Samsung HLS-5679W LED DLP Owners Thread (*NO PRICE TALK) - Page 34

I don't believe your discussing shipping is the cause of whatever guilt you may feel. What you are guilty of is on display here.I'm not now,nor will I be in the future,waiting on anything.If there is something I want I get it.There are a number of retailers here who I have known for quite a while.Saving money may be of concern, but is not an issue. Personal contact and a relationship over the years has served my needs well.I was addressing the concerns of another one of your underlings.In the pursuit of the best product,at the cheapest price,with an eternal warranty(AKA Costco vultures),at 100% financing, and don't forget the RESPECT you deserve as a customer,I believe you will continue to receive damaged shipments,One can only trust in the shockwatch. I will not soil your thread with any further attempts to satisfy another neophytes variances from your dictated thread adherences.

I'll throw in my recent shipping experience.

Last week, I received the 5679, an Oppo, and a Belkin power conditioner / UPS. All shipped separately from different online retailers, one common freight, one Fedex, and the other UPS. The 5679's box only had a small scrape in one corner. The 5679 came out of the box with no external damage and powered up just fine. Later on, when I was trying to figure out what to do with all of the 5679 packing material, I noticed one of the foam blocks in the packing was cracked. Maybe I lucked out that whatever cracked the foam block didn't cause a problem to the 5679.

The Oppo appeared to be the least well protected. The retail box was placed inside of the shipping box with no room for cushioning material. No external damage and works fine. The Oppo is very well packaged in its retail box.

The box the Belkin power conditioner came in took some damage in shipping. Here the retail box was placed in a tight fitting box, which in turn was placed in a larger box with air cell packing. The Belkin wasn't packaged in its retail box as well as the Oppo was, but the damage the external box suffered did not propagate to the retail box.

I was worried as to how the 5679 would survive shipping and was spring loaded to refuse delivery if all did not look right. I didn't consider the shake test tho.

Lowell

As much as I hate to add to the shipping thread(s) I thought as a truck driver for 38 years I would put my 2 cents in. I have hauled everything from swinging meat(sides of beef/pork on a rack system in trailer) to Formica, lawn /garden tractors and mainframe computers. My observation is, everything is warehoused, and the problems arise out of who is careful stacking the pallets adhering to stack limits etc. I have delivered the older big screen CRT sets at Sears, circuit City etc. You would be surprised at how the kids working receiving handled those items. I watched them unload 15 sets with a pallet jack and slam them into each other to tighten up their area for more room. Same deal at warehouses, so although your item may have the shock sticker on it, that does not remedy a destructive act prior to it being loaded on the truck and delivered. If the driver secured his load correctly that shock sticker will not read anything , especially damage caused before loading. Buying from a B&M store in your area is no more of a guarantee of non damage then buying online, you do have the closer option of going back and bitching to the store manager, but still does not eliminate damage. For the most part Drivers do secure their loads properly, if not, they won't have a job long because of the damage claims, which in some instances, depending on company your liable for. So, in summary, if Joe Blow in the warehouse ,or the B&M store, busted your set by dropping/mishandling it, etc. That does not necessarily mean the truck driver was rough with it or that he shock sticker is bad, does not work, etc. Like I said just my 2 cents from my many years of experience. :-)

Klac,

Thanks for the info... I have gone thru three samsungs and I have seen the fuzz on all of them. I went to Brandsmart yesterday (local store) and watched side by side a football game on the hls5679w and hls5088w and saw differences in the picture. The 79 had less silk screen effect than the 88. Then I compared to the Sony xbr2 and I am now considering that route after talking to a Sony Rep in the store. He told me that they had fixed the green blob issue. Thnks again for your help will let you guys know which route I take.

For those of you on the fence. POST calibration fixes every PQ issue making you not want to buy it. Its brighter without washing out the colors. The colors are true, and the banding is gone. I'll write up something more detailed when I get a chance, but you can feel safe pulling the trigger if you also get a calibration.

