WOW
Written: Nov 30 '05
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Pros: Price, picture quality, ease of use
Cons: No swivel base
The Bottom Line: Great as a PC monitor/TV combo. Great sound, 10/10 PC, 8/10 DVD, 6/10 TV quality (no HD). Explore other options if not planning to use as a PC monitor.
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| njited's Full Review: Olevia LT26HVX 26 in. LCD TV |
Picked this one up on Black Friday for $500 after rebates.
My goal was to combine a TV and PC monitor into one. I was able to save so much room by getting rid of my old 19" TV, 19" monitor, DVD player, 2 speakers and all the wiring that goes along. Now I'm using the DVD-ROM as DVD player and watch cable through my ATI All-In-Wonder TV Card (but have another coaxial running directly to the TV as alternate), with sound running through TV speakers (RCA to stereo adapter for PC).
Picture quality is stunning. Running at 1280x768 resolution the picture is sharp and crystal clear. I don't know what other people meant by bashing this LCD as a computer monitor. I also installed a few games (Doom 3, Civiliztion 4, Need For Speed Most Wanted) to see if there's any diffrence. What I found is that everything runs smooth and the overall effect is amazing (no lagging, ghosting, or flickering), however, in Need For Speed some shadows looked a little "square", which does not affect the gameplay whatsoever, worth pointing out.
I don't have any HD channels, but own one of those $30 signal amplifiers and the picture quality is much better than I expected after reading online reviews. If you look close you can see some "blurring" (more or less depends on the channel), but from normal viewing distance the picture looks great.
I tried my external DVD player hooked up through Composite, YPbPr, and S-Video, and the result wasn't the greatest. I'm not too experienced with DVD players (mostly use a PC), so there may be some setting which would improve the quality but which I'm unaware of.
Bottom line, for $500 I got everything I wanted and more. If you don't like to go cheap then buy a Sharp for three times as much and get the same picture quality with a fancier remote and a swivel base. It's your choice.
Tip: Try setting your Color Temperature to "Warm" and Back Light to "Middle" (Brightness=60, Contrast=80). I get the best results with these settings.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 499
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Epinions.com ID:
njited
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Reviews written: 1
Trusted by: 0 members
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