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hitachi 50x500 vs sansung 46 tantus. which should i buy, and why.
does anybody have a hitachi 50v500? i'm thinking about buying 1, any advice?
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Had a Samsung 5065W for 3 weeks, it died
I received a Hitachi 50V500A as a temp. replacement two weeks ago.
IMO PQ wise the Sammy is the clear winner, especially on HD.
Fan is louder on the Hit. and IMO the silver color and all around look is cheesier.
Keep in mind that
my Hitachi was a return and I have no idea what the A stands for.
I received a Hitachi 50V500A as a temp. replacement two weeks ago.IMO PQ wise the Sammy is the clear winner, especially on HD.
Fan is louder on the Hit. and IMO the silver color and all around look is cheesier.
Keep in mind that
my Hitachi was a return and I have no idea what the A stands for.
For what it's worth, I'm in the process of returning mine. I bought the 50V500 last week. OOTB, it had a very bad red push problem. I was able to correct that but now it's overly bright and the colors are terrible (for the record, after correcting the push, it was perfectly fine. I simply turned it on one morning and it was terrible again).
I've tried all inputs and they display the same thing. I tried a DVD and it looked like it was playing like a 16 million color game in 256 colors. Very blocky.
Unfortunate because I really wanted to like this set.
I've tried all inputs and they display the same thing. I tried a DVD and it looked like it was playing like a 16 million color game in 256 colors. Very blocky.
Unfortunate because I really wanted to like this set.
I have owned a 60V500A model from Hitachi for about 2 months and love the set. SD programming is good and HD is outstanding. So far, I would highly recommend the Hitachi but like anything else you could get a lemon. Sony had a lot of issues with their LCD RPTV this past year.
Quote:
Oh, I'm sure I just got a bum set or that it's been fiddled with by someone else. This was an open box model that had close to 40 hours of viewing on it.
The change in picture quality from day to day scares me, though. It would leave me to believe it's not simply a calibration item. As much as I like the TV, I can't see getting a tech out from CC, having him adjust it, then have to go through with Avia and also call an ISF tech to get it to look good.
I was able to get a great picture on my Toshiba 50HX81 with Avia and a little fiddling.
I like the concept of LCD RPTV (for size and lack of burn in worries) but the effort plus the lack of furniture means fall back to a standard CRT RPTV.
| Originally posted by Crow I have owned a 60V500A model from Hitachi for about 2 months and love the set. SD programming is good and HD is outstanding. So far, I would highly recommend the Hitachi but like anything else you could get a lemon. Sony had a lot of issues with their LCD RPTV this past year. |
The change in picture quality from day to day scares me, though. It would leave me to believe it's not simply a calibration item. As much as I like the TV, I can't see getting a tech out from CC, having him adjust it, then have to go through with Avia and also call an ISF tech to get it to look good.
I was able to get a great picture on my Toshiba 50HX81 with Avia and a little fiddling.
I like the concept of LCD RPTV (for size and lack of burn in worries) but the effort plus the lack of furniture means fall back to a standard CRT RPTV.
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Very nice set - i had the 50V500 for about 2 weeks. Great picture, awesome remote/menuing, nice cabinet (if you like silver). However there are a couple things you should know:
* DVI/Component on input A are shared. This means if you hook up your settop box to the DVI port you are left with only one component. I prefer not to run my component outputs through my receiver so this was a problem for me.
* DVI PC hookup - it's doable but as the Hitachi scales every input before it's native res you have to do a lot of fiddling with Powerstrip to hookup a PC and you can't do 1:1 mapping.
* Red push - every set i've seen and the one i owned had a pretty significant red push. This can be tweaked out and is not a deal breaker IMO but it's very evident.
* Usual LCD issues - the blacks aren't spectacular but they're better than the GW's IMO.
CNET rates this set very highly and i agree although for me the Samsung 56" i replaced it with was a better fit.
Good luck.
EDIT: Oh and i had no issue with fan noise - yes you can hear it but it was no louder than the wheel/fan in my Sammy.
* DVI/Component on input A are shared. This means if you hook up your settop box to the DVI port you are left with only one component. I prefer not to run my component outputs through my receiver so this was a problem for me.