I was playing around in the service menu and I think I have found some of the settings that affect banding. If you go to the DNIe section there are 4 GAIN values in the second column. I adjusted theses values down on my S-Video feed (where I get a fair amount of banding) and it seems to have made a pretty good difference on my set. The banding was minimized but not gone. The defaults were all high 20's to even 30 and I set them down to the low teens and even 6 on one setting. I also turned off all the SNI_Proc options but I'm not sure how much of an effect that had. I'll post my exact numbers later.

I would be very interested to see if other people get similar results or if it was just me. It's a little hard to judge for sure since I was watching dish network and I didn't have total control of the source so it's possible that it was just changes in the source. But I'm pretty sure this helps.

Make sure you write down your values first before you make changes so you can restore if you need to (there you've been warned).

Any other tips on reducing banding would be great!



FYI To get in Service mode:

Starting with TV Off - Mute - 182 - Power TV will go in after a few seconds after coming on.

If the SNI parameters were turned off, the 4 GAIN parameters should not have had an effect. The GAIN, parameters, BTW, affect edge enhancement when DNIe is on which the SNI parameters defeat if left off.


I just received my 5679 this past Friday. I spent the entire weekend figuring how best to approach it. When everything was said and done, I was left with the single best RPTV image that I've ever seen. Banding was practically nonexistent.

Having said that, there were many parameters that needed to be changed!

Eliab

I agree. But the procedure is quite idiosyncratic and the proper instrumentation is absolutely a must. Make sure that whomever you hire is intimately familiar with Samsung DLP displays but particularly this one which is really unique.

Eliab

So far - I like this display more than I thought I would! It is extremely quirky and really is "it's own thing." But I've learned much over this past weekend and will be posting tips in the not too distant future. I'm leaving on a MSP/MIL/CHI ISF tour today and won't return until Sunday so it'll have to wait until next week.

Eliab

I like to learn these displays as best I can. This usually means going through 2-4 per year. Same thing with DVD players.

Eliab

The exclusion of the color wheel and different firmware will render a noticeably different picture actually - especially after calibration.


Mine was appreciably out of focus. Unfortunately, the procedure for focussing these displays is more involved than on the HL-Rs and non-LED HL-Ss.

Eliab

I've got one scheduled for Thursday. Maybe I can persuade my client to post a review.

Eliab

Are you happy with the blacks and contrast?

Quick question: now that you've had a chance to work with this model, do these starting guidelines still hold for the 5679?

Digital NR - OFF
DNIe - Off
Mode - Movie
Contrast - 40
Brightness - 45
Sharpness - 0
Color - 45
Tint - G50/R50
Color Tone - Warm2

jdg

I just had my television calibrated by Barry Vandenberg this past sunday(orlandodigital.tv). Barry was very professional and I really had a fun time watching him adjust my set.
Barry was able to pause a picture that had a banding issue, he then went into
the DNIe settings and able to turn off several setting's in the SNI-PROC.
You could actually see the banding being removed from the picture.
Barry was also able to adjust the colors to perfection. Black levels are now
inky black.
Barry would be able to give alot more details then what I am as to what setting's he adjusted.

I am now very happy with my set and I would tell anybody to buy this set but
it is a must that they have this set calibrated. It is amazing what detail level
can be obtained after calibration.

I will be buying the new Toshiba hd-dvd XA2 when it arrives in december.

Denon 3806
Toshiba SD-K710 Progressive DVD
Verizon Fios Motorola dvr

I've included your report in the calibration list that is linked at the bottom of my post.

Enjoy.

The blacks are a little weak. I attribute some of this to the gray cabinet. I will line it with Velux this coming week and report back. I suspect that they, along with CR, will improve.

Eliab

These may need to be revised a little. I'm on tour right now and even though I have one scheduled for tomorrow, I won't really have time to check. But, I will when I return from my trip next week.

Eliab

I read a recent review of the Nuvision LED DLP - the reviewer's feeling is that it a was little too dim for a bright room. I'm curious what your thoughts are on brightness now that yours is calibrated?

Thanks.

brightness is definately improved post calibration

I have no real issues with brightness in my setting. I only have 1 window in my room and I have pretty good control of the light.

