ashmanj

I've been researching the new Sony KP-57WV700 for sometime now. I've compared it against all other major projection brands including the new 2003 line Mitsubishi's and the Pioneer sets.

After almost purchasing a Sony, I walked out of the store because I didn't get the price I wanted, (the lowest price it did get was $3400 from a local store delivered) I changed my entire perspective for one main reason.

I was always hesitant about the Sony because I wanted to base my decision purely on image detail. Yet the one thing that kept me attached to it was the name alone. Yet every store I went into to look at it on display, including Goodguys, Best Buy, Audio & Video (in LA), and a few other shops I continually noticed bad aliasing around the edges of all the HD footage I was viewing. On sports footage, when looking at the crowds in the seats, during a camera pan there was extreme strobing. I don't know what the hell it was coming from because I played with the remotes on all the Sony TV's I was viewing to see if I could get rid of it, but to no avail it always remained. I played with all the brightness settings and their trademarked edge-detail function, both turning it on and off. Nothing helped.

I don't want to buy a tv where strobing and aliasing around the edges is going to be there and I found myself constantly looking at the beautiful image the new 2003 line of Mitsubishi WS-55411 TV's had. Infact, the image itself was brighter however the Sony seemed to have better color saturation, but I was near positive I could get the same level of color saturation out the Mitsubishi. In addition, I was wondering where the hell am I going to put my center channel speaker without shelf space atop the Sony TV. Even though it's curves make it seem narrow it is nearly the same size in depth as all the other projection TV makes.

So in the end I bought a Mitsubishi, and have since had it ISF calibrated and let me tell you the image with and HD signal is truly flawless. I'm quite happy I chose not to buy the Sony. Even though the Sony TV has DVI, there currently are no receivers with DVI or Firewire connections. So to pay for a digital-in on your new HD projection TV makes sense on some level, until I see the receivers out there in stores, why pay a premium for it. No one knows how long it might be for these digital out receivers to hit the market and what will they cost?

I would have liked to get a platnium plus 55" Mitsubishi for the digital-in ability and the additional inputs and outputs however they stopped making them in the "plus" versions except in the 65" and unfortunately that TV is just too big for my viewing room. Why the need for the "plus"? Because all the "plus" models and the diamond models have something called quadfield focus which adds crisper detail to the edges and background detail. The basic platnium series lacks this feature but whether or not it's actually noticeable on the screen, I can't really say. The Diamond models are due in stores probably in the next 2-3 weeks and I expect the quality of the image to be nearly similar to the gold-plus series but those televisions do have better crt's. Whether or not the difference will actually come through in the image, I'm guessing you probably won't notice but those models do have an anti-glare screen.

Anyhow, for those of you interested in the KP-WV700 series, I highly recommend you take a look at some of the other brands before you blow $3000. It will be worth your while. When you do, look closely at the details in the edges as well as background details during pans and sweeps. I guarantee you'll notice the same strobing and aliasing effect I did in the Sony's.