./janella.com

It’s nice to see Target finally coming to the island.

[Note: My reason for documenting my HDTV purchase is to simply share my experience. I’m just your average Joe trying to figure this out.]

I was only slightly hesitant in ordering a HDTV through Amazon. I heard good things regarding their white glove service when you order an HDTV directly from Amazon. They deliver the TV to your home, unbox it, place it where you tell them, and they will even take the box away if you desire. They wait while you hook up the TV, turn it on, and inspect the TV for any damages. Pretty sweet service. Just to get it out of the way, for this purchase they did all of the above very well. I was very happy with the delivery of our first HDTV. Now onto my thoughts regarding the Samsung LN46A630.

The 46-inch HDTV looked physically very nice. I’m not much into red, probably one of my least favorite colors, but the red tinge on this model was barely noticeable. One of the first things I learned about HDTVs is that they don’t look great with their initial settings. I went forum post and a personal blog - here, and here - to get advice on settings. The menu system is easy to navigate. The remote buttons are big and labeled well.

Once I tried a couple of the settings presented in the postings, the TV pictured looked good. It even looked better when popping in a blu-ray into the Sony PlayStation 3. Standard Definition (SD) channels looked fair, some bad and some good. High Definition (HD) channels looked very good. We lived with the Samsung for three weeks with everything going fine. I watched Super Bowl XLIII in HD and enjoyed the experience.

But there are two downsides with the Samsung that became apparent after time. The first is sound. Now, I know it should probably be hooked up to a nice AV system, but the TV is in a small room. The speakers on the set are on the bottom grill pointed down, similar to an iMac. The sound is projected downward, and at times, seems muddled. I don’t have the greatest hearing so I need to pump up the volume a bit.

The second issue for me is the quality of off-axis viewing. At times I am about 30-degrees to the right of center when watching TV. Why? Well, I’m on my desktop computer. From where I sit, the colors become extremely washed out. It is watchable, but painfully so, knowing the quality of the picture could be better. I understand this is prevalent with LCD sets, whereas plasmas are more forgiving. I don’t know.

I’m looking, still, at the Sony KDL-40XBR7. We’ll have to see how it compares to the Samsung.

I remember the first five DVDs I bought when I purchased my first DVD player. They were:

• The 400 Blows
• L.A. Confidential
• Hard Boiled
• The Seven Samurai
• The Wedding Singer

Yes, The Wedding Singer appears to be the odd choice, but I found the movie very funny. Anyway, now that I’ve converted to blu-ray, I wondering what my first five discs should be? I already have a head start with three, two of them coming from a deal when I bought the PS3. The discs we current have are:

• Casino Royale
• Monty Python's Life of Brian
• Iron Man

I only bought Life of Brian because it was part of a deal. There were no other movies on the available list that I thought I would enjoy. I like Monty Python, but I enjoyed Monty Python and the Holy Grail more than Life of Brian. But anyway, I’m still trying to determine (1) what my next purchases will be, and (2) how big is my blu-ray collection going to be. I don’t want to repeat what I did with DVDs - a collection that grew close to 300 discs.

Why don’t I want to collect a bunch of blu-ray discs?

It’s not the whole ‘investing in a technology that may change’ thing that makes me hesitant. It seems to be a fact that anything you/I have a lot of - whether it be clothes, cds, mp3, or whatever - you/I only seem to really use, what, 20% of whatever you have of. Seriously. There are plenty of mp3s in my collection that I haven’t listened to since ripping. There are plenty of clothes that I’ve only worn once, if not at all. There are DVDs that I haven’t watched since buying them. They all take up space. They all took up $$.

Well, let’s see how I do. Saying and doing are two different things.

[Note: My reason for documenting my HDTV purchase is to simply share my experience. I am, by no means, an expert in this or have a particular 'eye' for TVs.]

I've been lusting after an LCD TV for about a year.

In general I like to research purchases as thoroughly as possible. I avoided researching TVs because I couldn’t get the green light for an LCD TV purchase from Farrah. Well, recently she relented. Off I went to research.

I knew zero about LCD and plasma TVs. I relied on three resources for my research:

• Amazon.com reviews
• The forums at avsforum.com
• Advice from friends such as Tage, Rol, Steven and Bigfil

First, I thought about the room the TV would be in. It would be placed in a spare bedroom. The viewing distance would be about 5-7 feet. From the chart on Amazon.com the size of the TV would be anywhere from 26" to 46". I was always told to go bigger than you think you should get, so I narrowed it down to either a 40" or 46" TV.

You can find various reasons to go for either a plasma or LCD TV. For the type of room and the price range I was interested in, an LCD TV instead of a plasma fit my needs.

I looked at all the brands, settling on Samsung and Sony. All of the TVs I have personally owned have been Sonys, the last being a 36" XBR monster weighing a ton. I’ve heard good things about Samsung though and wanted to seriously consider an alternative to the pricey Sony sets. I narrowed the field of sets to three: the Samsung LN40A650, Samsung LN40A750, and a Sony KDL-40XBR7. I went to Best Buy, a Sony Style store, and my local Fry’s to see the three sets in action.

All the sets I saw looked great picture-wise. I’ve been told when you head into the showroom to look at TVs know that the sets are calibrated to look their best. When you get home with your new TV you will need to do a bit of calibration to get the TV to look right. (Luckily there are a lot of good posts on avsforum.com to help you out.) From a design aesthetic, the Sony KDS-40XBR7 was the most pleasing. But when you think Sony you must also think extra dollars.

After fielding responses to the question of Samsung versus Sony question I posted on Facebook and twitter, I placed on order through Amazon.com for the Samsung LN46A630. Wait, that wasn’t on the list of TVs I cited before?

Well, I exchanged email messages with Tage, who sold me on some details on the LNA630. The LNA630 is basically the LNA650 but with a semi-matte screen. I chose the 46" instead of the 40" because, like a mentioned before, you should go bigger than you initially think if possible.

I’ll let you know what I think about the Samsung LN46A630 in a later post.