Philips 42PFL5603D

Pros: picture quality is great ; really does use a lot less power ; very easy to setup ; continues t look amazing no matter what I'm inputting to it

Cons: really the only thing I can think of is that it doesn't have a split screen mode (not that I would use it all the much)

Summary: I did some research before I bought this tv and for the most part people had good things to say about it. I think most of the problems you'll hear are isolated issues, ya get a warranty, but don't expect to need it.

I used to have comcast and their hd feed really sucks, they use a 3:1 compression (trust me I know I used to work for them), so I was always seeing issues with that. And the SD feed was absolutely awful, again thinking the tv couldn't do any better. When I quit working for them I switched to verizon fios, holly crap. Talk about a difference, I quickly realized it wasn't the tv at all. The HD feed with fios is breathtaking, and the nicest part is SD shows are at least 3 times clearer. I never thought I would watch SD TV again until I got FIOS.

I also have PS3, games and Blue-Ray are nothing short of ridiculous. The color, contrast, refresh rate, everything is great. Ya it does take some tweaking to get it right and I still change settings depending on what exactly I'm watching.

Four of my friends also have 42" LCD TVs. One has a VIZIO, two have 2 different models of samsung, and the other has a nice sharp (sorry don't know model #'s). And as well all have PS3, so I've seen all in 1080p. Bottom line the vizio and samsungs don't come close, the sharp is very nice. It looks about the same, but slightly better, it has 120 refresh rate and slightly higher contrast ratio. But not enough difference to make me feel bad about buying this one. The design is better than any lcd that I've seen, it uses less than half of the power (even when not in power save mode), the sound is good for watching tv (still have sound system for games and movies). All of my friends spent more (except VIZIO) and ended up with lesser products that are still costing them more every month.

This set rocks, plain and simple and lastly. If you have comcast or a dish and can get Verizon FIOS, switch.......right now. Take it from someone who was in the business, it is much better......and I'm not even going to get into the internet side of things. So ya do some research, but if you want an affordable lcd that looks outstanding and will save you money in the long run take a look at this set