TV with DVR & Internet: $89.90/mo
- Average user rating: 3.5 stars out of 20 reviews Back to product review
- My rating: 0 stars
Full user review
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8 out of 8 people found this review helpful
3.0 stars
"Impressive, once you get past it's ugly face"
Pros: Great HD picture quality; connectivity options; low price
Cons: Not very good-looking; some bugs
Summary: I owned a Sony LCD for a short time before buying this Olevia, and I must say that saving $500 and gaining 5 more inches of diagonal real estate outweighs the losses (including the pride factor of going from a respected name brand to a relative no-name brand).
The picture quality is great in HD (I receive over-the-air), and not-so-great in SD. DVDs played through a progressive machine look good (even without upconverting); just make sure you get the right settings on the DVD player--I had to call tech support to figure out why the picture was warped. I agree with everyone else that the 10-15 second delay after power-up is annoying, but I'm used to it now.
A previous user complained about cycling through all the sources on the remote. Yes, it can be time-consuming, but believe me, this Olevia beats the Sony by a mile. The Sony took about 5 seconds to go through each source (even if nothing was connected to it), but this Olevia can jump through all 12 sources in the same amount of time.
There are some minor bugs that need to be ironed out: 1. can't jump from the highest channel 62 to the lowest channel 2 using the channel up button, but when I added channel 67 (which I had deleted from channel scan)...it was OK. 2. Firmware upgrade never worked, but tech support said that if the TV was working fine, I didn't need to upgrade the firmware. If I didn't mind having a problem upgrading the firmware, then no need to upgrade it! ha ha...
The TV is just butt-ugly compared to most other sets out there. From the front it's not so obvious (the bottom speakers don't look bad to me), but from the side, it's just not a sharp-looking set. It's so fat that it could almost pass for a rear-projection unit (it looks about 10 inches thick not including the stand). Could use an extreme makeover.
But, I'm not complaining since, as I mentioned before, I got this set for $500 less than a smaller Sony ($800 at Target.com vs. $1300 at Costco). Friends and family members are impressed by sharp, vivid picture, especially during NFL football games which are just awesome to watch on this set.
Olevia 537H:
