Jim Barry
Established Member
- Joined
- Dec 13, 2004
- Messages
- 82
- Reaction score
- 32
- Points
- 89
I just got hold of the Samsung LE32R41BD after waiting a couple of weeks for it to come into stock at DigiUK. I am planning to get a media centre PC and I bought the set on the basis that it supports PC input at 1360x768 - acceptably close to the native resolution of 1366x768.
The initial impressions were quite encouraging. The main menus were crisp and the picture from the analogue tuner looked reasonably good. However, after scanning for digital channels, I was shocked at the abysmally poor quality of the DTV picture. Edges within the image had the dreaded "halos" that result from sharpening filters. Even with the sharpness control turned down to zero, the picture still looked terrible. The result was the same on SCART input from my DVD player and external Freeview box. The DTV programme info text also looked really bad, almost as though it was being converted to an analogue signal and back again. Perhaps the TV is actually faulty. If not, I am at a loss to understand how anybody could consider this dire picture quality to be acceptable.
I noticed in passing that there is no 14:9 picture mode, which is a bit of a shame for folks using the analogue tuner (given that widescreen material is commonly broadcast at 14:9 on analogue).
The real killer for me, however, is that the only available refresh rate for PC input modes is 60 Hz - there is no support for the 50 Hz modes needed for fluid playback of PAL material. This is despite the fact that I rang Samsung before placing the order, specifically telling them that I wanted to use the TV with a PC running Windows MCE. They said yes, it supports 50 Hz, no problem. They lied.
Fortunately, DigiUK were pretty good about it and have agreed to take the TV back and give me a full refund. I am now back to square one, looking for an LCD TV that supports PC input at the native resolution at both 50 and 60 Hz. Does such a thing exist? And what kind of stupid resolution is 1366x768 anyway? 1366 is not divisible by 8 so is not compatible with computer graphics cards. Of course I realize that 1366x768 is a 16:9 widening of the standard XGA resolution 1024x768. But why oh why can't the LCD TV industry get its act together and start manufacturing LCD panels at 1280x720, which corresponds to an actual HDTV format, and is readily supported by media centre PCs?
The initial impressions were quite encouraging. The main menus were crisp and the picture from the analogue tuner looked reasonably good. However, after scanning for digital channels, I was shocked at the abysmally poor quality of the DTV picture. Edges within the image had the dreaded "halos" that result from sharpening filters. Even with the sharpness control turned down to zero, the picture still looked terrible. The result was the same on SCART input from my DVD player and external Freeview box. The DTV programme info text also looked really bad, almost as though it was being converted to an analogue signal and back again. Perhaps the TV is actually faulty. If not, I am at a loss to understand how anybody could consider this dire picture quality to be acceptable.
I noticed in passing that there is no 14:9 picture mode, which is a bit of a shame for folks using the analogue tuner (given that widescreen material is commonly broadcast at 14:9 on analogue).
The real killer for me, however, is that the only available refresh rate for PC input modes is 60 Hz - there is no support for the 50 Hz modes needed for fluid playback of PAL material. This is despite the fact that I rang Samsung before placing the order, specifically telling them that I wanted to use the TV with a PC running Windows MCE. They said yes, it supports 50 Hz, no problem. They lied.
Fortunately, DigiUK were pretty good about it and have agreed to take the TV back and give me a full refund. I am now back to square one, looking for an LCD TV that supports PC input at the native resolution at both 50 and 60 Hz. Does such a thing exist? And what kind of stupid resolution is 1366x768 anyway? 1366 is not divisible by 8 so is not compatible with computer graphics cards. Of course I realize that 1366x768 is a 16:9 widening of the standard XGA resolution 1024x768. But why oh why can't the LCD TV industry get its act together and start manufacturing LCD panels at 1280x720, which corresponds to an actual HDTV format, and is readily supported by media centre PCs?