BEST 50-55" TV on the market?

The LG 55" OLED coming out in a few months (purportedly). That may be premature, but it has the potential to be.

What's his price range?

Seems like a logical approach would be to take the Best TVs Currently On The Market, visit the appropriate website for each, and find out which (if any) meet your physical dimension requirements.

Panasonic VT50 & Samsung E8000 plasmas generally rank highest for 2012.

For LCD panels, the Sharp Elite or perhaps one of the high-end Sony models should be on the list.

If none of those FIT, would then look at the upper-mid plasmas from Pan & Samsung: GT50 or E7000

The data i've collected shows all the mid-to-high-end 55" TVs (Sony LED, Panasonic LED and PDP) are all over 50" wide so you need to know the EXACT width of his custom opening before going any further with the 55" size consideration. Specific TV dimensions are shown on the manufacturers websites and in the downloadable manuals (don't go by what Best Buy or Amazon shows).

And if he's going to use the TV's table stand then the 55" TV's height may be an issue as they seem to be in the 32-33" range including stand. If he's willing and/or able to fabricate a structure within that custom opening and install an articulated wall mount then that would be better than using the stand as he can pull the TV forward so it's flush with the face of the bookshelving. It would also enable him to place the TV lower in the opening so that there is a larger air gap above it to allow heat to escape.

Using the stand pushes the TV pretty far back into the opening and gives it the "cave" effect - making it difficult to see from the sides. If the 55" models are only a fraction of an inch too wide, a cabinet maker may be able to use a router to carve a recessed opening into the left and right sides of his bookshelf to enable the TV to slide in.


The Panasonic ST50/GT50/VT50 and Samsung PNE6500/7000/8000 all have pretty good AR Filters, and the Sony HX850 and HX950 have AR Filters IIRC (but the Sony's have terrible off-axis contrast loss when you sit off to the side). But direct sunlight can be an issue with any TV - even older LCDs that have a full matte screen (which is increasingly rare nowadays).


Well then you might need to move fast because the current Panasonic and Samsung TVs have all been discontinued and the supply is drying up. The new 2013 models probably won't be available until around late March/early April .


Well the most expensive 55" TV you can buy right now is the Sony 55HX950 LED LCD TV and it's list price is only $2,999 and the most expensive 55" Panasonic is the 55VT50 which lists at $2,499 so there's no way he can spend more to fill that opening even if he wanted to. And that's presuming that a 55 incher will even fit into his opening.
Edited by RandyWalters - 1/18/13 at 7:11am

Why would you recommend this?

http://reviews.cnet.com/flat-panel-tvs/lg-55lm9600/4505-6482_7-35123203.html

And when, in today's grade-inflation times, something gets a "good" rating, it is, in reality, a mediocrity.

I've never seen anything good posted about the LG LM9600 series, he probably wouldn't be very happy with it since he's coming from a Pioneer.