Plasma TV Reviews: Plasma TV for Less

Reviews

This stand is great nice and sturdy, good quality glass... All the pieces acounted for it comes with the mounting kit to mount to the wall... One negative thing is the swivel is very loose i can move the tv with my pinky finger and no pressure so just be aware... also the tv swivel is very high so if you put you tv on it prepare if you have a low couch because you will have to tilt your head up. I have it in my bed room and it makes for a great bed watching tv stand. I have seen similar items in best but for about $350 or $400 and this is a steal if you can buy it at under $300.

All items arrived in good shape and installation instructions were clear and easy to catch. It took me 1 hour and a half for complete installation, including wires pulled through central mast. It is sturdy, it easily took our 42" LCD TV. Quality painting of metal parts, I've accidentally struck some parts and the paint has resisted

The box and packaging left a mess of styrofoam and dirt on the floor. The box was very dirty. The instructions were not very helpful, except for the pictures. The construction quality was not great. One of the bolt holes did not line up to corresponding frame piece. I loosened the nearby bolts and was able to push the pieces together how they were supposed to fit. You get what you pay for, I suppose.

This TV stand is an excellent stand for someone needing to place a TV in a smaller area. It fits perfectly where I needed it to. It's made very well, sturdy and easy to put together, took us about 45 minutes to assemble. I use the mounting bracket to hold the TV up over the stand, allowing lots of space for components to fit below the TV. Very happy with my purchase, and have had many compliments on how atractive it is.

The installation was fairly easy to follow. I am using it for my 50" Samsung T.V. The ability to rotate the T.V up to certain angle is a great feature. The design of the T.V stand definately saved us the hassel of drilling holes on the wall and running electric lines. Some of our friends actually think the T.V is mounted against the wall. If you setup and place it accordingly, it will give that impression! The shelf glass are tinted. Take due dilligence when you peel off the sticker from the glass. It is extremly hard to find this type of design at your major electric or furniture outlet. That is why I have purchased it from Web.

Reviews

I became really concerned when our 47" 80# flat screen TV started rocking when our 4 yr. old grandchild hit the stand it was sitting on. I Googled this product and figured if it was used in earthquake areas, it should work well for us here in Sedona not known for earthquakes. I'm very pleased. It was easy to install, stablizes the TV very well and can be easily unclipped if you need to move the unit for dusting, etc. We are much more at ease when the 6 & 4 yr. old grandchildren visit us now.

These straps anchor your TV securely to the wall via screw or adhesive. They have a nice buckle feature that allows easy adjustment of the length of the strap for a secure fit with easy install.

The strap was easy to install. I decided to cut the excess strap off for cosmetic purposes. Now we'll just have to wait for the "big one" to see if the product does what its supposed to do.

I bought these for the sole purpose of not having my television knocked over by the LO's! These straps are awesome, and very well made!! Made in the USA to boot...can't beat that either!! I was very happy with my purchase, and would definitely buy from again!

I'm using this to secure a my 50' flat screen to the wall. We have a todler who likes to climb. These work great and I would recommend them to anyone.

