RadioShack
Entered CNET Catalog: 06/22/2006
SKU: 0046838024979
Manufacturer: JVC America
Manufacturer description
Come and learn about the next evolution of HDTV. JVC's 1080p LCD with 1920 x 1080 resolution. This 1080p LCD Design features a true 1920x1080 pixel structure that delivers resolution that rivals reality. Packed with supporting features for the most demanding digital customer like a 5th Generation Digital Image Scaling Technology (D.I.S.T. 1080p) with GENESSA Picture Processing where all signals are upconverted and displayed at 1080p, 5-Point Color Management, Motion Adaptive Dynamic Gamma Correction Circuitry, 2 HDMI/HDCP Digital Inputs, Dual IEEE1394 Connectivity, 2 HD Component Inputs and features geared to make your Standard Definition sources perform better like Mosquito Noise Suppression, Intelligent Noise Reduction Circuity, a 3D Y/C Comb Filter with Cross Color Elimination and Digital Noise Suppression. With all of these features built in it is no wonder that JVC delivers the most technologically advanced and superior 1080p LCD television available today.Product summary
The good: Accurate primary colors and color decoding; delivers every detail of 1080i sources; solid feature set includes CableCard and picture-in-picture.
The bad: Reproduces a lighter shade of black than other high-end LCD TVs; relatively inaccurate color temperature in dark areas; PC input has limited resolution; cannot accept 1080p sources.
The bottom line: Although not quite up to the picture-quality standards of the stiff 1080p competition, the 40-inch JVC LT-40PN97's price and feature set still make it worthy of consideration.
Editors' review
- Editors' Choice: No
- Reviewed on: 10/25/2006
Our design complaints begin with JVC's remote and menu system, which the FN97 shares with past JVC televisions. The bland, gray clicker is completely backlit, but we found its crowd of similarly sized buttons difficult to navigate. Button placement is far from logical in many cases: the useful Aspect key, for example, is stashed way up at the top near the power button, while the nearly useless Guide is given a prominent spot near the directional keypad.
JVC's menu system looks like something from a mid-'80s VCR, not a modern HDTV. While its contents are easy enough to understand, we didn't like that navigating from section to section required scrolling downward through menu after menu. We were also frustrated by the time it took to switch from one input to the next, especially considering that you can't jump over unused inputs. As a 1080p display, the JVC LT-40FN97 boasts a native resolution of 1,920x1,080 pixels, the highest available today, and enough to display every detail of 1080i HDTV sources. All other sources, whether HDTV, DVD, standard-def, or computer, are scaled to fit the native resolution.
JVC equipped one of its highest-end LCD TVs with a decent selection of conveniences, beginning with a ATSC tuner on board for receiving HDTV channels over the air, as well as a CableCard slot for tuning digital and HDTV stations via cable without a box, a rarity among even high-end HDTVs these days. JVC doesn't include an EPG such as TV Guide, however, so you might miss having the ability to select channels from a grid.
Like many late-model 1080p LCDs, the JVC HD-40FN97 offers an aspect-ratio mode that allows it to display the entire image without overscan or scaling. JVC calls this mode Full Native, and we recommend using it with 1080i sources unless you see interference along the edges of the picture. Annoyingly, however, the set did not stay in All Native mode after we switched inputs; instead, it reverted back to the default Full, which meant we had to constantly remember to switch back. Three other modes are available with HD sources along with four aspect-ratio modes for standard-def sources.
There are four picture presets: Standard, Dynamic, Theater, and Game. The Theater mode, which can also be activated by pressing the dedicated Theater Pro button, provided the best picture quality for darkened-room viewing. There are two color-temperature presets, of which Low comes closest to the standard--although surprisingly, given JVC's good track record with other sets, it wasn't nearly as accurate in this case (see Performance below). We appreciated the flexible backlight control, labeled Energy Saver mode, because when reduced, it allowed the set to achieve a deeper shade of black. We didn't like the fact that the JVC lacked true independent input memories. Yes, you can adjust the picture parameters--contrast, brightness, color, and so forth--within each preset mode, but they must remain the same across all of the inputs except one. Strangely, the settings for the second HDMI input can differ from the rest.
