Vizio E701i-A3 Owners Thread - Page 18

Yeah m y 1.5.5 update did nothing for the ARC handshake issues. My workaround,

When I want to use an app to watch a movie, I simply set the CEC settings on when Im ready to watch the movie. For some reason, my AVR now recognizes it instantly. When the movie is over, I set the setting back off. We watch MAYBE 1 movie a week online via streaming. Probably 1 every two weeks. I cant deal with the annoying speaker volume nor waiting 27 seconds to turn on the avr and tv before turning on the cable source.

BTW,

I have no banding, no uniformity issues (i used the WOW disc). For 1499, this was the best money I have ever spent.

Just picked up my 2nd replacement with serial number 50. No flash-lighting, a couple of dark feathers in the bottom left and right. They are barely noticeable, and were there on the last set. If this set remains like this, then it will be a keeper.

ARC:

I just noticed while setting up this set that only HDMI1 is labeled with ARC on the back of the set. I don't use it, but though maybe others with an ARC issue overlooked this.

I just ordered mine today from Amazon. Delivery is supposed to be this Wednesday the 30th. Should I be looking at the serial number for some reason? I've seen quite a few setting recommendations here. Has anybody tried several and settled on one? It seems that a few have used Monoprice mounts. Is there a consensus favorite? Can't wait till Wednesday.

I picked one up from Costco today after the price drop. I got it home and tested it and it was working fine. Got it up on the wall and enjoyed a couple hours of 70 inch bliss until I had a sudden problem. The tv just went dark and shut down. After that, when I hit the power button on the remote or the tv, the small white light on the bottom left lights up for a second and then fades away over a few seconds. The screen never powers on. I tried unplugging for a while as well as switching power outlets and cords. I then tried Costco Concierge Service to see if they had any ideas, but after the normal troubleshooting, which I had already tried, he said he could arrange for a Vizio service call - in two weeks. I declined and plan to bring the set back to Costco tomorrow. Quite the pain-in-the-butt to haul this tv around.

Anyway, that's my experience so far. I plan to exchange for another of the same tv, since I have not seen this problem mentioned before here or anywhere else on the interwebs...

I think the consensus was tvs with a serial number starting with 47 were the best unless that's changed.

No check the beginning of this thread. It seemed the 46s and 48s had many more problems. I made sure mine was a 47 at the store before I bought it.

I really don't think it's that 46's and 48's were the problems, I think the stats are skewed because those have the most owners.

I just got mine at costco on Saturday. Went through the entire pile and they were all 46. So far so good. It's taking me a little bit of time to get use to the look of LCD over my old plasma. I still may take it back and get the 60" u50 for 799 shipped deal that just popped up online last night.

I do find it strange that this thread is 18 pages but has very little in the way of settings. Beyond the cnet settings (which makes whites look tan to me) I think only one guy has posted his settings.

I think if I got a crazy deal on a p65st50 (sub $2k) with no tax and free shipping I would buy it and take the Vizio back to Costco. BUT It is really tough to beat this set for the Costco BlackFriday price I paid. I'm not sure if I could go from 70" to a 60" now and be happy.

I bought this TV through Amazon and it was delivered on Saturday.

It is replacing a Panasonic TC-P50G15, that I am moving to another room. That Panasonic was nothing short of amazing. So, after a lot of adjusting on the 701, I'm banging my head on the floor.

This is my first big LCD, and the viewing angle differences are driving me crazy. If I calibrate the tv from my normal viewing position it looks good (it has the small feathers on the lower corners and a very faint flashlight on the lower right corner). But, from just 20 degrees off center it starts to washout and gets much worse as I move on around. Is this what the rest of you are noticing? I've seen quite a few big Sharps that don't seem to do this.

The room where the TV is has wide viewing angles and with the plasma I obviously never noticed. I know LCDs usually have this problem, but it seems more pronounced with this particular set. I'm wondering if the TV I got has something wrong with it. There doesn't seem to be much complaining in this thread about what I'm experiencing. Maybe, I'm just spoiled by the plasma and I'm thinking now I should have just gone with one of the 65" Panasonic Plasmas. This set was just such a good deal, I couldn't pass it up.

I spent months and months reading the plasma threads (Panasonic). I know that the ST/GT/VT are very close in overall PQ which makes the ST a real steal. The GT and VT prices are way down right now so even more tempting. I've always been a plasma fan and had every intention of getting the 65ST50. During those months and months of reading one minor concern kept coming up (Buzzing) and one major concern (IR). I won't even call it burn-in even though several had the problem for over a month. The main thrust was that you really needed to break them in for 100's of hours and even then some had an IR problem. There is a dedicated thread just for IR on the 2012 Panny plasmas. The majority of the posters said, BS, there is no IR problem. In the end I decided not to take the chance or spend the break-in time. I could have had the 65VT50 for under $2400 but ordered the Vizio yesterday from Amazon.

