Sony KDL-52 XBR9 (Clouding/Flashlight Issue

I've owned mine since Father's Day. No clouding or flashing. It was a replacement to my 40WL135 whose autodimming feature bugged me to no end.

The set would not fit in the back of my car with it in its box. I took it out of the box and placed in on top of the styrofoam from the box in my trunk. The LCD was facing up. No issues.

If you do all of your gaming and movie watching at night you should switch to a plasma! BTW Sony XBR9 isn't the best CCFL to get anyway. If you want a better alternative that costs less go for the Samsung B750.

Go get the XBR8. No regrets. If you can find a Magnolia HiFi-Best Buy who have on in stock for $3500.

I returned my first set for clouding also, no problems since.

Panasonic plasmas can be had for cheap and from what I read they don't have burn in problems at all. My B750 is going back this week and I've already ordered a Kuro plasma to replace it

What's wrong with B750? I've read all the B750 reviews and seen it in action several times and the only thing I can find wrong with it is the glossy screen. Why are you dumping it for the yellowish whites of a plasma?

return the set while u can i would also suggest the b750 over the xbr9 as it has much better reviews although the cosmetic design of the xbr9 is awesome i usually would say buy the sony but in this case i wouldnt if u can afford more $ get the xbr8 at 3500 thats a great deal

You haven't seen a kuro in action have you? The B750 doesn't touch the black levels or motion handling of a kuro. The whites on a 500M kuro are very bright with ISF Day mode. Do some reading up on it and you won't want an LCD afterwards.

Your comparison is correct. I recently went the front projection route and I've had a Pioneer 6020 for about a year and since I only watch movies on my projector I decided to sell the Pioneer (which I did for a good price) and got a Samsung LN55B650. If someone is viewing at night there's no comparison as the Kuro's will win. Many who are pro-plasma don't really understand how the picture will change once you get home. I do like the Samsung and it looks fantastic sometimes but it handles dark scenes very poorly and the Kuro will CRUSH it when it comes to black levels. Also, the Samsungs white levels in darks scenes look DIM compared to the Kuro due to the auto-dimming that happens.

Plasmas have something called an ABL (Automatic Brightness limiter). Due to power consumption plasmas whites will "dim" when there's a bit of white (or bright colors) on the screen. So that's a strike against plasma in this regard.

However, like many I'm sure your viewpoint is taken from in store comparisons. However, in most circumstances I don't think people will be viewing in those dynamic models which are turned on in the stores (unless they want to burn their retinas). However, when you get home and tone down the settings somewhat on the LCDs the difference isn't nearly as great.

LCDs still have an advantage in ambient light situations. However, in a dark room the B650/750s are no match for a Kuro. I've had both in my room and I have the B650 now (see the post above). And despite that C-Net review the B650 and B750 I had side by side in my media room there were no differences in black levels other than a little bit of black crush on the B750 over the B650 (and less blue hue in the picture but only to a certain extent).

I originally ordered a 40W4100 and i returned the set immediatley due to horrible clouding throughout the screen. Sony was great and replaced the set within a week. However Set #2 had same issue. So yesterday, I just received set #3 (this time the 40W5100, which just came out). However, the same clouding exists in dark scenes. The clouding that I am experiencing is similar to other posts -- only noticeable at night and during dark scenes. Very frustrating. Any suggestions are much appreciated...