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rightoh, well someone better get this started i spose
couple of weeks ago my new tv arrived.. i'd had a 28" toshiba flat widescreen for a few years - 3 or so, and felt it was time for an upgrade. i already knew what i wanted before even researching the field.. toshiba's latest big pictureframe tv. i'd wanted the origional picture frame telly when it first came out (when i got my last telly - it was about £1800 then..) but couldnt afford it, so settled for spending £500 on my old one. i did research for a couple of months what my options were, and they were actually surprisingly limited. most tv manufacturers have stopped doing 36" crts - instead concentrating on plasma/lcd technology for their larger sets. this is a bit of a shame in my opinion - the very best lcd/plasma screens do have some benefits over crts (no geometry problems), but the very best still do not have the quality that the very best crts have. anyways, my choise was down to the toshiba, a cheapish pannasonic (which had been discontinued) and a sony that was a couple of hundred quid more. the sony is a very nice set, but few internet retailers had it - the toshiba was released at a whopping £1600 back in november, and since then has fallen to £800. an absolute steal of a price.. my other option was a 32" screen, or a plasma, but i felt cheap plasmas have shoddy quality i wouldnt be impressed with, and my living room is large enough for 32" not to satisfy me
the day the tv arrived, the first thing that struck me was the size/weight of the box. flippin massive. before i ordered i checked it could be delivered into my flat - the delivery guys turned up with it and refused to take it up the stairs to my flat.. something about insurance. i was in half a mind to tell them to take it back - this is a 13 STONE tv remember, but the promise of all that shiney kit in the box (it took 2 weeks to deliver, and i didnt want to wait another 2 for another retailer) meant i accepted delivery with it outside the block of flats. i had to 'roll' the box up the stairs to my front door, tv inside. the box wouldnt go thru the door so we (the gf and I) had to unpack it outside, on the landing. we then tried to carry it thru to the living room, but even 1/2 of it was too much for my missis to lift - fortunatly a friendly builder spotted us and gave me a hand carrying it thru to the living room.
the stand was easy enough to put up and looks pretty nice - the glass shelves make it look nice, and it looks 1-piece with the telly overall it took maybe 45 mins to build, at which point i/gf lugged the set onto it, lined it up and screwed it down. sweet.. now for the other bits. i decided to just wire up the dvd player to start with (more on that in a bit), with some shiney new cables care of audiovisualonline.co.uk - i had a nice ixos component video, and a matching coax digital audio lead, to transport the sound/picture to the telly. next was setting up the speakers - i'll go onto the sound later - but the tv basically comes with 4 satillites, the sub and the centre speaker are built in to the set to make up 5.1 - each speaker comes with 5M(!!!) of cable - generous enough for the largest of rooms - but not mine - in order to get the routing i wanted for the rear left speaker, i chopped a chunk off the front left and added it to the rear speaker cable, so the cable goes from the tv, all teh way round the room to the back left corner. i know all cables are meant to be the same length, but its worse the compromise imo
all cables plugged in i turn her on and play with the settings a little. not much to change, i put it on autosetting 2 (contrast 50, brightness 50 etc) and get on me way..
oooooh.. the picture is *amazing*.. compared to my old telly, which isnt exactly bad, the geometry is near perfect - very very slight convergance, maybe 1mm.. you cant notice it without a test pattern. the whole case itself is only 1" wider than my old 28"er, because of the neat packaging, so it doenst take up too much room.. the blacks have more depth to them, although if you sit up close you can see colour banding on cr*ppy dvds and some cable channels. there dont *appear* to be any 100hz artifacts though..
now for the next test.. progressive scan.. my new dvd player supports it, the telly supports it, and the cabling (progressive) supports it.. now to see what everyone is on about.. errrmm.. poo. its only running 50hz! quick mental check.. durrr, of course, its 100hz interlaced or 50 if you run prog scan. a good look at the picture and i really cant see much difference between the normal and prog scan, so i turn it off..
now for the sound - i used to run a ~100w all-in-one speaker/amp package.. that was nice and loud - i rarely used full umph. this new setup.. well the sound is just as clear.. clearer if anything.. the surround sound pans between the speakers soo smoothly, and the bass - despite only being 13w or something.. it is plenty loud enough for the other speakers, which are plenty loud enough for my reasonably large living room.. so very good..
all in all - i'll give it 9/10.. the performance is faultless, really, but i wish i'd realised about prog scan before splashing out on a new dvd player. but what can you do..? it'd be the same on any other telly.
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It is amazing!!! My sister has the zp 46 (the zp48s smaller brother) and I set it up for her... in prog scan there is no flicker 
Will look at Froogle tho.
