Sony KP-57WS520 57-Inch Hi-Scan 1080i HD-Ready Projection TV
Power Supply issues hurt picture quality
It seems the power supplies on these units fluctuate in quality.  While some have reported no problems, myself and some other in the HT forums have found that these sets have power supplies that fluctuate in quality and/or are simply very vulnerable to RFI interference.    I took delivery on a 57WS520 and right away I noticed the picture had \\"snow\\" in it on dark backgrounds, even when the set was not hooked up to any source and even when the set was hooked up to a double conversion UPS (meaning it was running off a battery to ensure clean power on my end)!  However, no matter what I tried, this snow did not go away.  It was on DVDs, cable, anything that I hooked up.  In addition to the snow, it had fast moving light colored interference bars that moved in different directions around the screen, varying in size and intensity.  Since there was nothing hooked up to the set and the set was hooked up to a clean power supply, I had to conclude either my set was defective or the set in general had problems like this.  When I found another person on a home theater forum having the exact same problem with the exact same model and every possible offending component in his TV repaired with little success, I leaned towards the latter, that it was a design problem with this set.  I am debating whether to bother trying another or just return it for a refund.  It's one of those problems that you may or may not have depending where you live, but it is very annoying if you do have it.    UPDATE:  I have taken delivery on a second 57WS520.  This set has issues similar to the first, however they are not as severe and they occur less frequently than the first set.  I have decided to keep the set because aside from this problem it looks great, and all of these sets seem to have at least one quirk with picture quality.  While it is likely Sony could have avoided this problem by using a better power supply, it seems they wanted to cut costs here.    If you can live with this minor problem, this is a fantastic set, especially for the price.