Post calibration the brightness is not an issue and black levels are excellent.

Only real issue is that verizon needs to increase band width for (STD&DIGITAL)transmissions.

Well, looks like my intermittent red flashing (as though the TV was rapidly flickering into "warm2" and back) is not repairable, due to an inability of Samsung to make replacement parts available. Maybe this means the demand is high on the 5679W!
So, they're going to call me within the next 10 days about sending a replacement. I hope it has no new issues, as aside from this problem the TV has been great. Given that this problem only affects me for a little while each week, and that I have not seen it in several days, I almost feel bad about needing a new set, but I guess that's the way it goes.

On my HLS-5679W I have curved (concave) vertical edges that get worse close to the edges of the screen. This is very pronounced when you watch TV in 4:3 mode. Is there anyway to adjust this? Does anyone else have this problem?

Thanks

To some extent, everyone who has a shallow RPTV set has the same problem to some extent. What you need to do is figure out if your set is outside the norm.

The problem is caused by the short distance from the projector to the screen.

The only way to fix pincushioning is on the DMD board inside the display. You may wanna call a samsung tech out to do it (or someone you trust who knows the display). As with most tech visits, dont expect the world

What retailers are carrying these units? I have waited for some time but can't find one anywhere. Checked BB,CC,HHG,Tweeter, no 5679. Is this a regional thing? I am in Nashville, TN.

Thanks

Previous reports in this thread state most "high end" a/v shops have it, as well as BB which are magnolia affiliated. Many online stores carry it, but I understand how hard it is to get a set you've never seen. I took a leap, using the 5688w as my sample to look at while at BB. The only real diff between them is slightly dimmer, black levels aren't as good comparatively (granted, not enough to dismiss the set), quieter, less power consumption, less noise, no wheel... etc.etc. The color out of the box, the 5688w looked better, but post calibration, the 5679w is perfect.

I'm sure someone more professional, like our resident calibrators would be able to explain the diff between 5688 and 5679, but thats what I used for comparison's sake.

Prior to calibration of my HLS5679w, SD content via my Tivo/HDVR2 was like watching blots of paint w/ color banding/contouring from hell. My HD sources via DirecTV HR20-700 and Samsung DVD-R145 looked relatively ok, but not what you expect from an expensive set. Naturally, I was stuck in movie mode and things looked dull and dim.

As scheduled, David Abrams from Avical arrived at my home around 5pm, and 7 hours later my set was stunning. Don't expect night and day difference, it took me 2 weeks to get used to a calibrated picture after a lifetime of crap. Dave set my color gamut to normal for SMPTE C and wide for SMPTE HD. I use Dynamic for my good HD/upscaled input sources. The color looks pure, contrast/black levels are so lifelike its almost in 3d. I use Normal mode for crappier SD inputs with a little more brightness which makes the source look acceptable. Dave set up Warm2 for B&W viewing.

Prior to Dave coming, using the DVE disk, title 12, chapter 14, the ramp showed a LOT of contouring. Post calibration, this ramp is 98% smooth, with that other 2% soft enough to not hurt too much.

Watching Fifth Element post calibration was like watching completely different movie. The colors where vivid, the flesh tones where very lifelike. The improved black levels have definitely helped. I've had to begin watching my whole DVD collection again to capture the true elements on the movies. Football games look excellent. CSI, Lost, House, 3lbs, any network tv show in HD.... look great. DiscoveryHD is actually nice to watch, even though you aren't even paying attention to the content itself.

Dave was very professional and courteous. He answered every question very well. Being a geek myself, he was able to explain details of his process while he did them, which was extremely interesting. If I had 25k for equip, patience, and time, I'd be calibrating! Dave treated my set as if it was his own baby. He's welcome to treat it well any time in the future. Money well spent. Samsung should seriously consider service credits or something to offset the blatant misconfig of these sets to "look good on the floor."

Seven hours!

Thanks for the report. It's now included in the calibration list linked at the bottom of my post.

You guys must of had a good time.