Matty and her Improbably Large TV

Back in July, we moved house. The house we've moved into is bigger than the one we left, and has a bigger lounge. The JVC 22" telly that has served us so well for going on 11 or 12 years looked really, really dinky in the new house. So it was decided to do a touch of shopping.

Shopping with a man and a teenager for a television is clearly a mistake - or at least it is when you are hoping not to need a second mortgage to support the television.

We found ourselves in the Sony shop, admiring the Sony Bravia wide screen 32" HD (High Definition) ready LCD digital TV. "Cool," the family said. "Let's buy it," the family demanded. So ten minutes and GBP1300 (around $2200) later, we had to leave teenage daughter to take the bus home, and the TV was loaded into the back of the car (we had to fold the back seats down). We were the proud owners of an improbably large and expensive television set.

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Installation
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Installation for me was extremely easy - I prepared dinner, whilst my husband hooked everything up. Although the device is large (obviously), it is not as heavy as you'd expect. We lifted the telly from its box, and discovered it is attached to a mini-swivel stand (which is just as well, as it's flat, it wouldn't stand up otherwise). We were setting the TV up on the floor, since the 'proper' stand we've ordered wasn't yet in (and, in fact, as of 10 November, the telly is STILL on the floor). Apart from help with lifting, my main contribution to the installation process (apart from offering advice - hubby LOVED that) was to install the supplied AA batteries into the TV remote.

Peering around the back of the TV, we found two SCART leads, the hole for the mains lead, the outlet for the coaxial (aerial) cable, and loads of other outlets that are a bit of a mystery to me (to allow you to hook up a surround system or stereo and other techie stuff).

We have a Sky Satellite TV subscription and therefore the Sky box, so we used the two SCART outlets for the Sky box and for the DVD player - we haven't yet hooked up the VCR.

Once everything is plugged in and hooked up, the TV automatically looked to tune itself, as it is a Digital TV ready television. It couldn't find any digital channels, since we hadn't plugged it into the aerial. However, once we plugged the telly into the Sky box, all was well. The last thing we needed to do was to fiddle with the Sky remote to get it to recognise our TV, and all was well.

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All Hooked Up and Ready to Go
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Now we had a chance to play with the various picture and sound settings. This ensures not only that you have the best picture and sound for your home and circumstances, but it also lets you see how cool your electronic equipment really is.

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The Picture - Aspect Setting
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The TV is widescreen, so one of the first things you want to investigate is the little button on the top right of the remote. This changes the screen mode - you have a choice of several. Wide (16:9 aspect) screen - when you are watching, say, a movie broadcast in widescreen, this is ideal, however, with 'normal' 4:3 broadcasts, it stretches the picture, making everyone look fat and distorted. The Smart setting displays conventional 4:3 broadcasts with an imitation widescreen effect. This doesn't distort the picture so much, but you do lose picture around the outside (you can move the picture using the arrow keys to see more of the top or the bottom). 4:3 setting shows normal telly in the correct proportions, but there are large black border areas - you end up using only a proportion of the screen. The 14:9 setting displays 14:9 pictures in their correct proportions - again, there are black border areas on the screen. Zoom shows letter box format broadcasts correctly. I prefer Smart, my husband prefers Wide. Having said that, he watches a lot of sport, where I watch a lot of science fiction, so perhaps having fat sportsmen isn't as irritating as fat Air Force Colonels (Stargate...but I digress) There is also an Autoformat setting where it automatically chooses the best mode for what you are watching. It seems (according to the manual) that the broadcaster sends format information which the TV uses to pick the best setting.

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The Picture - Picture Quality
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As you might expect, the picture quality is, for the most part, superb. The colours are vivid, and the picture is sharp. My only quibble is that when the room is dark, and the picture contains a lot of contrast, there is sometimes a kind of fuzziness to the quality. The colour distorts slightly, almost as if you are peering at the picture through a film of water. There is an option to have the picture adjust automatically depending on the light levels of the room, but I find that the picture is too dark in certain lighting conditions if I use it. There may well be a fix for this - if you know it, please enlighten me (pun unintended).

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Sound Settings
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Not surprisingly, this TV supports Dolby. Again, you have multiple choices regarding the sound control (and, for me, this is just using the internal speakers). The choices include 'Natural', 'Dynamic' and 'Dolby Virtual', as well as 'Auto Volume'. Frankly my hearing isn't subtle enough to really tell the difference among the various settings, but then, we don't have a surround sound system hooked, up; nor have we hooked the TV up to our stereo speakers. Auto Volume IS kind of cool. This automatically adjusts the volume so that the adverts aren't ten times louder than the programme you are watching, which is what usually seems to be the case.

