77 of 78 people found the following review helpful:
Amazing HD Picture, but first TV delivered was defective
WHO TO BUY FROM: Amazon did not have this item in stock, so I waited for Amazon to have it in stock before buying - turned out to be the right decision. I bought another LCD tv last year from "ButterflyPhoto", a seller on Amazon's website, and it was a horrible experience. So I vowed never to buy a big ticket item from any other seller than Amazon on its site. Those...
9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
This TV has very serious flaws! Sony is unresponsive!
I wanted to post my thoughts here to inform potential buyers and also to beg Sony to do the right thing and stand behind their products. Even if it's one of their lower end models, $1,000+ is still a significant amount of money to pay for something that doesn't work properly.
I personally own the 52 inch model of this set (KDL-52v5100), but have used the...
WHO TO BUY FROM: Amazon did not have this item in stock, so I waited for Amazon to have it in stock before buying - turned out to be the right decision. I bought another LCD tv last year from "ButterflyPhoto", a seller on Amazon's website, and it was a horrible experience. So I vowed never to buy a big ticket item from any other seller than Amazon on its site. Those sellers have such great reviews b/c if you get screwed like I did and the sale never goes through, you can never rate them. So only happy customers get to rate those sellers, hence the above-avg reviews.
DELIVERY AND DEFECTIVE TV: I ordered the TV on a Thurs and it was delivered to my house on Tues. Pilot (carrier) called to schedule and appt, brought it into my house, took it out of the box and placed it on my tv stand, then made sure it worked before asking me to sign. But by Friday, a 1/2 cm black line appeared in the screen (yikes!). On Sat. I called Amazon and they were great in shipping out a replacement TV immediately at no extra cost to me (they even gave me the option to replace with another make/model). The new TV arrived the next Fri and Pilot packaged and removed the defective TV. The new TV works fine (so far, fingers crossed). After mentioning my ordeal to several friends, a few mentioned they had defective LCD TVs also - so I guess its not so uncommon.
Dealing with Amazon is great. If I bought from those other sellers, I would have been left to deal with Sony via the warranty - No Thanks! Its worth the extra hundred dollars or so to go with Amazon.
PICTURE QUALITY: The HD picture is amazing. I had a 2004 42' Sony WEGA that produced 1080i, but the Bravia is a much, much better HD picture (however, it seems Comcast broadcasts in 1080i, not 1080p). When watching sports on my WEGA, the picture could not handle fast action so well. The Bravia corrects this pretty well (via the 120hz) and there is definitely a noticable difference/improvement versus my old WEGA. The 120hz is well worth the money.
BOTTOM LINE, at $1,823, I am happy with the TV even after the first one was defective. I found the Samsung to be too glossy a picture and didn't like the touch of red, so the 52v5100 was the perfect TV for me at that price. Buy from Amazon, not those other tricksters.
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I just hooked it up yesterday, to replace my 50" Samsung DLP that broke. I had a 32" Vizio in its place for the past month, waiting for this model. Overall, I am very pleased with the set. As usual, the HD channels look spectacular and the interface is tremendously better than that of the Vizio's. It is hooked up to a HD DVR cable box, but configuration was a breeze. The non-HD channels definitely take a huge hit, as they look pretty bad on this size screen. In reality I wish I could have just gotten a 50" since the 2" additional makes a big difference in the overall size, but I am still pleased with the TV and glad I waited for this model to get the improved contrast ratio and 120 refresh rate.
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I bought this with a PS3 (because it's a blu-ray player) and haven't looked back. It was super easy to set up with HDMI and optical audio cables and I am constantly blown away by the picture. The blacks are especially dark and I had heard that this might be a problem with LCD TV's. The in TV speakers are fine, not tinny, although I elected to disable them and run the sound through my receiver for surround sound. I really can't fault the TV in any way. Just try and get the best price you can!
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The Sony Bravia KDL-52W5100 produces an outstanding high definition (HD) picture.
I did not note a particular problem with picture quality when viewing from an angle, even a little more than 45 degrees.
