Customer Reviews

Toshiba 26HF85 26" Widescreen HD-Ready Flat Screen TV

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I purchased this set from Amazon, who offered the lowest price and delivered it within a week. Highly recommended.
I have a satellite receiver connected via the standard jacks, which provide great picture and sound. Just a note: I had problems with some faulty cables. After switching them out, it fixed some odd stripes across the screen.
I have a DVD player connected via the HDMI input, which provides SUPURB picture and sound. I don't think this picture can be beat, especially with the new flat screens that are so expensive. I still can't believe people are paying for those slim sets when they have grainy pictures... even chunky pixels, with grayish blacks, etc.
I have this 26" model, which is compact and easily carried by one person using the handles that are literally part of the cabinet. This set fits nicely into a medium-sized armoire. It's the perfect size for bedrooms, although I'm sure the 30" model is great.
The speakers are fine unless you want to get rocked by a surround system while relaxing in bed. There's also a nice optional feature that calms down the loud parts of movies.
I have another Toshiba 32" TV that I purchased about 11 years ago, and it still works great with minor picture degradation. I believe this set will last too, as I think Toshiba makes durable products.
There are a lot of adjustments you can make to video and audio. This is especially important with HDTV as the high resolution can highlight both good and bad contrast, warmth, etc. It may take you a couple weeks to get it tweaked just right. It also allows you to fit standard sized pictures into the widescreen format in about 3 different ways... then you can actually move the picture up or down a little. Great feature.
I can't say anything negative about this set, except it takes a little time to figure out how to adjust everything, and it would be nice to have another HDMI input or two. The HDMI input along with the HDTV resolution using the CRT tube truly provide remarkable results.
To summarize... where technology stands right now, this type of TV offers the BEST picture and the LOWEST price. It's the only way to go.

The Toshiba 26HF85 is my first HDTV set. My criteria were 1080i support, HDMI and dual HD component inputs, in a small cabinet. With its speakers on the bottom, this set is very compact. At only 27.5" wide, it is small enough to fit on an extra nightstand in my bedroom. I have a DirecTV H10 Hi-Def receiver hooked to it via HDMI, along with a PlayStation 2 via component. The picture quality is superb, although I am certainly no expert in that area.
This set has a well-designed and attractive remote control with buttons that glow in the dark. The cabinet has nice styling as well, and even has built-in handles like the smaller Toshibas. The menu system is fairly easy to use and offers plenty of options, but the on-screen graphics are low-quality and are hideous compared to the gorgeous menus in the newer Samsungs. This set does have auto aspect ratio sensing, but I don't feel that it works as well as it could.
The 26HF85 is an attractively-priced HDTV if you don't require an on-board ATSC tuner.

This is an excellent HDTV at a price one third to one half of a LCD or Plasma HDTV. If you have room for the cabinet, these TV's are extraordinary values with pictures that have better blacks and truer colors than many LCD or plasma sets. The picture is astounding, even off a conventional air antenna. The set adjusts to obtain the best picture from the signal and the analog signal can hardly be distinguished from the HDTV image.

Let me start off by stating my own blatant bias. I am a fan of CRT TV's (tube TV's) over Plasma, LCD, DLP, etc. I know everyone will be screaming in an uproar, but to each their own. For me, it's CRT for now. Keep in mind, studios still use CRT's for editing purposes (There's a reason for that! It's called picture quality!) This is our second CRT HD TV. Our first is Sony's unsurpassed KD-34XBR960. For pure picture quality, the Sony is absolutely the best picture in standard or HD format of any TV on the market period. Don't even argue. Read the reviews here and elsewhere to find out for yourself. Then see for yourself at a local store. End of discussion. Sony wins. We recently added the Toshiba 26HF85 to our home. HD-Ready, 16:9, etc. Lotsa bells & whistles for the money. Surprisingly good picture quality. HDMI inputs (hard to find in this price class!). Plenty of extra inputs as well. Amazon killed Best Buy on the price by $150. Negs - Dated cabinet is very vanilla. Remote suffers from same 1980's identity crisis. Annoying pop-up of sleep timer countdown every 10 minutes. Sound not bad, but only ok. Poor color contrast for setup & display menu makes it difficult to read. Menu not intuitive, but plenty of adjustments to suit individual viewing tastes. Get your money's worth, read the manual and fine-tune the display for your own preferences. You'll be glad you did. Overall, this TV is all about value. You're gonna be hard-pressed to find a better picture & more features for this kind of money. Most of my gripes are with the setup & menu functions anyways, and you won't even care about that while enjoying TV in all of its' HD glory for under 400 bucks!