I wonder if every exchange I make at Costco resets my 90 day return??? They don't do exchanges for the TVs at costco. They refund the money and then allow you to buy a new one. At the register they manually enter the promo coupon of the original purchase.

Creid325: I think this is par for the course with this tv. My latest replacement is pretty nice as far as uniformity and flashlighting is concerned. The PQ does washout heavily if viewing from the side.

Update for any interested - took my e701 back to Costco yesterday (had 2 dead pixels) and exchanged for another one, so far so good. My previous serial # was a 47, new one is 49. Costco did the $300 back to match the current $1579 with no problems, gotta luv Costco. Yes, your new "exchange" resets your 90 day return, however, whatever the current price is will be the price you have to pay if you "exchange". I wanted to swap my defective out for a new one while they still had the sale going on. New Viz looks good, couple flashlights on the bottom middle but only noticable on power up. Once TV switches to inputs I don't don't see any defects. Apparently the backlight is set way too high on start up? Even factory settings the backlight is way too bright IMO, I turned it down. TV also updated to 1.1.5 as soon as it found my router connection.

Not sure if anyone else has seen this, but Costco here in San Diego had a Vizio rep in the TV department the past two weekends, pushing their product. He was nice and friendly, but I knew more about the e701's than he did LOL (thanks to this thread and CNET).

I had also purchased a Sharp 70" (600U) from Best Buy and was comparing PQ between it and the Vizio. Viz is superior IMO. Took the Sharp back to Best Buy yesterday, surprisingly they didn't give me any problems and my hats off to Best Buy customer service, good job. (Not sure why I bought into the "Sharp hype", must have been a bipolar moment.) Regarding viewing angle, my Viz does wash out a little as I get off angle, whereas the Sharp did not. For my setup this is not an issue as I'm watching from directly in front. In all, it was a busy Sunday with reboxing and moving 3 large TV's, but now I'm very happy and ready for the Super Bowl

Something I need to ask that hasn't been mentioned yet. When you attach the stand (some have mentioned problems) how do you position the TV? Do you set it on it's side or turn it upside down?

I laid mine down on it's back, screen up, with some pillows underneath to elevate it. This made it easier to attach the screws. One of them did not want to go in easily so I removed one of the others and swapped them, then all went in fine.
Edited by BDUB619 - 1/28/13 at 11:37am

This latest time I removed the box that contains the remote, screws, power cord, etc. Removed the stand from the styrofoam. Laid the tv down while all foam was still attached. I removed the bottom foam that covers the stand attachment point. Use the four plastic plugs that hold the box to the base to get more clearence as follows. Stack two together and place a pair under the foam on the bottom left and and a pair under the bottom right. This propped the tv up enough to mount the stand. I was careful this time to not put excess pressure on the tv frame in case excessive torquing caused the flash-lighting issue. Once standing upright again; I removed all the styrofoam pieces and it was lifted into place.

I don't believe you will ever be satisfied coming from a Panasonic plasma. I kept telling myself the Vizio was such a great deal to justify all of the shortcomings, but I got to the point where I realized I was never going to be happy was this tv. If the only thing you like about the tv is the price, it's not a good deal. I took mine back and bought a Panasonic 65VT and I couldn't be happier now. I paid more but with best buy price matching an online retailer, I paid 2399 with 24 months interest free financing.

Ok guys, decided to give this set one more chance. After the recent sale prices i couldnt resist. To start off, this is my 3rd set and this set is way, way sharper than the previous ones i had. I got this one from best buy yesterday while the other 2 were from amazon. Something very interesting is my sets SN starts with 01, havnt seen that before. All ive seen are like 46-50. Anybody know what this would be about?

This set unfortunately also suffers from flashlighting/clouding in the bottom left and right corners. I will have to see what i can do about fixing that or if its extremely noticeable in dark scenes it will be a deal breaker and i will wait for the new 70" 3d M series. Thus far this panel looks way better all around , especially sharpness wise than my previous 2 so this sets panels differ greatly.

First off.... I am new to this forum and I would just like to say hello to all of you.


Late last week I bought the Vizio 70 and it will arrive on Wednesday of this week. I am going to mount the TV on the wall and I have one request. Can one of you tell me how far down the mounting holes are from the top of the TV in the back? I already have the mount and knowing how far down the top mounting holes are will give me a good idea where everything will lineup on my wall before the TV arrives.

