Plasma HDTV Reviews

Philips 17PF8946A 17″ HDTV-Ready LCD Flat-Panel TV Philips’ widescreen, 15:9 aspect-ratio 17PF8946A TFT LCD television is stylish enough and small enough to be used in any room of the house. The 17-inch TV offers high brightness (450 cd/m2) and high contrast (400:1), and an integrated TV tuner for cable or broadcast reception of all your favorite programs. This is an EDTV display, which means it’s a step closer to high-definition or HDTV than standard TVs. When used with a progressive-scan DVD player (or 480p-output DTV set-top box) you’ll get seamless, razor-sharp images from your favorite movies and concert videos.

LCD technology allows screens to be thinner and televisions to be lighter and more energy-efficient than ever before. The result is television that not only fits on a wall, but fits in places conventional televisions cannot. The 17PF8946A’s comes outfitted with Digital Crystal Clear III technology, a suite of picture innovations including Dynamic Contrast, green/blue stretch, and a 3-line digital comb filter. The comb filter removes blurred edges between colors and reduces dot crawl (tiny, moving dots of color along a sharp color separation in a vertical line, as in a depiction of a character’s striped T-shirt).

A feature called Active Control continually adjusts picture settings at over 60 times per second for all inputs, correcting both sharpness and noise reduction. Auto Picture lets you change–at the touch of a button–the picture settings (color, tint, contrast, etc.) for various types of programming, including sports, movies, multimedia (games), or weak signals.

Auto Sound allows you to select from 3 factory-set controls and a personal control that you set according to your preferences. Use the factory-set controls (voice, music, and theatre) to enhance appropriate programs. Virtual Dolby surround simulates enveloping surround sound from any 2 speakers.

Inputs include 1 component-video, 2 S-video, and 3 composite-video connections, as well as a VGA computer input, which accepts signals up to WXGA (1,280 x 768, from 60 to 75 Hz). Side-panel AV inputs accommodate a camcorder, gaming device, or VCR hookup, and a headphone output (minijack .125-inch) lets you listen in private.

What’s in the Box
TV, stand, remote control, remote batteries, and a user’s manual.
Customer Review: TV Damaged – Lousy Customer Service
I received a defective Philips TV – when I took it out of the box, I heard what sounded like a piece of metal rattling around inside the TV. I received three 33-page manuals (in 3 different languages)on how to use the remote control, but NOTHING about how to set-up the TV! I was able to attach the TV cable to this hunk of junk, but found that the SOUND wasn’t working! After 3 hours on the phone talking with 3 different Philips customer service idiots (each time I called, I asked for a supervisor, and was promptly disconnected!), I was told to return the TV – at MY expense – to ARKANSAS, of all places! After this frustrating experience, my opinion of Philips (and their products) is sub-zero. I rated this item as a ‘1′ because there is no ‘0′. I rate Philips, and their policy, as a ‘minus 100′.
Customer Review: Great device and a great deal.
I bought this TV for my college dorm room. The HD capabilities of this TV are terrific, my Xbox games just flow off the screen, and dvd’s look awesome too. Unfortunately, I don’t have a HDTV receiver, so I can’t watch TV in HD, but thats ok because the regular cable looks good on the screen. I also have the ability to connect my computer to the screen, but haven’t had a chance to do so yet.

There are a million input and output connections and the whole device is just really well designed. I’ve found that the included remote is well designed and easy to use. The only minor gripe about this TV is that the speakers aren’t that great, which should be expected from a screen of this type, just the way laptops have notoriously bad speakers. Simple solution to the speaker problem: buy a speaker system or simply a sub-woofer and you should be fine, or connect it to your home theatre system.

I’m really satisfied with this product, especially for the price I paid.

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