Tosh 46WM48B + Panny S97EBS REVIEW

L

lee31

Guest
OK, all set up now

First opinion with TV was "bloody hell, aint it big" lol when turning it on for the 1st time, SKY kicked in on kids Boomerang channel, Dora The Explorer was crystal clear, absolutely superb picture & pretty good sound through TV speakers too. I let the kids enjoy it till bed time, then had a fiddle. As with all new gadgets, I think it is a tendancy to look for faults, which I have done & in truth, found some. Black & Whites on REAL broadcasts could be better, the do suffer from colour wheel distortion but only at viewing distances under 3 metres and as my normal viewing distance is just short of 4 metres, I am happy. I have spoken to Tosh about this & they say its NOT a fault but if I start to notice it from 4 Metres then get Tosh engineer in to look & they have advised me to use the Xmas period to keep an eye on it, nevertheless, gotta say, Im well pleased with the TV although for me, it does have a few annoying quirks eg, you have to use two digits for direct channel change, eg fromm BBC1 need to press 04 to get to channel 4, Last channel button doesnt recognise AV channels, eg if on AV1 & I press last channel, goes to eg ITV, if I then press last channel again, it stays on ITV & wont go to AV1
Also, which this I find very annoying, when TV starts, it automatically goes to SKY, if I then turn my DVD player on, DVD channel automatically appears (But only if scart connected) which is what you expect, but, if from SKY, I choose a terrestial channel, then put SKY back on, then turn DVD player on, the DVD channel is NOT automatic - I find that annoying

I have connected my DVD player by both RGB scart & HDMI, I have had to do this purely for auto-channeling as if only connected via HDMI you have to phisically turn the TV over to HDMI channel, this normally wont bother most of you but my wife & kids arnt bothered (nor do I want to tell them) how to work the TV properly, so connecting scart aswell, allows auto-channeling when the kids want to watch a DVD when Im not in.

The DVD player is superb too, very swish slimline design with blue led's & a nice looking transparant DVD tray with blue tint.
I have so far tested the DVD with R1, R2, DVDR-V, DVDR-MP3 & CDR-MP3

With exception of the DVDR-MP3 all played superbly both through RGB & HDMI and have had no problems at all with NTSC signals although automatically, I set the DVD player so's that an NTSC signal is trasmitted in NTSC (default was to convert it to PAL) - oh and HDMI sound could not decode the sound for CDR-MP3 but I have since turned off the sound option for HDMI as I run all my sound cables to a Marantz SR7300 receiver

Although I have only had the TV & DVD for 48 hours, I would say now that I am very very pleased with it all, I will spend some time tonight testing with different types of films where lighting & speed of movies may result in viewing changes eg, plan to test with films like Matrix R2, Pitch Black R1, Armageddon R1 Criterion, LOTR trilogy R1, Crouching Tiger R2 Superbit, Driven R3, Independence Day R4 & will try some slow films like Jerry Maguire etc.. then will test on animated DVD's like Monster Inc & Shrek to give the colours a real test - I watched Ronin DTS R2 Jap import last night & that was top drawer.

If any1 has any ideas on another film to test on this system, let me know what you think would be good as I may well have it as I have around 800 DVD's from all corners of the globe

I am also awaiting delivery of some official Microsoft Component leads for my Xbox & as soon as they come, I'll link it up to the TV & have a blast

Will be back with more info - thats if its of use ?

Lee
 
Where did you order your hi-def xbox leads from and does it have the 5.1 optical lead? Your help would be apperciated.
 
Lee,

Can you do me a favour when you have a sec.

Try comparing colours between the HDMI input and RGB scart.
I find the colours to be 'washed out' slightly on the HDMI.

I'm not saying it's a bad picture cos it ain't, but it looks to me like it could be better.

Thanks,
V.
 
Hi Lee,
I'm waiting to pull the trigger on a DLP TV but can't decide which make/model to get. I want to be able to do 1:1 mapping from my PC so I think the Tosh is a no go.

Nevertheless, give us your opinion/views once you've watch all thoses DVDs, some screen shots would be nice , if you can.

Cheers

Paulh.
 
Vandal said:
Lee,

Can you do me a favour when you have a sec.

Try comparing colours between the HDMI input and RGB scart.
I find the colours to be 'washed out' slightly on the HDMI.

I'm not saying it's a bad picture cos it ain't, but it looks to me like it could be better.

Thanks,
V.

HDMI def better mate, more definition to pic. Im only using the supplied Panny HDMI lead but used an Ixos £75 scart lead so its not my scart lead !

All I did to compare was pause the pic & change channels, not sure if your Denon is the same but I did have to turn HDMI on via the DVD set up screen 1st, maybe you need to do the same & you may find the same as me ?

I also find it better colour if you turn "Black Stretch" OFF !!
 
Cheers Lee.

Think I've sorted it now.
There was a setting to change the HDMI output on my 2910 to RGB (from YCH or something) and that has cleared up the colour problem. Now looks stunning.

Component and HDMI look about the same to my eyes. 720p also looks slightly clearer than 1080i.

V.
 
