Hitachi VS810 Owner's Thread

Wupshaw,

Have you calibrated your set yet? If so, what disc did you use (Avia, Essentials?) and what are your settings? I hope to have time to run Avia on Thursday when mine is delivered and will post my Day/Night settings Thursday or Friday.

Interesting. Do you mean that even if you over/under adjusted things like brightness, contrast, etc., you wouldn't see the problem in the test patterns? I have Avia, so I'll give it a shot later this week.

I seem to remember a discussion in this forum re: the applicability of AVIA or Essentials to LCD and DLP technologies. I'll see what I can find. What are your current settings? I may start from there and see where Avia takes me.

On a separate note, how far are you sitting from your set? Is the 50" big enough for you, especially w/a 1:2.35 DVD like Lord of the Rings or Star Wars?

I'm going to be about 10 feet from my set, but I could back up to about 11.5 feet. I was leaning toward the 60", but I'm afraid the SDE and artifacts will be visable so I went with the 50" (plus, the 60" was not yet in stock, and would take 2-4 wks, and would hang off of my stand by about 6.5 inches on each side). I've looked at the XBR at CC and Magnolia and from inside 12 feet, the picture is not that great, especially on HD.

How close are the blacks on this set compared to a DLP like the Kirk?

I did it! I pulled the trigger on the 50VS810 and so far it is great! I decided the HD input issue was one I could live with and took delivery of the TV last Friday. Currently only using one HD input now (DVD) + cablecard.
I have quite a bit of ambient light in my room and glare seems to only be a problem during the time when the TV is warming up. Once at full brightness, I really don't notice a glare problem.
I think the blacks are very good on this TV. But, I am not an expert, so I really can't give any objective info about this. I keep looking (even at night when the room is dark) to see gray instead of black, but blacks still look black.
I also looked into the SDE. Up close, I could see it. Once I was ~ 2 feet away, I did not notice it at all. Again, I am not an expert... and probably do not have the best vision.
Anyway, I had a little buyer's remorse over the weekend about spending so much on the TV. This was cured by the CC 10% off I was able to call and get on Sunday (in addition to 18 months no interest).
Does anyone who has this set have any programming info in the guide? I have the cablecard with Cox Digital cable, but so far the guide just has the channel name, but "no info" for the programming. I think this is something that is supposed to come from the cable company. My sense is that because I am the first in my area to have the cc, Cox will be clueless if I call about the guide.
Anyway, great TV. I love the HD picture and am pleasantly surprised with the SD picture. Plus, the TV looks great even turned off!

I realize this is an owners thread, but I think I will probably be ordering the 60" this afternoon and had two questions. I am very concerned about the glare issue and would appreciate any input as if it distracting or not, or if it only really looks bad in the overly lit showroom. Also does anyone notice any green bleed on a input with no signal, or when credits are rolling and the screen is mostly black? All of the GWIII's seem to have this problem to some extent. This is why I am returning mine. It really bothers me to see the green in the black and is even in part of the black bars when in 4:3. This is mostly noticeable at night when there are few lights on. The two technicians that came to see it and saw the problem said it can't be fixed and it is normal for LCD's (as the gray scale comes up fine). I was hoping the VS810's didn't have this problem.

My set doesn't come until tomorrow, so I'm probably not going to be much help until then, but I did not notice any green bleed in CC after watching for an hour (albeit in brighter light) and looking at many dark scenes and a 4:3 feed with black bars, although I was not looking for it. I hope to post a First Impressions tomorrow night once I've got it all set up; I'll let you know my impressions re: green bleed.

As for glare, check out wupshaw's post above; I'll post my impressions tomorrow, if you can wait a day.

Thanks, ad10ad I would appreciate that. The green bleed is most noticeable on movie credits or commercials when the background is supposed to be black, but has green bleeding into it. Also with the lights off on a blank input. For most who own the GWIII and XBR it is in the bottom right corner.

Sorry, HDWannabee....One of the pretty well documented shortcomings of these first generation CableCards is that they are all "one-way" and DO NOT provide the features associated with an interactive program guide. You are getting all you are going to get.

That said, however, I've come to grips with the loss of the guide, will survive with the basic "time & title" guide, and can't wait to see a 60" "810" so I can make the leap.

Thanks, BBH.
I knew about the no interactive guide cablecard issue. I never had digital cable or a guide before, so I don't really miss it. I guess I was just wondering for sets like this one and the new Mits DLPs that have guides built in, where do they expect to get their info from? I certainly know it would not be 2 way, but do OTA broadcast have programming info included to feed into these built in guides? Are they expecting cable companies to populate the guide eventually? If not, why do Hitachi and Mits include guides at all?