JVC also includes a few advanced picture adjustments, most of which we disabled for critical viewing. Dynamic Contrast and Smart Picture both change the picture on the fly so we left them off, while Color Management simply seemed to add more saturation to blue, so we left it off, too. We also turned off Smart Sensor, which changes the picture depending on ambient room lighting, and left the noise reduction controls deactivated--as usual they should be engaged for low-quality sources.
Around back, there's an ample supply of inputs, and while a few of them double up, we liked that the two HDMI inputs warranted their own dedicated input slots. Input slot 1 offers a choice of component, composite or S-Video; Input 2 includes S-Video or composite-video; while Input 3 has component, composite, or VGA-style PC. One of the HDMI inputs merits an analog audio input (to get audio from DVI-to-HDMI connections), and there's an unusually complete monitor output section with composite and S-Video along with stereo audio. The rest of the input bay includes a pair of FireWire (IEEE-1394) ports, two antenna inputs, and an optical digital audio output.
The HDMI inputs of the JVC LT-40FN97 were incapable of accepting a 1080p input from our Samsung BD-P1000 Blu-ray player, which is unusual, since nearly every 2006 1080p HDTV we've tested can do so (this capability wasn't as common last year, however). We don't consider lack of 1080p compatibility a huge deal since few 1080p sources are available, and it's nearly impossible to tell the difference between 1080i and 1080p anyway. We were disappointed that the PC input could handle only 1,024x768 resolution, which is pretty low for a television with 1,920x1,080 pixels. There are also no front- or side-panel inputs for quick connections.
The JVC HD-40FN97 exhibited acceptable picture quality for a high-end LCD, although it wasn't in the upper echelon of the breed. It handled all of the detail of 1080p sources, and its color was relatively accurate, although it was compromised by bluer color temperature in dark material. The JVC also delivered a lighter shade of black than did a few high-end LCDs, which caused its picture to lose some of its impact, although black levels were still deeper than on many models.
We began by setting up the LT-40FN97 in our dark lab and adjusting the picture controls accordingly. The Theater Pro mode provided a good starting point, although we reduced the backlight control all the way to get as deep a shade of black as possible and modified the JVC's light output to around 35 footlamberts--comfortable for our lighting situation. Even in the Low color temperature mode, the set evinced a relatively blue grayscale in dark areas, a surprise since JVC is usually very accurate in this mode. We did calibrate the color temperature using service menu controls, but we weren't able to improve it much over the defaults (see the Geek box). For our full user-menu level picture settings, check out Tips & Tricks above.
We were able to directly compare the JVC LT-40FN97 to competing sets, including the Samsung LN-S4096D, the Sharp LC-46D62U, and the Westinghouse LvM-47W1, all 1080p LCDs, along with the Panasonic TH-50PH9UK, a 50-inch plasma. Watching the excellent-looking Aeon Flux Blu-ray disc via the Samsung BD-P1000 at 1080i, we noted that the JVC delivered decent black levels for an LCD, about on the same level as the Westinghouse, but that black areas of its picture weren't quite as deep as on the others. The letterbox bars, the black of Aeon's skin-tight jumpsuit, her blue-black hair, and even her eyeball as she examines the drink in her cell--all appeared slightly lighter than on the Samsung and the Sharp, but still dark enough to satisfy most viewers.
The difference in black levels was less noticeable overall, however, than the difference in color. The JVC did have accurate color decoding, and its primary colors were perfectly acceptable, but the third ingredient, color temperature, was less than ideal in dark areas, tending toward too much blue. We noticed, for example, when Aeon sat in the circular window before the night sky, it appeared an unrealistic shade of blue instead of the lighter blue-gray we saw on the Panasonic. Her shaded skin was tinged a bit bluer than it should have been in this scene, and we noticed this touch of pallor in other areas where she appeared in low light. The black of the letterbox bars also appeared relatively blue.