Thanks!


This new TV is replacing a 12 year old 50" Toshiba "Big Screen".... So to say the least, I am pretty excited about it arriving!

Measuring from the bottom of the bezel to the bottom mounting holes is 10" (ten inches). Welcome to the forum.

That's just what I needed to know.

Thanks!

Thank you.

You're the first person to confirm what I'm seeing: the whites are a tan color.
I started with the cnet settings and the PQ and color is great, except for that.
Much less flashlighting than the M650VSE.
Slightly less washed out blacks. But there is a slight amorphous greenish tan that can be seen with no signal ( I think someone called it a "blob")
Overall not bad. Also it looks like a wider aspect ratio than the M650VSE even if that's just an optical illusion.

I actually noticed the tan white on the demo units at two different costco's.
I've been on 3 phone calls with VIZIO support where "3rd level engineers" ask me take take snapshots so they can "use a program to analyze" the white. And these photos include an M650VSE next to it for comparison and it's white is crisp and slightly bluish (with some flashlighting of course).

The last response was it was because I had the mode set to 'movie', duh. They told me to switch to 'custom' and crank up the backlight, brightness and contrast. I've already done that and it's still tan or creamy colored.

I haven't checked my serial# yet, will do that this evening. I asked Andrew Robinson (stellar review on hometheaterreview.com) about his own display unit and he says he doesn't have tan colored white after pro THX calibration.

Just wondering if this is a characteristic of the e701i-a3 or should I pick up a different display from the costco lottery before the sale is over.

Also, there's no deeper calibration on this panel for professionals is there?

I commented to my wife that my serial number 50 set is sharper than the last sets. She said I am crazy, so I don't know. Any way to find out if Vizio has changed the sharp panels they are using???

My set arrives Friday. Super pumped. I gotta ask the same question thats been asked several times. No good calibration settings at all? I keep reading cnets are no good.

Ok guys....I'm not quite sure why no owners are posting settings (still dialing in looking for optimal results perhaps)? Anyway, my story....originally purchased the set in November, all was well until this Friday, when turning the set on, blam....LED failure....several LED's failed to ignite on the lower left hand screen. I left the set on, and about 30 minutes later, the LED's ignited, and all looked normal!. Odd, yet unacceptable. Back to Costco this past Sunday, exchanged the set (02 serial number, SW 1.14)....small feathering in lower left, no clouding worth mentioning ( actually pretty smooth uniformity), and definitely no banding.
Home from work this evening, too lazy to break out the sensor, and fire up Cal Man......the following results are a "by eye" calibration (I calibrate ....a lot).....dim room/bright room comparison made.....various material ( Mike and Molly, Scary movie 3,Spiderman, Spartacus, Underworld Awakening...Comcast cable feed, Blu ray). The following are the results of my dial in...The photos don't do justice (no pausing, I just snapped away...the blue hue from the Underworld caps are from the scenes that were shot in the bluish muted palette), natural looking picture with a sense of depth...very happy......for now

It's been said elsewhere, but needs to be repeated. Copying some else's calibration such as CNET's may or may not work. Just because the sets are the same doesn't mean their calibration will have the same settings. They may or may not be in the ball park. It may or may not be a good starting place. Each set should be calibrated on it's own. Here's a good article on calibrating a TV: http://www.curtpalme.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10457

I have been having the same flicker problem. Did you ever get this resolved? I notice it when I am in the guide on my Windows Media Center HTPC (I have the same media center connected to other TVs and don't have this problem, so I know it's an issue with the Vizio).


I plan to try adjusting the sharpness tonight

Hey Group - 2 things:

I had a noticeable flashlight right in the bottom middle of the TV, right above the stand. Did the “massage trick” with a terry cloth and low-n-behold, the flashlight has all but completely disappeared. Even on the startup screen (where any & all picture defects can be seen) the flashlight is barely noticeable. Unbelievable, that “trick” really works!

&

Anyone else prefer the advanced picture setting - Smooth Motion Effect - ON for Gaming? It looks a little different at first but really improves the clarity and moving picture effect in games IMO. Pseudo 3D look too. I turn all advanced settings off for BluRay and HD Cable, but leave 'em on for gaming. I find it funny all these advanced features and technology to improve the picture quality in our new TV's and first thing we do is turn them all OFF

What video card are you using?

I was running an ATI HD-4550 and swapped out to an Nvidia GTX 570HD and have notices flicker with the Nvidia that was not there with the ATI.

BTW - I purchased mine 10 days ago at Costco. I went back on Sunday and they gave me my $300 in cash back. Cant beat this TV for the price!