bonnie & jason

Samsung HL-5087W 50″ 1080p DLP HDTV initial impressions

With the Canon HV10, of course, I needed an HDTV to view the footage.  After much research on LCD, Plasma, DLP, cost, brand, etc., I decided on the Samsung HL-5087W.

Amazon had a great deal compared to any other vendor and even included free shipping.  I got it for $1699 and I just noticed the price has now dropped even further to $1550 from Electronics Expo.  (You need to pay shipping with them though.)

Why?

At the end of the day, I decided that I wanted  1080p and 50″ but was not willing to pay the premium for the LCD and plasma versions.  Also, the extra width of the modern DLP really wasn’t an issue for me.  Neither was the “rainbow” effect that some people can see with DLP displays.  As such, I was trying to decide between the Samsung and the Sony KDS-50A2000.  At that point, it was more a matter of price than anything else.  (The Samsung was more than $300 cheaper.)  I suppose I also liked the aesthetics of the Samsung better.  Finally, when I went to the store, I couldn’t tell a difference in picture quality.

Performance

I have a DirecTV HR-20 HD DVR hooked up via component cables.  It pulls in what would be off-air HD via the satellite so I don’t need an extra antenna.  (I’ve heard image quality is actually better off-air though.)  Overall, image quality seems to be what I expected.  HD channels look great.  SD channels look ok.  The only complaint I have is that the HD channels occasionally look over-compressed.

sidebar: The DirecTV DVR interface is lacking in many ways.  The UltimateTV (which has now been relegated to the basement) interface works much better.  The biggest complaint is that the 30-second jump doesn’t actually jump.  It basically just fast forwards and then stops.  So instead of instantaneously shifting through commercials, I need to watch them go by semi-quickly.  It’s also harder to manage recorded shows.  I’m hoping many of the issues get fixed via automatic firmware downloads… we’ll see.

The best image quality I’ve seen, however, is from the Canon HV10 connected via component cables (it doesn’t have an HDMI output.)  The TV resolution really shines here and color and sharpness are fantastic.  I also don’t notice any of the compression artifacts that I noticed with the DirecTV receiver.  I can’t wait to see what it looks like with HD DVD/Blu-Ray 1080p sources!

Final Thought

I’m not sure if TV’s need to break in like speakers and receivers, but I feel like the image quality has gotten better after the first week of use.  Maybe my eyes are just getting used to it.  I’ll update this again if I notice any other changes.  Anyway, if anyone knows anything about this, I’d love to hear it.