Calibration of the set is fairly straight forward, and the average viewer would probably be satisfied with the standard picture. If you're a viewer with a highly refined eye, you can tweek the picture to your heart's delight through the options menu accessed through the remote. There are numerous suggestions for custom setting for this TV on the Internet.
I was torn between ordering Sony BRAVIA V-Series KDL-52V5100 52-Inch and a similar and the higher rated Samsung LN52A650. I was leaning toward the Sony because the set was going in a room with several windows, so reflection was a consideration. The Sony screen has a satin non-reflective finish instead of the Samsung's high gloss. Several on-line reviewers had noted that the reflective surface of the Samsung was a problem. When I was ready to pull the trigger on this purchase I found the best Samsung price was $600 higher than the Sony. That along with my other considerations made up my mind in favor of the Sony.
LCD TV's have relatively small speakers, so the quality of sound is decent but limited. Many will chose to add a surround sound system or at least a couple of external speakers.
Purchase and Delivery
I found the best price online at Amazon.com. I ordered the set Monday and it was delivered to my home on Friday morning. The driver took the set out of the box and took all of the packing with him (earning a nice tip). The set came right out of the box mounted on a small fixed black stand. When I ordered the TV, I also ordered a useful flat panel TV stand with an integrated mount to the back of the set. This raises the TV a couple of feet off of the floor, provides left and righ swivel, and has 2 glass shelves for the cable box, blue Ray, etc. These stand are available locally or on line for [...].
I strongly recommend this television and Amazon.com.
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Just picked this up yesterday from the local BB to replace my aging 7 year old Sony 46" rear projection 1080i set with this puppy...
Now that we get MotionFlow @ 120hz on the V series I think this set is a no brainer. If I had the money I would probably choose this over the XBR anyways because i think it's a good value and I honestly can't tell the difference between this and the XBR. I just had to pop in Planet Earth on the PS3 and watch the bird scene from the beginning of Pole to Pole and it's like going from SDTV to HDTV all over again how sharp everything looks now.
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The TV is great, 52 inches is huge. Motionflow looked very strange at first but I've gotten used to it and prefer it for movies. The best way I can describe motionflow is like when you are driving and you focus on one particular thing like a road sign or a car for a moment. That object you focus on stays clear despite how fast it's moving while everything around it gets blurry. Motionflow acheives the same effect. It focuses on the subject of the scene and keeps it sharp while everything else moves around it. Motionflow is a bit unlike your eye in one regard. Your eye keeps the thing you are focusing on in the center of your vision. Motionflow keeps the subject of the scene sharp as it moves across the screen. The difference (that the in focus thing is not in the center of the field of view) can be a bit jarring at first.
I've had the TV for about 3 weeks and have had no show stopping issues with it. The TV is hooked up to a receiver for audio. I have an HD TV signal coming in through component and bluray coming in via HDMI. I had to mute the volume on the TV itself to stop it from occasionally popping up the message "Audio switching to external source". I tried using Bravia sync over HDMI but it did not seem to do much but confuse my receiver (it's a sony receiver and it's bravia compatible). While Bravia sync was on my receiver would sometimes not turn on or switch inputs. Perhaps I could've gotten the Bravia sync feature to do something useful if I'd read some manuals but it didn't seem like it was worth the hassle. I still am not sure what Bravia sync is supposed to do.
I watched the Harry Potter movies and Fast and Furious in Bluray, they looked great. When I signed up for Fios I got three free months of HBO. HBO in HD looks fantastic. The tv is a huge step up from my 32 inch Westinghouse that has some dead pixels in a line down the right side of the screen.
No matter how big you are you'll want the help of another person to help you move the TV. I'm 6'6" and I couldn't wrap my arms around it to pick it up. It's not heavy it's just bulky, unwieldy, and too expensive to drop. You can pick it up by the bottom of the screen and lean the screen on your body but I don't recommend it because while doing so you won't be able to see where you're going.
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Researched tvs for months. I decided on this one due to reading specs/reviews and checking it out at the store "Bang for the buck" Great picture and sound. Great color. Blacks are very good shadows were crisp and contrasting. I like that I can customize about 20 settings with a good calibration disc. The screen has a semi-matte finish. Having windows in the house, and watching weekend sports rules out plasmas and samsung lcds due to high-glare though Samsungs rated higher.
