Olevia 337H 37-Inch LCD HD Ready Monitor

by Syntax

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 41 x 12 x 32 inches ; 65 pounds
• Shipping Weight: 63 pounds
• Shipping: This item can only be shipped to the 48 contiguous states. We regret it cannot be shipped to APO/FPO, Hawaii, Alaska, or Puerto Rico.
• Shipping Advisory: This item must be shipped separately from other items in your order. Additional shipping charges will not apply.
• ASIN: B000FGA76Q
• Item model number: 337H
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #111,438 in Electronics (See Top 100 in Electronics)

Product Description

37" HDTV Ready LCD TV with no tuner

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great picture, full featured, super value, December 2, 2006

By 

voodoo (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Olevia 337H 37-Inch LCD HD Ready Monitor (Electronics)

This is my first HD-LCD television, so I did some research before deciding on this unit. The fact that it cost almost half of units by Toshiba/Samsung/Phillips etc really helped in the decision making process :)

Let me start with the specs. This is a 37" LCD flat panel television capable of a max resolution of 780p and 1080i. If you aren't sure what those are, do a bit more research before reading the rest of this review. The native resolution is 1366x768, and displays movies in the 16x9 format. It has a very nice looking silver cabinet, with speakers mounted across the very bottom of the tv. Basic function buttons are located on the far right side of the black strip between the screen and the speakers. They look nice and don't feel cheap or mushy.

On the back of the television you will find all major inputs such as HDMI, Component video, S-video, composite video, USB port, and even a VGA/Component port to use this television as a computer display. However, there is no coaxial cable input on this tv. This is not an issue if you are using it with an HD cable box or similar unit, but if you just watch movies on it and want to hook up your regular cable, you must run the coaxial cable to a VCR or DVD/Receiver, then run a composite video cable to the television.

Since this unit does not have a built-in HD tuner, to watch HD cable you must have a HD cable box (provided by your cable company with HD service). This isn't a drawback, but I wanted you to be aware. HD-ready means it's ready for a tuner but that it is not included.

I hooked this television up to a Samsung upconvert DVD player so I could watch my movies in 720p. The picture is fantastic, and sound is adequate from the regular speakers. I have a small home theater system though, and I much prefer the sound from that instead of the television. The "Big Picture" technology on this tv lets me watch my full screen movies without black bars on the sides, and it has several aspect ratios to choose from at the touch of a button including normal aspect, 1:1 ratio, panoramic, and Zoom 1 and 2.

The menu functions on this tv are also very easy to use and done really well. You can fine tune the picture settings, color temp, cropping, and many other aspects of the picture.

In the box I also got a very easy to read Quick Start sheet, Remote control, and a full users manual on a cd. Olevia prints their 800 number on all their literature and from what I have heard has very good customer service, although I haven't tried it yet.

Like I said, this is my first HD LCD widescreen and I have nothing else to compare it to other than what I've seen in the store. This unit replaced a 32" Toshiba that I was very happy with, but I don't regret my choice. This tv looks fantastic, performs well, and shows quality you wouldn't expect for the price. Olevia (made by Syntax) seems to be doing something right...offering a high quality product at a fair price, not selling a brand name.

One note that has nothing to do with the actual television, but you might want to be aware of with widescreen tv's. If you are an avg user like me you probably weren't aware that widescreen dvd's actually come in a few different aspect ratios. What this means is that some movies, such as Pixar's "Monster's Inc", will show in full widescreen mode because the aspect ratio is 1.85:1 which is made for viewing on 16x9 widescreen tv's. However, other widescreen dvd's, such as Pixar's "Cars", are shown in 2.39:1 which is sometimes called the "theatrical presentation" of widescreen. Please be aware that when viewing movies like this you will still have black bars on the bottom and top of your picture.

I was highly annoyed when I discovered this as I bought the widescreen specifically to eliminate this, but in certain widescreen formats you will still have them. You can eliminate them on this particular tv by zooming in the picture, but you lose quality and some of the screen, which isn't acceptable to me. Again, it's not the tv but just a choice made by someone when they create the DVD. Maybe newer tv's will eventually be able show both aspects without black bars, but for now they are here to stay, in some widescreen movies at least.