Reviews

I purchased this product for one reason only, but wound up using it for so much more. I needed it because my 1-year-old 16:9 plasma TV had two vertical lines that outlined the 4:3 frame that was "burned in" from watching regular non-widescreen content. PixelProtector's "wash" options were reported as being able to remove this burn-in, as long as there was even the slightest chance that it was not permanent. I had tried the TV's built-in burn-protection and burn-removal features, but the lines were still there. I was not optimistic, but for the price, I didn't have much to lose. When I received the NTSC DVD, I read the entire manual (a PDF file on the DVD, accessed via a PC). I was supposed to start with "Wash 2" (a pure white screen) to see how much damage there was to deal with. Then I was to run "Wash 1" (flashing pixels very randomly) for a few hours, multiple times if necessary. When I popped in the DVD and started "Wash 2", it was a 4:3 picture. This was very strange because the packaging specifically said "Widescreen" , and the opening menu was 16:9. I checked "Wash 1" and "Wash 3" and they were both 16:9. I went on to the product's website and filled out a support form. Within a few hours, I had a response to supply my mailing information and a new one would be sent out immediately. It was only a few days later that I received a new copy. Sadly, it exhibited the same problem. After viewing the properties of the video file for "Wash 2", it showed that the DVD was authored incorrectly. I sent another e-mail explaining exactly what the issue was, and the response from the author was incredible. He thanked me for pointing out the problem, and told me that he would have a new batch produced. One week later, he had a new batch and promptly sent me a DVD from that new batch. "Wash 2" was perfectly authored in 16:9. This is the type of customer service that you rarely see anymore. Instead of companies that keep you on hold for a half-hour or more, or never answer your e-mails, this company had the author himself take the interest to work with me to resolve the problem. My e-mails never went more than a few hours before being answered. As for the product itself... simply amazing. With "Wash 2", I saw the lines as clear as day. I ran "Wash 1" for 8 hours, and then checked it again. It was slightly (but noticeably) better. I couldn't believe it - I thought that the damage was permanent, but seeing the slight reduction was proof that this problem could be taken care of. I ran "Wash 1" for 16 hours, gave it an 8-hour rest, and ran it again for 16 hours. Only then did I check "Wash 2" and THE LINES WERE GONE. I will now run "Wash 1" 8 hours weekly, and "Wash 3" for 20 minutes weekly (read the documentation both in the PDF and in the program itself - it contains a wealth of information). Although many people will be using this program to calibrate their systems, as I said before, this was NOT the reason I bought the DVD. HOWEVER... having fixed my burn-in problem, I used the calibration screens to calibrate the brightness, contrast, color, and sharpness. I have done so using both "Avia" and "Video Essentials" since I bought the TV, and they certainly improved the picture quality, but PixelProtector is much better. I guess the other two programs were for CRTs, and although they certainly helped with the plasma TV, PixelProtector was probably written with newer plasma and LCT technology in mind. The bottom line is that I cannot believe that it got rid of the burn-in in the first place, and the TV's picture is, in a word, stunning. Both due to PixelProtector, its author, and its support team.

I don't know who is writing the positive reviews of this DVD, but I thought it was a total waste of money. After I wasted the ink to print the 21 page instruction manual it still made no sense. The manual shows you a few test screens and is real vague at explaining what to do with each one, then when you put the DVD in it shows you different test screens that are not in the manual and asks you to select one. So then test screens show up on your TV for around 20 seconds each then it changes to another one and you are supposed to hit pause each time and adjust something on each one. The problem is very few of the test screens are in the manual so you have no idea what to adjust on 3/4 of them. And like I said above, even the ones that are in the manual don't have a good explanation.

The instructions for use of this DVD are minimal at best. Supposedly you can go to their website for more detailed instructions, but retail customers must register for their forum to see the instructions. It would have been far more convenient if the instructions were included, either in printed form or on the disk itself. I can't comment on whether the DVD will fix "stuck pixels." You must run it for many hours to achieve that result.

Did not see any difference and could not get any help from customer NO service.

This DVD comes with no printed instruction manual, and no on-screen help. The disc contains a PDF file of very limited instructions, which I found vague and basically useless. The DVD itself is nothing more than a series of calibration images, most of which aren't even mentioned, much less explained, in the instruction file. My advice: save your money.

Reviews

Bought this TV ~4 years ago and subsequently other flat screens for different rooms in the house. The AKAI really stands out with the best picture quality of any of my screens. Excellent contrast and crisp 1080i images when connected to digital HD cable. Great buy overall and looks great too! Biggest complaint is the remote control which is not compatible with my cable universal remote control.

Basic TV is ok but PIP does not work. Sound is bad. customer service, warranty and user guide are use less.