There is minor flashlighting in corners. Tough to prevent with large lcds. I found about four inch patch of clouding in bottom right. It was only found when tweaking settings, looking for it
A swivel stand would be better. Perhaps SONY will make this change.
Now the most foolish thing SONY did IMO: They put 3 of the 4 HDMI outputs on the side. Now I have 3 cables sticking out of my tv. You have to really tuck them in hard to barely hide them. This puts stress on the cables and the import jacks. Someone tell me why SONY did this. Big deal for me.
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Got this TV today....... had to talk to SOny about set up because my electronicaly challenged husband connected it wrong!!! Sony was soooo very helpful and may have prevented a divorce (lol)!! Nothing bad can be said about this TV.... price was amazing (under $1600) and the quality of the picture in HD was truly amazing!! The screen barely has glare.... which is the main reason I went with sony versus Samsung... setup had my husband done it right seemed really easy... I agree with the other review that says the quality of the picture takes a hit if it is not viewed in HD but overall SONY ROCKS!! DO NOT hesitate to buy this product!!
UPDATE: HAVING HAD THIS TV FOR MORE THAN 2 MONTHS NOW AND I REALLY COULD NOT BE HAPPIER........... THE QUALITY IS AMAZING..... COLORS ARE BEAUTIFUL AND THE SCREEN IS SOOO SHARP AND BEAUTIFUL......DO NOT HESISTATE TO BUY THIS TV.....AMAZING
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I wanted to post my thoughts here to inform potential buyers and also to beg Sony to do the right thing and stand behind their products. Even if it's one of their lower end models, $1,000+ is still a significant amount of money to pay for something that doesn't work properly.
I personally own the 52 inch model of this set (KDL-52v5100), but have used the other size models as well. My comments here pertain to issues that apparently plague the entire Sony Bravia V and S series and have NOT been addressed by the latest firmware update available as of this date. The bang for the buck on this TV would be great, if not for these issues. The worst part of it is that Sony has seemingly been completely silent on the issues and has so far refused to acknowledge or do anything about it. If Sony would just address these issues, my rating would increase significantly. I've been a lifelong Sony customer, but at this point I cannot imagine buying or recommending another Sony product if this is how they support their products. I'm really hoping they come through and address this appropriately and restore my faith in the Sony brand.
While some common LCD problems, such as clouding and flashlighting do affect some other owners, here is a summary of the two major problems I have personally experienced with these Sony TVs:
1. Visual Problem (Red Flashing) - In some programs, red items in the scene will flash as though someone is boosting the color saturation momentarily. You can see this color shift in faces, but also in other objects. This happens on all inputs and with many TV shows, movies, etc. I see it a lot in the set background of The Daily Show. There is a whole lot of information about this issue on avsforums, various youtube videos, etc. Many owners have had multiple service visits and exchanged TVs, without resolving the problem. There is simply no way that Sony does not know how to reproduce it.
2. Audio Problems - There are frequent audio dropouts. The sound will cutout and won't come back until the channel is changed or TV power is cycled. Additionally, when the TV volume is very low (1 to 10), there is significant hiss and noise which make the program audio nearly unintelligible. Late night quiet viewing is very problematic due to this. There is also a loud pop whenever the display resolution changes using HDMI.
I could learn to live with the audio issues, but the Red Flashing issue is serious and very distracting. I am seriously hoping that Sony can and will do the right thing and release a firmware fix for this as it very much seems to be a video processing bug which affects all of their Bravia Engine 2 sets. If Sony won't resolve this, then I plan to fight them tooth and nail while under warranty as these are clearly design and/or manufacturing defects. I've heard some people try to claim that this is the price to pay for buying one of the "value" models and it's par for the course. That is pure nonsense! These are NOT simply the quality issues that one might expect, related to contrast ratios, color accuracy, etc. These are serious flaws!
Anyway....hope this information helps potential buyers make a more informed decision. I welcome any comments or feedback!
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