In its favor, the JVC LT-40FN97 rendered plenty of detail throughout the film, keeping up with the rest of the 1080p displays easily. The strands of Aeon's hair were always visible, and when she almost falls into the blades of grass, their edges appeared razor-sharp. The texture of the lawn appeared realistic and natural, as did the stone walls of the garden. According to our Sencore HD signal generator, the JVC resolved every detail of a 1080i signal as long as it was set to Full Native mode. It's worth noting however, as we have with other 1080p 40-inch LCDs, that for most viewers the difference between 1,366x768 and 1,920x1,080 native resolution is very difficult to discern, and the JVC LT-40FN97 was no exception. When we looked very hard at the JVC from a close seating distance of about 6 feet, we did see slightly more sharpness in highly detailed areas such as hair and grass compared to the Panasonic plasma's picture, but again, the difference was slight and became more so when we moved further back.
Compared to the other LCDs, the JVC held its own when seen from angles other than straight on. The image did wash out slightly from off-angle, especially in dark areas, and it seemed to do so slightly more than the Samsung's and the Sharp's, but overall it wasn't a big difference. Of course, the image on the Panasonic plasma didn't change when seen from off-angle, although its big panel of glass reflected much more ambient light than did the JVC's matte-plastic screen. We also noticed that the upper-right corner of the JVC appeared lighter than the rest of the screen, a uniformity issue that became apparent in many dark scenes, such as when Aeon skulks behind the curtain of the theater.
We also checked out how the JVC handled 480i standard-def sources by connecting it to a standard DVD player via component-video and viewing some of the tests from the HQV disc. The set exhibited average standard-def performance by this measure; it resolved every line of standard-def and looked detailed enough as long as sharpness was set at midlevel. It didn't do a very good job of smoothing jagged edges from diagonal lines, however, and it engaged 2:3 pull-down detection--providing Natural Cinema wasn't turned off--relatively slowly, if accurately. Watching some of the disc's noisy low-quality video, the Digital VNR cleaned up the image nicely, as long as it was set to Min. The Max setting softened the picture noticeably, so it should be avoided along with Auto, which tended to choose Max anyway. The MPEG NR setting, for its part, didn't seem to have much of an effect at all.
| TEST | RESULT | SCORE |
| Before color temp (20/80) | 7,956/6,357K | Average |
| After color temp | 8,201/6,558K | Poor |
| Before grayscale variation | +/- 412K | Good |
| After grayscale variation | +/- 404K | Poor |
| Color of red (x/y) | 0.647/0.329 | Good |
| Color of green | 0.274/0.595 | Average |
| Color of blue | 0.144/0.056 | Good |
| Overscan | 0 percent | Good |
| Black-level retention | All patterns stable | Good |
| 2:3 pull-down, 24fps | Yes | Good |
| Defeatable edge enhancement | Yes | Good |
User opinions
Select a User Opinion to view: 1 2out of 2 user reviews
Good size, picture quality, and price
Pros: 1080i quality, 2.1 surround sound virtualization
Cons: input selection button scrolls through sources
We came upon this model while it was positioned at the corner section of a Video Only store. What initially impressed me was the clarity of the picture at an angle for an LCD set. LCD’s had the rap of the inability of viewing the picture when you go beyond a certain angle away from the center of the screen. The missus had her treadmill next to the couch and it was difficult for her to view the 27” CRT from an angled view without moving the TV.
What also impressed me was that this set was 1080i native, the highest level of picture clarity. Yes, it has a built-in tuner but the native 1080i picture resolution for me, has negated the warnings of a built-in tuner not being able to upgrade to a better picture quality-it is already at the highest quality. What sold it to the wife was the HD picture quality while watching a DVD on food.
