Anyone using a 32 inch lcd in their living room?

Before you settle on the Samsung, do yourself a favor and do some research in this forum. There are other LCD's that rate a bit better. Take a look at the 32" Panasonic and Toshiba sets. They should be priced comparably with the Samsung. The Panasonic will allow you to control the backlight yourself and give you more control over the picture. The Samsung has DNIe(Digital natural image engine). Most of the time it does look great but you will get artifacts. I started with Samsung myself, but "clayface" on standard cable drove me batty. Also, there's false contouring issues with even dvds and HD shows. If I were you, ask to see some standard signals on the display tvs. Not just hi-def demo material. All of the LCD's will look pretty good showing hi-def. Where they fall down is on standard material. The thing that I like about the XBR is that non-hi-def cable looks fairly natural. The XBR is also the most expensive LCD. If I could do it all over again, I would have investigated the Toshiba and Panasonic models. The price has really been dropping for those brands lately...

I originally had two models in the running - the 32XBR1 and the 32HP95, and decided on the latter. First and foremost, my main reasoning for the two sets was they were the only two 32" with CableCard that I had to select from (Sharp, Samsung, Westinghouse, JVC, did not have it in the 32") and it was a nice feature to have. Also wanted PC input, along with HDMI, and both of these sets had it. It's been a fantastic set. My DVD player is connected HDMI (Denon DVD-1920) and the picture is really nice. I'm not going to get into the finer detaisl of picture quality and stuff, but I'll say I like the set, and do not regret NOT spending another 600$ and getting the Sony for an extra component input.


As far as SD goes, it's SD, and nothing more. It looks good on this particular set, but the only problem I'm running into I think is what's in my lines. It's almost like a banding effect, where there's horizontal lines scrolling up or down the screen, and it depends on the channel for their variance and strength. Something I need to have looked at.


But overall, I like the set a lot.

Quote:
I went with the XBR versus the non-XBR, because of two factors. First, the XBR is comprised of 8 panels versus 4 panels in the non-XBR. This means that from an angle, you get a better picture. Less "fade out."

Also, the XBR has a wide color gamut backlight. The "color wide" feature really does give you more CRT tube-like colors. From what I've read, it basically puts the color decoder in proper alignment.

I think it probably sounds odd that the thing I like most about the XBR is the fact that it is CRT tube-like!

I find basic analog cable and digital cable very watchable. Worse case scenario- on the lower analog channels the picture is a touch grainy. But, the contrast is very good and the colors do not suffer from "clay face".

That was enough for me. I did start out with Samsung. A basic model, then the flagship 329D model. Clayface drove me nuts, and I was lucky enough to be able to do one Final swap up to the XBR. I regret the big dollar I spent, but the quality is there to be sure.

Quote:
What specific models are you referring to? Also, you mention XBR but is that a Sony only feature?


Looks like I should be happy with a 32 inch from all the feedback I've gotten I could go for something bigger but I need to keep the width below 39 inches so that it still fits in my room

Quote:
All of the Samsungs have DNIe. I tried the LN-R328 and LN-R329D. The Panasonic I refer to is the TC-32LX50. The Toshiba model number escapes me but it's the current model you'd see at Best Buy or CC. From what I understand, the 32" Toshiba is made by Toshiba. The smaller models are Chinese knock-offs.

Yes, the features I mentioned for the XBR may be XBR only. Sharp may have that special backlight on their newest models, but I'm not sure about that. I know the non-XBR Sony does not have the advanced color-wide feature.

What I advise is buy the tv from a vendor with a liberal return policy. Check it out and if there's issues that annoy you, then swap it for another name brand.

This forum is full of good info about the various models. Do a search under "DNIe" to see what the other users have to say about Samsung tvs before you buy.