I take most of it back

After trying a few DVD's the blacks & whites got worse rather than better

I was all about ready to put my foot through the TV when I decided to try RGB through scart only - voila, nothing wrong at all & a superb pic. The result is that I have since found that although my DVD player is HDMI it has 4 settings 525, 625, 750 & 1115 (I think) and as the TV's HDMI settings is 720 & 1080 the DVD is NOT compatible with the TV so I will be on to S&V tomorrow hopefully to exchange the DVD player as they were fully aware that I was linking it to this TV - very annoyed, just hope they see reason or its £260 not well spent :thumbsdow
 
lee31 said:
I take most of it back

After trying a few DVD's the blacks & whites got worse rather than better

I was all about ready to put my foot through the TV when I decided to try RGB through scart only - voila, nothing wrong at all & a superb pic. The result is that I have since found that although my DVD player is HDMI it has 4 settings 525, 625, 750 & 1115 (I think) and as the TV's HDMI settings is 720 & 1080 the DVD is NOT compatible with the TV so I will be on to S&V tomorrow hopefully to exchange the DVD player as they were fully aware that I was linking it to this TV - very annoyed, just hope they see reason or its £260 not well spent :thumbsdow

Do you have another player in mind,as im looking for one to go with my tosh aswell but i aint got a clue.Sammy maybe?
 
Strange,

Went to bed really peed off & phoned S&V 9am, they told me that their shop set up was Tosh with S97 & it was superb & they would check it out & get back within the hour, no call so phoned again at midday, said would phone back, never did so I got out Toy Story & had another go, strange thing is the picture was absolutely superb, I took it out & put Pitch Black in, again SUPERB !! so the judge is still out on this set up, I think I need to have a good sit down & check further but with xmas & 3 excited kids (4 including me lol) I will leave it till things settle down especially as the TV has to go back for exchange, yep, 4 days old & already a fault, the output audio RCA jacks have stopped working & wont process any sound to my amp - I get all the luck

Lee
 
Hello paul

I have an optoma RD65 and I would not recomend this set if you want to input any thing but a 50Hz source. The same is also true for the RD50 which suffers from this same fault.

If you input any NTSC or PAL60 (60Hz) signal into the RD65/RD50, the picture judders.

Follow link for more info.

http://www.avforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=171415

Try a Sim 2.
 
both my original copies of Toy Story & Pitch Black are R1 NTSC & I can honestly say, they play like a dream NO juddering at all
 
You wont get any juddering on the toshiba as they have made the tv set correctly. However Optoma owners are suffering heavly with this issue.
Enjoy your set Lee.
 
lee31 said:
I take most of it back

After trying a few DVD's the blacks & whites got worse rather than better

I was all about ready to put my foot through the TV when I decided to try RGB through scart only - voila, nothing wrong at all & a superb pic. The result is that I have since found that although my DVD player is HDMI it has 4 settings 525, 625, 750 & 1115 (I think) and as the TV's HDMI settings is 720 & 1080 the DVD is NOT compatible with the TV so I will be on to S&V tomorrow hopefully to exchange the DVD player as they were fully aware that I was linking it to this TV - very annoyed, just hope they see reason or its £260 not well spent :thumbsdow
525 = NTSC(480), 625 = PAL(576), 750 = 720p, 1125 = 1080i
The first numbers relate to the actual number of 'scan lines' in the original image. The second set of numbers is the actual vertical resolution which is displayed on screen. Therefore most likely that the settings on either the DVD or the TV need changing to see the pictures.
 
Does the TV automatically determine 720p or 1080i?

I can set these on my DVD player, but I can't find any settings for this on the TV.

Thanks,
V.
 
Vandal - set the dvd player to 720p and the tv will automatically switch. If it does not you will end up with a blue or green screen.

The best DVD i have seen on this set is the Empire Strikes Back R2 in 720p. Its awesome. For some reason Return of the Jedi dvd is a bag of grain in comparison.
 
Paulherb i would not worry about the 1:1 mapping issue, i had it on my other plasma and its a nice feature but not a deal breaker when the set is this good :)
 
Will try Empire Strikes Back when I can find the damned disc.
Watched I, Robot the other night and the picture on that is fantastic.

My 'test disc' was Star Wars Episode 1.
Still find this disc great in parts, but grainy in others.

V.
 
Hi Carl,
I'm going to demo the set in the next few weeks as I live on the Isle of Man and the local dealers hav'nt got their hands on any yet.

I would like a model that does 1:1 mapping as playing Hlaf Life 2 or checking the web out on a 46 inch monitor would be well cool.

Cheers

Paulh.
 
Vandal: I tried the THX setup from terminator 2 the other day and when you get to the test with the circle for testing 16:9 format the left line of the box surrounding the circle was not visable.I tried horizontal adjustment but it wouldnt go far enough to show the line.Did you have the same problem?

Paul Herb:
you are indeed correct...Half life 2 on 46" is fekkin awesome..I tried it the other night and picture qual was awesome and that was only in VGA-VGA :)
 
Phunt, I will try it out and get back to you.

Recently moved house and all my DVD's are boxed up so will have to dig out T2 :D

V.
 

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