Samsung LN40A630

Summary: After several months of researching, trying and comparing LCD's I decided on this one. The final contestants were the A550, A630, and A650. The A550 was the cheaper option with 60 Hz. and I almost bought it for the price/ratings. I decided to wait and go with the 120 Hz technology and so it was between the 650 and 630. Also, the SD tuner of the 550 was rated below average, which is another reasone I decided to step up to the 6 Series. I went to a store and saw them both side by side. Played with all the picture settings and had them dim down and up the lights. The main issue I had was the reflection of the screen on the 650 (read the editor reviews for the 650 on Cnet), it definately reflected a ton of ambient light. Even with the lights out, on dark scenes you could see yourself on the screen pretty well. Of course there are a few other differences like the extra HDMI and ability to get RSS feed for news and weather for the 650. For me neigther were an issue since I don't require that many HDMI's and the news and weather are always on TV anyways. The semi matte screen finish of the 630 was perfect for my living room lighting and you really can't tell the difference in the contrast ratio from one set to another (630 has 40k:1, 650 has 50k:1).

So I chose the 630 and couldn't be happier. The picture quality is amazing, you really have to see to believe it and once you calibrate it out of the factory settings, it is just incredible. You can store 2 or 3 different picture settings for each input, so for example, you can have a night and day setting for watching TV, and completely different day and night settings for watching DVD, or blu-ray, or games, etc. The auto motion plus works great. You can set it to Off, Low, Med, High depending on what content you are watching. I like it Off for hollywood movies so they look like a movie and not like video, and I like it on Med-High for nature and science films like Planet Earth or Dicovery channel. In High, I haven't really seen any artifacts and the cammera pans are really smooth.

The sounds is not the best out of the set's speakers, but really, which set's are? I run my sound out of an AVR so it's a non-issue. The only reason why I gave it 4.5 stars is because my set is slightly slanted, seems like the problem comes from the stand. I tried taking it off, adjusting (which consists of basically trying to wedge the screws in hard while pushing on the slatend side) and putting it back in and it seems to be the same. Now I say, it is just a hair, but I can see it and it bothers me. The tech support guy said that it's common on swivel stands, but I don't believe him. I think what I'll do is add a sticky pad underneath and to one side of the stand and see if it works, if not I'm calling support again and going from there. Anyways, I believe this is probably an isolated issue. The set is the best for the money, and you will not regret getting it. I reccomend watching the price on a price engine for a bit. I got mine for $999 on a limited sale an online store had.