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Sound Quality
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Even without a surround sound system, I have to say the sound quality is superb. To my perhaps undiscerning ear, the sound is clear, loud and stereo. The volume control seems to show a percentage of the maximum volume - we've never had it about 35, and it's usually closer to 25. Voices are clear and understandable, and the auto volume really does work.

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The Remote - or, Playing with Menus
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The menus to adjust sound, picture and options are easy to access and easy to use. There is a button on the remote conveniently labelled 'menu'. Pressing this gives you access to, not surprisingly, the menus that control picture, sound, screen size, features (including power saving, light sensor and PC adjustment - you can hook up a PC and use this as an unfeasibly large monitor), timer (sleep timer, alarm timer, clock) and the set up menu (tuning, programme sorting and the like). The menu appears as a small, easily navigateable box in the lower right hand corner of the picture.

There are also buttons that are dedicated to some of the menu functions. There is a button for digital text, a button for the aspect size, and a button for sound options. There are also the four coloured buttons for fast-text and digital text (you know, when you get the 'press red now' screen. There is a button for the digital TV guide, though I haven't used it, since I have Sky, and so use the Sky remote for programme selection. There is a 'picture freeze' button which allows you to freeze the TV picture (duh) in order to, as the manual helpfully points out, take note of a recipe or phone number. I've only pressed this once by accident -as I have Sky Plus, I can pause live telly (it’s not entirely dissimilar to TiVo, except I have to reboot it from time to time, as it freezes, and it doesn’t suggest programmes for me – it doesn’t have quite the functionality of the TiVo).

There is a power switch and the numbered buttons you'd expect to find on a remote as well.

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Specifications - or, the Techie Bits
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The TV is HD (High Definition) ready LCD DVB (the DVB apparently stands for Digital Video Broadcasting). It can function as a PC monitor, and will accept PAL, SECAM and NTSC 3.58, 4.43 (only Video In, apparently. No, I don't know what that means either).

The TV weighs approximately 20kg with the stand, and comes with the TV (duh), the remote, 2 AA batteries, a support belt and screw (for anchoring the TV to a stand) and a mains lead - you have to supply your own SCART and aerial cables.

It's 1366 pixels wide by 768 pixels high, and boasts Dolby Virtual and BBE Digital sound (I'm assuming all this means something to someone).

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Matty's Verdict
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The Good
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It's cool. It's very cool. Apart from my niggle with the colour/contrast in certain lighting conditions (which I suspect can be fixed with a bit of fiddling), I am very pleased. The picture is mostly crisp and clear, as is the sound. The remote is easy to use, and the telly automatically senses if I'm using the Sky box or the DVD player, and so I don't have to press buttons to switch between the two.

The picture is especially good when watching DVDs - the quality of the DVD combines with the quality of the television set, making a viewing experience that is more than the sum of its parts.

Since the TV is HD ready, it means we are ready for when Sky launches its (no doubt premium-priced) HD service. My brother in the States has HD TV, and the difference between HD and normal broadcasts really is remarkable. Whilst we were in the States, we watched part of a baseball game broadcast in high definition. We could see the midges and gnats flying around the field. It was THAT clear.

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The Not-so-Good
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Again, there's that small issue with colour quality. My main complaint, though, is that $2200 is a lot to spend for a goggle box. That's one expensive television set, especially as we are not currently using the digital Freeview features. The TV apparently has a cool menu like Sky does showing what's on each channel, and various buttons for digital and analogue text services, but again, I don't use those.

Thing is, I suspect that given a few months, the price will drop considerably. Having said that, by then there will be something new and wonderful out there that will seem, to early adopters, even better.

It's your call. I like the TV. I really do. But I'm paying for it - quite literally.

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Price & Contact Details
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You can find full technical details and specs at Sony's website (www.sony.co.uk). The TV is available at Sony stores, as well as at all good retailers, and will cost you around $2200 in the UK, though there are often discounts available (at the Sony store, we got 10% off along with a free three year warranty. We could have chosen to take instead of the discount a DVD recordable player for GBP1.00, or various other slightly odd options).

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Matty's Moronic Warnings
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Like every other instruction booklet, this one has its share of the 'bleedin' obvious' type warnings. Some of my favourites include:

* Do not allow children to climb on the TV set. (It would have to be a very thin child to even be able to attempt such a thing)

* Do not throw anything at the TV set. The screen glass may explode by the impact and cause serious injury. (But what about when the football's on?)

* Adjust the volume so as not to trouble your neighbours. [At night] closing the windows or using headphones is suggested. (You MUST be joking - headphones every night?)

* Do not hang this TV set from the ceiling. (So much for watching whist prone...)