I bought this TV from Price Club about 2 years ago and I still love it! The Picture is brighter and clearer than most LCD TV's I have seen to date, I also own a 47" LG 1080P LCD TV, and honestly this TV looks better for most material. I have had no reliability issues with this TV whatsoever, it has performed flawlessly for over 2 years now, and I abuse it daily with Blu Ray movies and Xbox 360 games... excellent TV ~

No support No warranty No one to talk to the tv it's expensive just paying for the shipping!!!! after 2 and a half year it's scrap need it parts and no one will repair it cause the part for the TV it's no longer available do not and I MEAN DO NOT BUY ANYTHING MADE BY AKAI

I bought this HDTV monitor over a year ago and I have been very happy with the quality. Never saw any problem yet and the price was great. The remote is bit too low-key but for the price its not bad. Compared to other HDTV monitors i guess this is a bit heavy so i prefer to keep it on a table compared to mounting on the wall.

Reviews

I bought this in December of 2007 and have had it now for three years. It works fine, with the exception of the really bad sound, which I just thought was something that all flat screens. We bought a sound system/speakers, and it does the job. It is HD compatible and the picture is great. For the price, I am really glad I went with it.

WOW I was shocked to read all the negative reviews. I bought this TV for $900 about 3 years ago and it still works great. My only gripe would be the sound, but I've since hooked it up to a surround sound system and it's great. Of course there are much better TVs on the market but I wasn't looking to spend alot of money and I'm happy I didn't since I pleased with what I have.

I bought this TV from Amazon, 3 years ago. We live in a very narrow row home, so I was looking for an inexpensive flat panel to replace my large bulky TV. Space-wise it's great! Picture quality is average. Sound quality is poor. First, the picture is not high quality but I knew that going in. I was not sure what to expect. I was satisfied with the product when I received it. It's not great but it's good enough. However, for the price it could be considered great. As for the sound quality, it sucks! The speakers are located on the sides facing the back of the TV. Who sits behind a TV? When we turn the sound up close to it's highest possible volume, the sounds starts to get even more muffled than usual. This is just poor engineering. The remote that is included is huge and bulky. We have comcast cable. We tried to program the cable remote to Sylvania with no luck. So we have to used 2 remotes. The cable remote switches the channels and the TV remote controls the volume and the power. Other than that, this TV has S-video and RCA input jacks. That is a plus because we connect out laptops to the TV. It also has output Audio jacks for surround sound. If this is the way you are going then the TV speakers shouldn't matter much. Lastly, remember that this is a monitor and does not have a tuner!!! If you do not have cable you will be using a VCR or DVD for the tuner (most VCR/DVD combos have them, not all DVD players do). This transmits a hum from the VCR/DVD tuner. We have cable and it eliminates hum. So if you have cable, that should not be an issue. Overall, I give it 3 stars becuase it served us well for the last 3 years but with the new technology and prices dropping, I would buy something with a tuner and better sound quality now.

This was a great TV! I bought it probably a year or so ago and it served my family well for endless hours of television entertainment. Even though it was EDTV, it looked identical to HDTV. I've since given this to my sister for her to use in her college apartment. Because it's a 'monitor' and not a TV per se, it does not have a coaxial cable input. This can easily be remedied by running the coaxial cable through your cable box or DVD player.

Why can't we rate this with zero stars? One star is far too many! Our story is just about identical to many that have been reported here. One day about a month ago there was a loud POP and the TV just stopped working. Unfortunately we didn't pay $600 for it, we paid $1200 in April '06! Funai/Sylvania should be shut down and we do plan on writing letters to the Attorney General, reporting them to the Better Business Bureau and contacting our Congressman to ask for a congressional investigation into this company. Someone needs to start a class-action lawsuit here. We also got the run around about them sending us a box. We made several calls, talked to supervisors and their supervisors and got no help whatsoever. I cringed when I read the great reviews that some have given this TV who have only owned it a few months. I wish them luck. We, also thought it was great and the picture was beautiful until without warning it turned into a piece of junk! Don't buy it!

Reviews

if you want to spend over a $100 for the same mount, buy this one and send me the change!!! this same mount at wallmart,sams, meijers were over $100. easy to install, strong,mounts tv close to wall but allows cables to be pluged into back of tv ,has built in level and it tilts.

