch 4:3 tube TV is well overdue for replacing and I've been
carefully comparing and contrasting LCDs and Plasmas in the sheds.

Looks to me like, at the moment anyway, plasma wins hands down and
I've come the conclusion that when you compare them side by side the
LG models are far superior, particularly in terms of colour rendition.
So there I am, in Curry's. I ask for the remote so I can have a play.
When cycling up and down through the Freeview channels on one of them
I notice that when it displays a 4:3 picture the borders are grey. Not
black. Not even a very dark grey. Thinking there must be something
wrong with it I try another LG model and it does the same. I go
through the menus and see nothing to make it change. It's very
distracting. This gorgeous, jet black, shiny TV with very, very good
contrast ratio obviously achieved at not inconsiderable expense (the
blacks are deeply black), sits there with a dirty great mid grey
border each side.

I ask the group; what sort of incompetent pillock ever thought that
was a good idea ? How can someone intelligent enough to design a TV do
something so ridiculous that completely spoils the end result ?

Curry's bloke says most people watch 4:3 with it stretched but agrees
it seems stupid.

Well LG, you've lost a sale. I'm going to hang on and see if the
others catch up on picture quality or you get your software in order.




Answering my own post here !

Thanks for all the advice. I looked again at a different store and
I've ended up with a 42" LG LCD 42LC2D. I compared it very hard with
the equivalent plasma model and, apart from black level, it really did
win hands down.

The picture is excellent but it certainly needed tweaking from the
over contrasty, saturated default. The peak whites were totally
crushed. With no test card it took a few days of watching to get it
tweaked up, but now it is, I love it.

It's bloody big though once it's in the living room :-)

norm

norm wrote:
On Sun, 05 Nov 2006 17:42:03 +0000, norm
wrote:

My 28 inch 4:3 tube TV is well overdue for replacing and I've been
carefully comparing and contrasting LCDs and Plasmas in the sheds.

Looks to me like, at the moment anyway, plasma wins hands down and
I've come the conclusion that when you compare them side by side the
LG models are far superior, particularly in terms of colour
rendition. So there I am, in Curry's. I ask for the remote so I can
have a play. When cycling up and down through the Freeview channels
on one of them I notice that when it displays a 4:3 picture the
borders are grey. Not black. Not even a very dark grey. Thinking
there must be something wrong with it I try another LG model and it
does the same. I go through the menus and see nothing to make it
change. It's very distracting. This gorgeous, jet black, shiny TV
with very, very good contrast ratio obviously achieved at not
inconsiderable expense (the blacks are deeply black), sits there
with a dirty great mid grey border each side.

I ask the group; what sort of incompetent pillock ever thought that
was a good idea ? How can someone intelligent enough to design a TV
do something so ridiculous that completely spoils the end result ?

Curry's bloke says most people watch 4:3 with it stretched but agrees
it seems stupid.

Well LG, you've lost a sale. I'm going to hang on and see if the
others catch up on picture quality or you get your software in order.




Answering my own post here !

Thanks for all the advice. I looked again at a different store and
I've ended up with a 42" LG LCD 42LC2D. I compared it very hard with
the equivalent plasma model and, apart from black level, it really did
win hands down.

The picture is excellent but it certainly needed tweaking from the
over contrasty, saturated default. The peak whites were totally
crushed. With no test card it took a few days of watching to get it
tweaked up, but now it is, I love it.

It's bloody big though once it's in the living room :-)

norm

You'll soon get used to the size, then think of it as normal.

"Adrian A" wrote in message
...
norm wrote:
On Sun, 05 Nov 2006 17:42:03 +0000, norm
wrote:

My 28 inch 4:3 tube TV is well overdue for replacing and I've been
carefully comparing and contrasting LCDs and Plasmas in the sheds.

Looks to me like, at the moment anyway, plasma wins hands down and
I've come the conclusion that when you compare them side by side the
LG models are far superior, particularly in terms of colour
rendition. So there I am, in Curry's. I ask for the remote so I can
have a play. When cycling up and down through the Freeview channels
on one of them I notice that when it displays a 4:3 picture the
borders are grey. Not black. Not even a very dark grey. Thinking
there must be something wrong with it I try another LG model and it
does the same. I go through the menus and see nothing to make it
change. It's very distracting. This gorgeous, jet black, shiny TV
with very, very good contrast ratio obviously achieved at not
inconsiderable expense (the blacks are deeply black), sits there
with a dirty great mid grey border each side.

I ask the group; what sort of incompetent pillock ever thought that
was a good idea ? How can someone intelligent enough to design a TV
do something so ridiculous that completely spoils the end result ?

Curry's bloke says most people watch 4:3 with it stretched but agrees
it seems stupid.

Well LG, you've lost a sale. I'm going to hang on and see if the
others catch up on picture quality or you get your software in order.




Answering my own post here !

Thanks for all the advice. I looked again at a different store and
I've ended up with a 42" LG LCD 42LC2D. I compared it very hard with
the equivalent plasma model and, apart from black level, it really did
win hands down.

The picture is excellent but it certainly needed tweaking from the
over contrasty, saturated default. The peak whites were totally
crushed. With no test card it took a few days of watching to get it
tweaked up, but now it is, I love it.

It's bloody big though once it's in the living room :-)

norm

You'll soon get used to the size, then think of it as normal.


That's what I keep telling the missus, but I'm not sure she's convinced ;-)

Chas

"Chas Gill" wrote in message
...
You'll soon get used to the size, then think of it as normal.


That's what I keep telling the missus, but I'm not sure she's convinced
;-)

It's what millionaires tell their wives about their wallets. Any
millionaires here to confirm that?

Bill