Philips 42PF7320A 42-Inch Widescreen Plasma HDTV
Great buy for the price and quality
This TV is simply great for the price. I had done research before buying this TV and concluded to three brands before buying it. They were Panasonic, Phillips and Samsung. I was also comparing 50 inch plasma as well. After reading reviews, checking models in CC and other stores, based on the price and picture quality Phillips was the winner. I would still say if you have more money go for Panasonic because they have better colors than Phillips but not as worth of $800 extra. Plus once you put HD using component cables or HDMI, it is just mind blowing. I would like to comment on one of the review here which says picture is grainy from near and it is not looking good. I think that's true out of the box on first day because you are not using HD cable box and even component hookups. When I took out the TV of the box and hooked up with the cable directly, picture was really mediocre and I was really disappointed. Next day when I got the HD Cable box and hooked up with component cables then I got to see the actual pic quality and it is really amazing.  <br /> <br />Sometime even if you have a component hookup make sure that you are watching the TV through that connection and not other as other simple cable connection will not have as good pic as component or HDMI. You can press AV+ button on the remote and it will tell you which connection you are using. I was actually using plain cable for a while before I realized that I need to change the source to component using AV+ button. Another point is, you might have to adjust brightness, contrast, and others to get the best quality as out of the box settings are not that good.  <br /> <br />Another point to note,  If you are using cable box make sure you have 4:3 setting is set to 480i or 480p and not to `stretched'. This will change the quality of your digital and analog channel otherwise they will look horrible. You can do this by turning off the cable box and press menu from the cable box remote. You can also verify that your HD is set to 1080i on the same screen.  <br /> <br />Other plus point is it has plenty of connections. I have watched DVD through this TV and pic is really great. I use the `automatic' setting on the menu for picture size as it automatically fits the screen where it is 4:3 this would help to reduce any burn in issues. <br /> <br />In overall it requires some tweaking and make sure you play with this for couple of weeks because then only you will get the all the settings right. In the end it has great pic quality and under 2k you can not beat this unit.  <br /> <br />