This mount was more than sufficient for my 40" LED-lit LCD TV (under 40lbs). However, the quality of the construction and included accessories had a few minor flaws: 1) The bend in the horizontal pieces of the wall mount frame is not square (and the steel is thick and sturdy enough that you cannot bend it yourself). This means that it does not sit completely flush with the wall when mounted. When you tighten the screws, it does pull the frame closer to the wall, and I am not at all worried that it is not secure. 2) There are plenty of sizes of screws to choose from to mount the vertical arms to the back of your TV. However, if you need the screws that are ~3/16" in diameter (the smallest size), they supply square washers to keep the screws centered in the U-shaped channel. The problem is, the washers don't fit in the channel! My TV used a larger sized screw, so this wasn't an issue for me. 3) The bubble level was a little bit off, but by the time you have the bracket mounted to the wall, hopefully you've already measured and marked level positions for the holes, so it wouldn't have been very useful even if it was accurate. The instructions are clear and easy to follow (though they did say you needed a 7/16 socket for the main wall mount screws when in fact they were 1/2", but who only has one socket instead of a set?) Despite the minor issues above, I would still recommend this over any of the overpriced wall mounts out there, a simple steel frame and some screws shouldn't cost $100+

I saved a bunch over similar ones I found locally. Works great and arrived quickly. Easy to install.

Very sturdy and easy to install with proper instruments. Definitely need a screw driver with the extension for the tightening of the tilted part of the screen. Holds 52" nicely and beats all store models by price and quality.

Why should these items ever sell for $150 dollars. This one is sturdy; the parts fit all sorts of TVs; the instructions make sense. It's perfect.

Reviews

had this for 2 months. GREAT TV. I'm blown away. We upgraded from a 50 inch DLP projection that was about 5 years old. The picture difference is night and day. Refresh rate, clarity, black level and overall vibrancy are off the chart. I'm a graphics guy by trade so I know what to look for. This is by far one of the best deals out for the $$. This unit is HEAVY and was delivered by special scheduled freight. If you're going to wall mount it make SURE it's firmly mounted to studs. We just use the stand mount. Ample connections on back. We have 2 component, a composite and 2 HDMI hooked up and still only use about 1/2 the connections.

