ATEC AV470 1080 LCD TV Review
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Phil Hinton examines the most affordable 1080P screen on the market. Bring us sunshine just don't dim the lights!IntroductionFounded in 1993, ATEC will not be an instantly recognisable name in the world of AV, however the company has developed over the last decade from civil defence work, right through to design and manufacture of LCD displays. The ATEC LCD line up and the price points in which they compete is mighty impressive, so when their new 1080p model was launched late last year we just had to have a look for ourselves. Summary In rounding up my thoughts after living with this screen for nearly two weeks now is going to be a little tricky. I want to lambast the LG.Phillips panel for its poor black reproduction that is going to drive those who appreciate movie watching mad with its grey and washed out appearance in those darker scenes. But then that is one of the problems with LCD technology, some do it better then others, here on the AV470 it is frustrating and sadly allows no user control of the backlight. However use the set as an everyday workhorse taking your Sky HD feeds and HD DVDs in rooms with ambient lighting and the set comes into its own offering good detail levels, accurate colours and stunning sharpness. You still get the occasional wash out but as an everyday TV for watching SD and HD programming it does the job very well indeed. I imagine that next generation gamers will also benefit from the sharpness and detail that this set offers as well as a good response time. And just look at that price. The build quality is superb, the remote forgettable, some nifty PIP features and a full native 1080 panel and all for around £1499. At that price I am prepared to cut the AV470 some slack on the black levels as the rest of the functionality and picture quality with every day material is above average for budget sets. So those looking for the very best in picture quality for serious movie watching can look elsewhere, the AV470 will not fulfil your wishes, but as the living room work horse displaying normal TV, HD & Games material in brightly lit surroundings it does the job admirably and 1080p for not much money, you can’t say fairer than that?
Heavy, so very heavy! First impressions of this giant 47 inch full HD screen were of surprise at the actual build quality on offer. This set weighs an absolute ton! Just ask the poor, hapless delivery driver who had to help me up a steep flight of stairs with the packaging. This just highlighted to me that if we are going to review new TV sets on any kind of regular basis, I need to get back into the gym! Once unpacked I suddenly noticed just how sexy this screen looks, with its two tone colour effect and super dark screen coating, it oozes the type of style Sony would be proud off. The screen area is brought forward from the speakers below with a stylish grill running up the sides and the control buttons on the right hand underside lighting up in a snazzy blue colour. This is one nice looking and well built unit. Even on such a budget priced screen if you removed the ATEC badge from the front, I bet many enthusiasts on the forums would be fooled into thinking this was a market leading branded TV.  Talking about fixing things for the next model brings me nicely on to the remote control. Let's face it you won't lose this remote by accident. On purpose maybe, but not by accident. The brilliant white colour will burn your retinas from 50 yards, Ok so I maybe exaggerating a little with the retina problems, but in all seriousness the remote looks and feels cheap and the functionality and layout is not ideal. It took me a good 10 minutes to figure out the main user keys which instead of being easy to find and use, are positioned all over the shop. Once mastered, the menus are easy to navigate and user control allows plenty of adjustments in the right areas. So what better time than to calibrate the set and get ready to connect some sources and watch material. Performance I left the set running for a full day with a DVD on repeat just to give the TV time to settle from its journey before I did any close examination of the calibration. One thing that has improved lately with LCD screens is the control of the backlight which can washout images if set too high. Some early models from Toshiba and Sony were guilty of looking great with bright material, but switch to a dark scene with shadow detail and it became a grey mess with parts of the panel visible behind the image. Thankfully most sets these days do not suffer from those problems to the same extent as early machines, but unfortunately the AV470 is not so lucky. I found it quite frustrating that even once I thought I had the TV displaying blacks at acceptable levels, once film material was playing my attention kept wandering to the lack of black or even semi black. Instead what I could see was the backlight on the panel washing certain areas of the image and taking away any shadow detail present. Sure, off air material from Sky and the built in DTV Tuner looked good as did bright scenes on HD DVD, but get a dark scene and I started cursing away. Light pollution is a problem with LCD sets in one form or another, to be honest I have seen only a handful of sets that present acceptable black levels to my taste, but I did find that the AV470 struggled more than most. The set employs an LG.Phillips 1080p panel and boasts a contrast ratio of 1600:1, at the time of writing I was unable to confirm this figure. But the lack of backlight control is a problem when watching in the dark. However, let’s get back to the place this set will be used, the living room, with light spilling in through windows and lots of strong lighting during the dark hours of the day. In these conditions and playing off air standard or High Definition material, the ATEC produces quite a nice image all round. I noticed that with HD DVD in particular colours jumped off the screen producing convincing flesh tones and adding excellent depth to the image. Detail was also stunning on this set, feed it a 1080 picture and the detail levels will impress even the most fickle amongst us enthusiasts. Playing Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire on HD DVD the amount of background information and detail present, as well as a convincing depth of field looked three dimensional. Again with Potter being a dark movie it also showed up some weak spots in terms of shadow detail and light spillage, but overall the AV470 did impress me with its sincere no nonsense approach to HD pictures. Discs like King Kong (again HD DVD) demand to be seen in full native 1080 and for £1499 the AV470 gives you the detail, brightness and colour depth you would expect although I did see some video noise in there at times. So enough with the movies, how does the AV470 handle other material such as Sky? Again this will be the sets bread and butter material and it handles SD material surprisingly well. Watching a documentary about the Vicar of Dibley had plenty of close up facial shots of the interviewees allowing a surprising amount of detail to come through in the image. It looked sharp, detailed and refined with very little in the way of video noise. Even colours looked impressive with flesh tones appearing well rendered although they did look a little processed. Wide shots within the program didn’t look overly soft with only the occasional artefact in the image being visible. Next were Aberdeen Vs Hibs in the Scottish cup and the AV470 impressed with its fast response time for movement. Only on wide shots did there appear to be smearing of the ball as it moved across the screen, colours appeared natural and refined. Switching to high definition off air material showed the class the AV470 has in rendering fine detail and colours and I could find no major faults in its overall performance. Other nice features available with the set include picture in picture with various set up options. You can determine where you want the secondary image to appear on the screen and even allow a full swap or side by side images. This kind of usability is surprising in such a competitively priced TV set. Have your sayDid you find this review useful? Please let us know. To comment, click here and post a reply. Review EthosRead about our review ethos and the meaning of our review badges here. 1,595 word review viewed 7,450 times. | ATEC AV470 1080pSize: 47 inch television Suggested price: £1,550  Reviewed 31st January, 2007 by Phil Hinton Key Features
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LG-Philips LCD TV Panel
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E. & O.E.