I'm just an average person that sometimes watches tv, so I'm no expert, but I do love this tv. I just bought it about 2 weeks ago, so it's still new for me. It did take some tweaking of the picture to get it the way I like it, but I've never owned a tv that I didn't want to fine tune the picture. I think the picture is beautiful - nice and bright and clearly defined. There are a lot of settings, but after 5-10 minutes you'll have the tv exactly the way you like it. To be honest one of my favorite features is the Favorite channels! You can program your favorites and then if you just want to peek at what's on one of them, you just click the left-right arrows on the remote (separate from the channel up and down buttons) and you can quickly switch over to them. I also like that the tv has 2 inputs in the back, so if you have 2 video gaming consoles, like me, you can have them plugged in without buying a separate splitter and you can switch to either of them with the remote. This tv has 5 different viewing settings, so if you don't like how the tv picture comes out on one of them, you can switch - same for video games - I sample each view before I decide for games (1:natural 2,3,4:theater settings 5:full screen). I was also happy to know that it can support 1080i HDTv. I don't have HDTv now, but I like knowing that if I get it in the future, I will be able to get the best picture with it (my friend told me 1080 is the highest). I have this tv about 7 feet or so from my sofa and that seems like a great viewing distance, but I can also see it from across a second smaller room at about maybe 25-30 feet away and it still looks great from there. I haven't had any problems with it so far and I'm not an electronics expert - I just expect to turn things on and they should work - and this tv definitely does that! So far I have been watching cable tv, playing dvds, and playing video games on it - everything has an excellent picture quality! I bought this tv because I have a smaller Toshiba in the bedroom that I have had for years and I loved it so much, I decided to go out and get it a big brother for the living room. I haven't opened the manual yet at all - I haven't needed to. I am happy that I got this tv on sale at Best Buy and would definitely buy it again.

Pros: beautiful picture that can be fine tuned to your tastes, good sound (I just use the tv, I don't have separate speakers), nice remote control features like - favorite channels, switch to video game console 1 or 2, easy to set up (plug it in and plug in your game console and you're done) and picture viewing options
Cons: it's heavy (I had to have a friend help me with it but I am a single woman and not that strong, lol)

An excellent starter HDTV. It is not what one would describe as a "big screen TV" but for those of us who don't want a giant appliance in their living room, this Toshiba takes up very little space and delivers a great picture. Just know that if you don't have HD cable or satellite, it isn't going to look much different from your old set (aside from the aspect ratio). Still, we all know that soon all TV will be in high definition, and regular non-HD TVs will be irrelevent. This is a good transition TV because it will keep up with technology, and it won't cost that much more than a regular TV (at least on amazon.com). I give it 5 stars not because it is the best HDTV, but because for what it is, a low-priced transition TV, it is excellent.

This is not meant as a review for this set, but rather, a comment about Toshiba products in general. I own a Toshiba 32 inch CRT set that I purchased as an open-box special from a large chain electronics store. That was over nine years ago and I have NEVER had a problem with the set. Thousands of hours of use, three moves, coutless lightning storms, and one hurricane later, it provides a gorgeous picture that I would put up against any new set in stores today. I can say the same for the two Toshiba DVD players, one a dual disc model, one a carousel unit that I own. Years of use and they work as well today as the day they were purchased. Check out any consumer ratings magazines, including the one that is the standard for consumer reporting, and you will see that Toshiba produces televisions that are consistently among the most reliable. And no, I DO NOT work for Toshiba.

For the price I paid, this television is worth every penny.

As someone else had mentioned, I had to tweak just about every setting to get the picture to my liking. I have only a DVD player and a gaming console connected to it right now, but I like to have different display settings for each purpose. With this television, I was able to retain a custom setting.

The widescreen is a definite bonus whether I'm gaming or enjoying a movie. The picture is sharp and colorful.

I haven't regretted this purchase yet.

I purchased a toshiba "FST" 24 inch 4:3, four years ago and the picture quality "FST" was zounds better than any other TV, (Phillips, Sony, Emerson) in my house.

I'm reluctant to shell out a small fortune on lcd, plasma, or projection just yet. The technology is young will probably get a lot better and cheaper.

According to Consummer Reports CRT set still gives the best picture quality and requires less repair. If you don't need to fill up half a wall to entertain yourself and your friends, consider a HDTV CRT.

I am very happy with my Toshiba 26HF85 26" Widescreen HD-Ready Flat Screen TV. I'm considering another for the bedroom.

I purchased this set as my first HDTV, on a recent-college-graduate budget. It works great. The picture is clear, and with a little work, the colors look great. I did have to use some of the service menus to perfect the picture, but nothing too major.

My only annoyance is that there aren't enough consumer-accessible options. Also, the aspect sensing could be a little more accurate. But for a first HDTV that will probably end up in a spare room after a year or two, it's great.