* DVI PC hookup - it's doable but as the Hitachi scales every input before it's native res you have to do a lot of fiddling with Powerstrip to hookup a PC and you can't do 1:1 mapping.
* Red push - every set i've seen and the one i owned had a pretty significant red push. This can be tweaked out and is not a deal breaker IMO but it's very evident.
* Usual LCD issues - the blacks aren't spectacular but they're better than the GW's IMO.
CNET rates this set very highly and i agree although for me the Samsung 56" i replaced it with was a better fit.
Good luck.
EDIT: Oh and i had no issue with fan noise - yes you can hear it but it was no louder than the wheel/fan in my Sammy.
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I had one. The fan was loud, the colors looked artificial (I didn't do much calibrating), and, worst of all, the video noise/screen door effect was awful. I really wanted to like the set, but couldn't. I also auditioned the Sammy DLP and the Sony LCD RPTV. The Hit. came in last in PQ. I ended up keeping the Sony as the best overall set. Note, though, that IMO, the Sammy had the most stunning pq for brightly lit HD shows like baseball and basketball. I returned the Sammy though because of the digital contouring in dark scenes, headache problems, audio delay, and relatively poor sd signal quality.
I love my 50V500A no problems what so ever.
HD is bright perfect, fan noise is present but low, I have fallen asleep many times with the set on low and there is no problem with noise, the clock in the kitchen ticking is louder.
LOVE the HDTV from Direct TV, I watched squid swimming for an hour, because the picture is so unbelieveable.
my only problem is ONLY ONE DVI INPUT, Hey Hitachi whats up with that, you guys smoking crack or sumthin.
With everything going to DVI we need more inputs.
But have them open the box in the store and look at pixilation and listen for fan noise. I did both and have 0 complaints about picture quality.
If you know of a solution for DVI let me know..
HD is bright perfect, fan noise is present but low, I have fallen asleep many times with the set on low and there is no problem with noise, the clock in the kitchen ticking is louder.
LOVE the HDTV from Direct TV, I watched squid swimming for an hour, because the picture is so unbelieveable.
my only problem is ONLY ONE DVI INPUT, Hey Hitachi whats up with that, you guys smoking crack or sumthin.
With everything going to DVI we need more inputs.
But have them open the box in the store and look at pixilation and listen for fan noise. I did both and have 0 complaints about picture quality.
If you know of a solution for DVI let me know..
I have a 60v500 and love it 1000%. No problems at all. The logic that led me to this set was:
- Going to use it with an HTPC and am very lazy about turning off the set when I'm not using it => CRT is out because of burn-in. Too bad, because they have awesome picture quality, although size/weight is a turn-off.
- No need for flatscreen, don't want to pay the plasma/LCD premium, and size is a major factor; also, plasma can have burn-in issues, but not such a big deal; arguable better picture of plasma doesn't offset its much higher price => plasma/LCD is out.
That left DLP and LCD. Although some say that DLP is better, when I considered that I could get a 60" LCD for at least $1,000 less than I could get a 60" DLP, the choice was easy.
I considered the three major LCDs, Sony, Panasonic, and Hitachi. I spent about two hours in a Circuit City playing with DVE calibrating the sets as best I could. The result: they all looked the same. In the end, I chose the Hitachi because it was cheaper than the Sony and I liked its menus MUCH better. Hitachi gives access to calibration options in its user menu that others only have in the service menu, if at all--specifically, the color decoder. This set gives individual control of red, blue, green, color and tint as well as separate cyan, red, blue, magenta, yellow, and green saturation controls. In the user menu!
In terms of contrast, color richness, and black levels, the picture on this set can't compare to a well-calibrated CRT (rear-projection or front!), but its picture is still the best I have ever owned. Out of the box, the picture needed calibration, but wasn't awful; after calibration, it is awesome. In addition, I love the fact that, once it's calibrated, it basically stays perfect without the need to constantly go back and re-tweak it. Every few months, I pull out DVE again and check the bright, contrast, and color decoder, and so far, they are always spot on.
