I recently ordered Samsung 46 inch LCD TV, which of model number is LN46B650. Actually it has not arrived yet. So I can’t really give a review yet. However, when I receive the TV (which is supposed to be delivered this Sunday), I will definitely update this post as I play with it.
Here’s the photo of the TV set (links to amazon product page):
Researching Viewing Distance
My place is not big and distance from tv set to my couch is about just less than 6 feet, which is a little over the ideal view distance for 46″ LCD. However, I assumed that eventually I would move to a bigger place in next 1 or 2 years and decided to buy 46″ sized LCD TV. (I referred to cnet’s “Ultimate HDTV buying guide” article)
Checked!
Researching brands
This was the issue that took the most intensive research on my part. I’m a type of person who longs for a good quality product and believes that a good product does not come with cheap price. When it comes to brands, price usually includes the “brand” name plus the unique technologies used to make a particular product. And the technologies distinguish between good LCD TV and bad LCD TV. Therefore, at first two brand names came up: Sony and Samsung.
Sony is known for good quality of visuals and audios at consumer level as well as production level. That’s why Sony came as a first option obviously. 2nd runner was Samsung, whose LCD panels have been used for apple products such as iPhone and Cinema Display. If Apple uses Samsung, it must be good quality.
So basically I debated between two brands Sony and Samsung for a long time.
Decision, Order, and Delivery
I ordered it from bestbuy after comparing between sony (KDL-46V5100) and samsung (LN46B650). The main comparisons that I made are:
- color: Samsung model had better colors that were more saturated. So when I looked at two TV sets, red was more red on Samsung TV.
- black/white: The contrast on Samsung model was better looking than Sony one again.
As you can see, I did not consider the sound features in both tv sets because I would hook up my Bose speaker systems to a TV. What I cared the most was color and contrast. And from what I saw it from bestbuy display Samsung (LN46B650) beats Sony TV (KDL-46V5100) set.
The delivery happened in the morning. Delivery time frame was 9am to 12pm and they did within the frame. Bestbuy delivery guys set up the LN46B650 TV set on my living room and hooked up a DVD player, Bose speaker system, and HD Cable box. Everything worked without any issues. They also took my old CRT TV with them.
So whole purchase experience was very smooth from ordering to delivering.
Fun with Yahoo! Widget
I was skeptical about Yahoo! Widget first without using them. However, I found it very useful once youtube widget is installed on the tv.
So far so good after more than 6 months use
My favorite part of the TV is the Yahoo! Widget since there are very good widgets by Amazon. I started using amazon-on-deman widget few months back and since then I regularly watch “friends”, which I bought and rent some HD movies. The picture quality is superb. Control is easy (although sometimes response time is slow, but I can live with it). You won’t notice that you are watching HD movies through streaming service directly on TV.
Things that have been bugging me
Of course things are not perfect always and here is my list of things that have bothered me:
- Response time of each click while using Yahoo Widget. Seems like there is 1-2 seconds delay after each click.
- Connection mode switch right after power up doesn’t respond right away. Sometimes I have to wait for 5 – 10 seconds. (i.g. Switching from playstation3 to cable tv connection)
- The quality of remote control. It’s been almost 1 year, but I need to press harder on controller keys
- Switching to another channel while watching cable refreshes the screen with a different resolution, different MHz, etc. When you want to move quickly, you can’t because your remote becomes non-responsive when screen refreshes by itself.
Still highly recommended
There are more decent TVs out there nowdays. My TV is almost 1 year old and already outdated by other new LED TV, 3D TV, and so on. However, the picture quality that TV provides has been outstanding and colors on the screen have been very vivid. If anyone looks for the LCD TV with Yahoo Widget, I still highly recommend this samsung LN46B650 series. Again once you start using amazon on demand widget on the tv, you will totally not want to operate DVD player.