We bought the set for $2599.99 and it fit just right in the back seat of Chevy Malibu with about an inch to spare on each end. No, the box had to removed and folded and made as a back cushion for the set. But we kept the TV in the shipping box bottom which served as a steady and sturdy base while in transit. It still needed two people to handle moving the TV out of the car as it was not the lightest thing in the world-but it is not as bulky as the old 27” CRT set.
The TV was kept mounted on its table top stand with a later thought in making it a wall mounted set in the future. The initial wiring setup was not troublesome- just figuring out what goes where (a DVD player, an LD player, and 2 VCRs) took a bit of thinking. You will need good access to the back side to make the best cabling connection and cable management. Even though you can rotate the screen 20 degrees to the sides, I could not recommend doing that while hooking your peripherals to it.
JVC gives you two cable splitters, two RF cables, the remote and batteries with the set. The TV has a 75-Ohm (VHF/UHF) and ATSC digital Cable In coaxial receptacles for input. The splitter splits the coaxial from the cable to both connections or splits the signal between the VCR and TV and to both connectors.
The set has inputs for the following:
-2 video (RCA Connectors: Audio/ Video)
-2 video (RBG)
-2 digital (HDMI)
-2 iLink
-2 S-Video
-1 PCM/digital audio (optical)
-1 PC Video (max resolution 1024x768 at 60Hz)
- Cable Card
-RS-232
-SD (multi-media) card for software updates
-Headphone
I suggest getting those Velcro cable straps in managing the cables as you will make changes to it later. We use rolls of the Velcro cable straps in my IT job for server room cable management and it helps out a lot when you are adding or removing machines regularly.
You have several viewing ratios depending on what you are watching in broadcast or recorded programs:
>480p
-Panorama
-Cinema
-Full
-Regular
>1080i
-Panorama Zoom
-Cinema Zoom
-Full
-Full Native
>780p
-Panorama Zoom
-Cinema Zoom
-Full
>480i
-Panorama Zoom
-Cinema Zoom
-Full
-Slim
>PC
-Full
-Regular
The best aspect setting for standard cable TV viewing is Full. The best aspect ration for DVD viewing is Full. The Cinema aspect sort of cuts the top and bottom of the picture for both TV and DVD viewing. Until we get Digital Cable with HD, I cannot comment on the other settings.
To get the best quality picture for playing recorded DVD, you will need the current generation of DVD players with the progressive scan which adds more lines. Most DVDs are at 480 resolution so picture quality will suffer. We purchased a Sony DVP-NS75H DVD player that upscale the picture resolution to 780/1080i so that our current DVDs can be played in the TVs native mode. Picture is excellent and all you need is the HDMI cable to hook up to the TV for video and sound (the bad part is the HDMI cable DOES NOT come with the DVD player and it is an additional $60 minimum for just the cable).
The 2.1 surround is excellent in creating a virtual surround sound with just the TV speakers. I am tempted to just run the system in that sound setting for the time being until I build our Media Center PC.
The only disappointment I have with this set is the input button which it rotates the sources in order rather than being able to specifically choose which input to play from. Maybe I haven’t re-read the whole manual yet that has the desired control feature I want.
out of 2 user reviews
Best buy for your buck
Pros: Easy on screen menu. Available in Silver or Black finish
Cons: Could not find any at this time.
Overall, I think that I got the best 40 inch LCD HDTV for the price. I was leaning towards the Samsung, but the price was so much better with this JVC. This TV is easy to use, comes with 2 HDMI ports, a port for your computer, available in either Silver or Black, good simulated surround speakers, (I have it hooked up to my 5.1 surround system), and the HD picture is absolutly stunning. There are not enough words to desribe it, you just have to see it with your own eyes! I highly recommend this 40 inch LCD for all of those who are in the market for a new 1080p HDTV.