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great value for a Budget MONITOR, December 7, 2006

By 

W. Anger (Austin, TX) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Olevia 337H 37-Inch LCD HD Ready Monitor (Electronics)

Note, this model does not have an analog coaxial cable input. I liked the value in the 37" I bouught last year so so much, we bought this 37" Syntax LCD for our workout room(a less expensive model). Keep in mind that I'm no AV specialist. I used to use analog cable and now we have digital cable. This monitor looks fantastic with HDTV.

Pros
- Syntax models offer the BEST overall value in an LCD's in my opinion.
- The remote control is far better than last year's model which required you practically get straight in front of the sensor to enable.
- it's light (compared to CRT) making adjustments and cleaning very handy.
- the picture is great (especially with DVD's)
- the sound is OK.

Cons
- No analog coaxial cable input
- Color, hate the silver,love the black,
- Questionable customer service

Note that I've bought expensive electronics and I can tell you, the expensive electronics fail just like the cheap ones. I bought this model because it was MUCH less than getting a PANNY or a SONY, etc. It makes NO sense to me to spend thousands when you can spend hundreds for something material that will inevitably drop in value the moment you take it home.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great TV for A Great Price, January 2, 2007

By 

R. Owens (Arlington, Texas United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Olevia 337H 37-Inch LCD HD Ready Monitor (Electronics)

When I first saw this TV, I was a bit skeptical about getting it. After all, it was extremely cheap for what it said it could deliver. I was aware that Olevia is actually the manufacturer for Phillips and LG so I figured that the TV was probably just a stripped down version of one of their LCDs. Instead, what I got was something that looks a heck of a lot better.

Picture:

The picture quality on this LCD is amazing. The LCD has the typical 1366 x 768 that is common with most LCD's under 50" or so. Unlike most LCD's, the picture quality on this TV is more natural than some of the other LCD's from larger brands. The 1600:1 contrast ratio helps the TV produce more realistic blacks than most LCD's of the same price range. One thing to note is that it does not appear as though the TV upconverts standard definition TV. Thus, you can definitely tell that you are watching standard definition on it versus high def programming. Overall, the picture quality is about a 9.

Sound:

The built in speakers on the TV are OK. About a 7 at best. The biggest downfall of this TV is the lack of audio outputs. The only audio output on the TV is through the headphone mini-jack. Fortunately, the mini-jack will transmit Dolby Pro-Logic and Dolby Pro-Logic II signals so you can get a decent surround sound from it. However, don't expect Dolby DTS sound from this TV. Another thing to consider is that the system will only send audio either through the speakers or through the mini-jack so to get audio to come out of the mini-jack, you have to turn off the speakers in the TV's menu.

Inputs:

The TV has a single HDMI port, a single Component Video, a single Composite Video, a VGA port (component maximum), and a single S-Video input. Audio input and audio output are through mini-jacks (one of each). There is also a USB port for firmware upgrades. Essentially, you have enough inputs for a digital cable or satellite box (HDMI input), a decent progressive scan DVD player (component video) or the latest high-def video game system, and one other item that connects via standard composite video (or s-video). If you have two devices that use the same input type, this TV will not have enough inputs for you.

Definitions:

This TV supports 480i/p, 720i/p, and 1080i... at least that is what the box says. After upgrading the firmware to the latest version, I was able to successfully send a 1080p signal to the TV and it accept it. Now, it does appear as though the TV is running in a PC mode (rather than the display saying 1080p HD, it says 1920 x 1080 60Hz). However, it did work. I did notice that the screen flickered slightly on near white colors, but that was due to the 60Hz refresh rate.

Features:

This TV has more features than some of the more expensive LCD's that I have seen. One of the nicest features is the ability to upgrade the LCD's firmware. Thus, as new technologies emerge, the TV can be upgraded to support those technologies.

Overall, this is a pretty nice TV. With the exception of a few minor annoyances (inputs and outputs), this TV is definitely well worth the price.