I saw 50VS810 today in CC and I think I will buy one by end of the week. Unf., they didn't have HLP5085 in this store but I spend so much time looking at this DLP set that I think I can add some comments. Both TVs looks great and unique. VS810 picture is very sharp, probably as sharp as HLP5085. My main problems with Sammy are: 1) rainbows; 2) white reflection in the middle of black screen. I found this reflection more noticeable on hlp5085 than on 5063. Not sure what cost it but I found it on every sets I saw. The main problem with VS810 is SD effect. I can see it up to ~5-6 feet. But I will sit ~10-12 feet away, so it should not be a problem. The screen has glare but much better than Mits. And I guess this type of screen "add" some blacks to the picture.

Now, my question is how good this TV is with nonprogressive DVD players? Does it has good enough internal deinterlacer?

How much matching stand from Hitachi cost? Any other good (and cheaper) stands around?

Did anybody try to use it with PC through DVI input?

Hello everyone!!

This is my first post but I have been lurking here for a while learning what I can. Thanks for all the good info.

I am looking to purchase a RPTV in the next 2 months, so I started looking at what is available and am very interested in the new Htachi.

Last night I went to CC and checked it out. The place was empty so they let me play for awhile. Initially the 50vs810 looked bad and the blacks were terrible compared to the kirk next to it. After adjusting it however it looked really good and almost as sharp as the Kirk. All the sets were being fed by a central DVD player with a component distribution amp.

My problem is the set exhibits a uniform grainy quality with light colors, looks like dirty optics. A white background really shows a fuzzy dark grain. Very distracting and a deal breaker for me. The salesman noticed it as well but had no explanation. None of the other sets seem to have it. Could it be the amp?

How do your sets look?

Perhaps I'm not articulating the problem correctly. Any thoughts.

Other than that the set is gorgeous!

Thanks

Sounds like you might be describing the Screen Door Effect. Does the effect go away when you are at "normal" viewing distance, say 7 feet? If so, its normal for LCD technology. Even my Sony CRT HDTV has it to some extent. Its nothing to worry about so long as you don't sit on top of the set.

ad10ad

Yes, you may be correct. Although I have never had the screen door effect pointed out to me I think that must be what I am seeing. The xbr950 next to it didn't appear to have the same effect but I was standing very close to the Hitachi.

Due to the way CC had the displays set up you really could only stand about a aisle width from the screen.

I will try a different store.

Thanks

I was in CC today and saw this set. I purchased a 50V500 last year and then stopped keeping track of newer TVs but this caught my eye. The case looks really nice. The PQ looked terrible but so did everything else in there, I'm sure with some tweaking it will look as good as the 50V500 if not better.

I was trying to figure out why the price was so high? Just a new model? Can't be because of the cablecard.

Another question for you VS810 owners. How is the shadow detail? Is it acceptable enough? Close enough to a DLP? I'm just weighing my option when I get a set maybe at the end of this year.

wupshaw, have you tried to use PC with your VS810?


Also, I played with different settings today in CC and it seems that every temperature setting except for "high" produces picture with yellow tint. Do you use other settings? Are they useful in any light conditions?

Interesting, in CC I tried "default" and it made white background looks yellowish/reddish. It looked OK (and similar to all sets around) only at "high".

Thanks for clarifying about color temp..

Could you please also comment on the fan noise level? Can you hear it?

My 50VS810 arrived about 3 hours ago. So far I am quite pleased. I posted my initial impressions (including thoughts on the "glare issue") and a few screen shots in the "Hitachi 50VS810 First Impressions" forum. I'm going to tinker with it some more tonight and post my settings in a day or so. It'll be interesting to see what others have used.


As for some of the questions on the set:

FAN NOISE: I have central air so my room isn't dead silent to begin with, but, I didn't notice the fan at all with the sound on. If you put the set on, with no volume, and walk up to the set, you can hear the fan very faintly. If you back away to normal viewing distance--about 10 feet--you have to strain to hear it.
EDIT--I shut my central air off to see if I could hear the fan. If you listen for it, you will hear it during a quiet scene, or at very low volumes. It is not distracting personally, but it can be heard.


GREEN BLEED: Didn't see any watching dark scenes/credits, but I've only viewed the set in the daytime. I'll check tonight.