Sharp LC-32D5U 32-Inch LCD TV
Not as great as everyone claims it is
I actually believed the great reviews about Sharp LCDs and forked over lots of cash for my LC 32D5U. (...) Rest assured; I have this overpriced paperweight in my living room and I've spent the last four days struggling to get it to work. Here are my impressions:    - Great Picture... eventually. It takes a while to get the TV set up, but once it's right, the picture is amazing (as long as it's not a dark scene). To find the best setting I started on the \\"Movie\\" AV mode. I turned off the OPC (automatically adjusts brightness based on room brightness). Other settings:     Backlight +2     Contrast +24     Brightness +3     Color, Tint, Sharpness 0     Color Temperature Medium (This is on the advanced menu)     All other settings are the same as the \\"Movie\\" mode.    Despite these settings, the TV does not handle dark scenes very well. I loaded Splinter Cell Chaos Theory on my XBox. Most of the game takes place in shadows. My 11-year old Toshiba had excellent color and you could distinguish between different shades of black. Out of the box, none of the AV modes made the game clear on the LC-32D5U. After I made the changes above, it got much better, but it's still not as good as the colors on my old analog TV. I have a pretty critical eye, but I don't think the Sharp is any better than other LCD TVs on the market.    - Decent Sound. The simulated Dolby surround is pathetic. It makes background noise and music sound pretty good, but all the dialog gets muffled and you can't understand what anyone is saying. Fortunately, the normal mode is pretty good. I'm not a huge fan of bass, but I had to turn it up slightly (+5) to keep the sound from being too tinny. The sound is much better than my old Toshiba.    One problem is the audio output. You have a choice between \\"Fixed\\" and \\"Variable\\". In fixed mode, the output signal is constant and the TV does not control it. Sound comes from both the TV speakers and the audio output. This sounded wonderful with my TV connected to a high-end set of PC speakers with a subwoofer. Unfortunately, in this mode, the TV volume does not control the audio output so even when you press \\"Mute\\" the sound keeps coming from the external speakers. If you choose \\"Variable\\", the TV will control the volume of the external speakers, but it stops using the built-in speakers. In this case, the sound is not as good because it is further away from the picture. I'd like an option in between. I can't believe that months of R&D couldn't consider something I discovered in ten minutes.    - Poor ATSC Tuner. The tuner cannot handle virtual channels in digital broadcasts. My local Fox station (WOGX) broadcasts on channel 31.1, but the PSIP claims 51.1 (to keep the station's analog UHF \\"brand\\" of \\"Fox 51\\"). Despite 70-72% signal strength, the TV refuses to display the broadcast. It does display other local broadcasts: CBS (58-62% signal) and PBS (82-85% signal). These look awesome when they have HD programming.    Setting the channels on all the tuners (analog and digital) is a frustrating exercise. The TV wants to scan for channels automatically and you can't add them manually. The digital OTA broadcasts are especially frustrating because there are only three of them in my area, but I have to wait for the TV to go through all 61 channels (and it only picks up two of them). For my cable channels, I only want to display about ten of them so I have to go through the entire list and tell it to skip each station. It's exasperating because of the sluggish response when changing channels (see below).    - Castrated HDMI. I hooked up a Samsung DVD-HD850 upconverting DVD player using two different THX-certified DVDs and ran the THX Optimizer. The DVD player manual confirms full-spectrum RGB color pallet (0-255). The Sharp, however, can only display 7 of the 10 black shades in the test screen. Curiously, when I connect the DVD player with analog cables, all 10 shades are displayed.    - Senseless Resolution. I don't understand why LCDs come in 1366x768 resolution. This does not match any of the HDTV standards. (This is why I bought the DVD-HD850 only to learn that it's upconversion for 768p meant 1024x768, not 1366x768.) I figured the Sharp would convert any incoming signal into 768p, but it actually converts all incoming signals to 1080i. How it can do that without the proper resolution is a mystery to me. Sharp's 45\\" LCD uses 1920x1080... heck, Dell has a laptop with 1920x1200 resolution. If the TV converts everything to 1080i, why not have that as the native resolution?    - Useless Manual and Obscure Interface. The manual doesn't really explain anything that you can't figure out by navigating the on-screen menu options. It does not actually explain what the options do or what they mean, it simply lists the options (which you can just as easily read on the screen). I'd say the menus are adequate, but not spectacular. I think Samsung does a much better job in that department. (I recently helped my brother set up his new Samsung DLP TV.)    One annoying note is that the Sharp does not let you name the inputs yourself. You can choose from a list of input labels, but you cannot type your own. Also, despite the manual explicitly talking about connecting gaming devices, there are no options for \\"Game\\" (let alone \\"XBox\\", \\"PS2\\", etc.).     - Sluggish Response. This problem isn't limited to the sharp. It seems all the new TVs take forever to change inputs or even change channels. Each channel (cable or air) takes a long second or two to display and you can't just scroll through them because the TV insists on displaying each one as you go through the dial.    - TV Guide & Other Gimmicks. The inclusion of the TV Guide \\"feature\\" is obviously in the first generation. The interface is less than intuitive. It relies on analog OTA or cable broadcast of TV listings. The unit managed to pick up my listings in less then 24 hours, but it's at the mercy of Cox Cable... it does not display any information on local OTA broadcasts (just OTA for Jacksonville and Orlando). That's an issue with the cable company, but that also makes the recording functions useless for local channels (required for HD recording). Speaking of useless, the built in Firewire (\\"iLInk\\") is a good idea, but I have yet to find any AV-HDD advertised that will work with it. I think rather than mess with all these new technologies, Sharp should've focused on getting the ATSC tuner and HDMI interface working correctly.    - Huge. This is a 32-inch display but the TV's footprint is 38 inches wide. That's only an inch shy of Samsung's 42\\" DLP! I think the LC-32D7U (detachable speakers on the bottom) uses a more efficient design, but it costs about $300 more. It is otherwise identical to the LC-32D5U which means it shares all the other flaws.    Of all these issues, the ATSC tuner and HDMI issues are fatal flaws in my opinion. I've given Sharp customer support one more day to try to resolves these problems before I cash in on my 10 day return policy.