Although you can't get 1:1 pixel mapping through the DVI port, I haven't noticed. Also, it's true that it took me quite some evenings of tweaking with powerstrip to get a perfectly centered picture with zero overscan from my HTPC, whereas, I hear that with the Samsung DLP (for example), it's basically plug-and-go. Not a big deal. I don't notice any degradation in picture quality from the built in scaler... but then, I'm not really looking for it. Text is sharp and readable, movies and DivX look great.
One annoyance is that you can't have separate color decoder settings for each input. Although contrast, bright, color, and tint are remembered, the red, blue, and green settings are global. This basically means that only one input is going to have perfect color decoding and the others will just be close. Not a big deal to me.
I love this set. Every time I see it, I think it's the exact right set for me. No buyer's remorse here--not even a little bit!
- Going to use it with an HTPC and am very lazy about turning off the set when I'm not using it => CRT is out because of burn-in. Too bad, because they have awesome picture quality, although size/weight is a turn-off.
- No need for flatscreen, don't want to pay the plasma/LCD premium, and size is a major factor; also, plasma can have burn-in issues, but not such a big deal; arguable better picture of plasma doesn't offset its much higher price => plasma/LCD is out.
That left DLP and LCD. Although some say that DLP is better, when I considered that I could get a 60" LCD for at least $1,000 less than I could get a 60" DLP, the choice was easy.
I considered the three major LCDs, Sony, Panasonic, and Hitachi. I spent about two hours in a Circuit City playing with DVE calibrating the sets as best I could. The result: they all looked the same. In the end, I chose the Hitachi because it was cheaper than the Sony and I liked its menus MUCH better. Hitachi gives access to calibration options in its user menu that others only have in the service menu, if at all--specifically, the color decoder. This set gives individual control of red, blue, green, color and tint as well as separate cyan, red, blue, magenta, yellow, and green saturation controls. In the user menu!
In terms of contrast, color richness, and black levels, the picture on this set can't compare to a well-calibrated CRT (rear-projection or front!), but its picture is still the best I have ever owned. Out of the box, the picture needed calibration, but wasn't awful; after calibration, it is awesome. In addition, I love the fact that, once it's calibrated, it basically stays perfect without the need to constantly go back and re-tweak it. Every few months, I pull out DVE again and check the bright, contrast, and color decoder, and so far, they are always spot on.
Although you can't get 1:1 pixel mapping through the DVI port, I haven't noticed. Also, it's true that it took me quite some evenings of tweaking with powerstrip to get a perfectly centered picture with zero overscan from my HTPC, whereas, I hear that with the Samsung DLP (for example), it's basically plug-and-go. Not a big deal. I don't notice any degradation in picture quality from the built in scaler... but then, I'm not really looking for it. Text is sharp and readable, movies and DivX look great.
One annoyance is that you can't have separate color decoder settings for each input. Although contrast, bright, color, and tint are remembered, the red, blue, and green settings are global. This basically means that only one input is going to have perfect color decoding and the others will just be close. Not a big deal to me.
I love this set. Every time I see it, I think it's the exact right set for me. No buyer's remorse here--not even a little bit!
I am looking at the 60" version of this set. I have a question about the dvi-input. Does this set benefit from using one of the dvi-equipped dvd players? If I would use one of those players to send a 720p or 1080i signal, what would the hitachi do with it? (i.e., does it further scale it - and does that negate the benefit of such a player?)
Thanks
Thanks
I have the 60v500 with Sammy 930HD DVD player going into the DVI. The Hitachi handles it, no problem. PQ is awesome. Not HD quality, but VERY nice. I've never actually done A/B comparisons between component/DVI or DVI 720p/ DVI 1080i, I've just taken everyone's word that 720p through DVI is the best option.
supposed to be a terrific set. here's a review:
http://reviews.cnet.com/Hitachi_50V5...?tag=pdtl-list
It's a really good deal now, too. you can get the 50 inch Hitachi for the price of a 42 inch GWIII.
Not that I'm complaining, though.
http://reviews.cnet.com/Hitachi_50V5...?tag=pdtl-list
It's a really good deal now, too. you can get the 50 inch Hitachi for the price of a 42 inch GWIII.
Not that I'm complaining, though.
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