Our family decided to upgrade from our first HDTV, a 32" Toshiba LCD; which we've always liked, it's just not very big. Initially we were thinking of about a 46" LCD but after visiting both BB and American TV & Appliance, we discovered that with a plasma one got a great - and maybe even better - picture, and a larger size for the the same or less cost than an LCD. But I was still leery because of what I'd heard about plasmas of the past: energy hogs that run hot, heavy, fragile, image burn-in, and short service life. I felt the plasma sets at the stores and while they ran warmer than the LCD's, they weren't hot and they weren't any warmer than the CRT sets I'd lived with for years. I also checked the specs on energy consumption and they weren't extraordinarily higher than LCD's. And while image burn-in can still be a problem, it's easily avoidable if one uses some simple common sense. Plasmas' service life is as good or better than LCD's. They're rated for more hours of TV watching than I probably have left in my lifetime; so I think I'm safe in that respect. I also rely on Consumer Reports religiously and it also supports the fact that today's plasmas are good, reliable TV's with superb picture quality. So we switched to now looking only for a plasma, and we could now also look for a bigger TV (50"-58") for the same or less money than we had been planning to spend on a 46" LCD. Eventually, based on reviews, visits to electronics stores, researching specs, and price, it came down to the Samsung PN50B550 or the Panasonic P50S14. I found some forums that described how to safely hack a Sammy b550 into a b560 (the firmware is resident in the 550, but not activated); and I didn't think the b650/660's internet access feature made them worth the extra money for us. The Sammy b850/860's are fabulous - very slim, fantastic picture - but at least $900 more than the b550. And the b550's were being priced to move to make room for the incoming Sammy C series plasmas for 2010. So the best value - price and quality of picture - for us was the b550. The decision to choose the between the Sammy and Panny (at about the same price) was agonizing. I wanted to make the absolute best decision for the money being spent. Eventually it came down, to a great extent, to the recently disclosed revelations that Panny plasmas black levels and contrast degrade measurably over time; and the Sammy was already a bit better than Panny when both were new, but the Panny was a bit brighter. So we decided on the Sammy P50B550, but now where to buy. Our choices for best price came down to Amazon.com or a local big box, American TV & Appliance. We chose Amazon because for the same price we got the set delivered into our living room(free shipping) and saved the sales tax. At American we would have had to haul the nearly 90# box home ourselves or pay extra to have it delivered. The free shipping was a big factor in the purchase decision. The online purchase and followup communication from Amazon was flawless. The set was delivered a day earlier than promised, and even set up in our living room within 5 minutes. The delivery crew was great and well trained. The only drawback was unavoidable; because we live in wisconsin, and it was February, we had to wait until the set warmed up from the 10 degrees outside temp before trying it out. But what a great choice we made. We got a 50" plasma for at least $300-$400 less than a 46" LCD with a picture quality that would even come close to touching (but still not equalling) that of the Sammy plasma. The contrast is much better than any LCD's we saw and to my eye the blacks are absolutely black. Such a noticeably better picture than LCD, plus a much larger screen, and for less money. I see a lot of criticism of its speakers but I don't think they're really any worse than almost any other TV, LCD or plasma, at almost any price point. Almost daily we marvel at the picture quality and comment that it's like sitting alone in a theater (no one talking, no cell phones, no babies, no sticky floors) in the best seats in the house. And buying from Amazon.com made the purchase even better and the best value - THANK YOU AMAZON!

I've owned this tv set for more than a month now. I bought it after extensive research and I am completely satisfied with this product. Initially I was concerned with the burnt-in images and with the power consumption. Energy wise, I have to say it is even better than my old TV (a 2005 Samsung) with the same usage so, don't worry about you electrical bill. The burnt-in pixels: I've read a lot of opinions and technical data and I took the chance. So far so good. The TV has an integrated maintenance software and I guess that if you do that maintenance you should be ok (there was a review about somebody actually trying to burn in some images and after 3 weeks of "still image" he was able to remove any Image retention marks by using the aforementioned software). Anyway, the TV has some picture settings that allow you to zoom in the image so you can avoid the black bars on the sides of the screen (for those channels that do not broadcast in 16:9 ratio). Quality wise: EXCELLENT (COLORS, CONTRAST, REFRESH RATE). You may want to consider getting a wall-mount for this TV (it is pretty big and heavy and the included stand does a relatively good job but if you have kids, pets or you are just clumsy....). The wall mounts are fairly cheap (around $25 on Ebay) Another thought: If you buy one, consider getting the HD package for you local cable company. Without it, the image quality is going to be very low (so add another $10 to your monthly expenses) I hope this has been helpful.

I searched and read reviews for weeks. I finally decided to get a 47" LCD until i was in best buy one day and saw the quality of this HDTV. I immidiately came home and searched and bamb amazon had it for almost 100$ less than best buy. It arrived 2 days earlier than it was supposed to and i can not be more happy with the purchase. This is a great large HDTV. The features are good and i really like the UI for the menu's. the quality is second to none that i've seen (other than those really nice LED's) for the price. man you can not beat it.

I probably did 2 months of homework before I finally settled on this Samsung 550 Series Plasma. Initially I hadn't even planned on looking into a Plasma, but now I'm glad I did. I'll get the only con I have out of the way first. During your first 100 hours of viewing, like any plasma you do have to be smart about possible image retention. There is a quick fix to this though, this model has a screen burn prevention feature that moves pixels automatically up and down as often as every minute. Don't worry, it is unnoticable. There is also an after-image removal feature that can be run if you do have noticable screen burn. Just be smart, don't leave something paused for a long period of time and you'll have no worries. The pros of this TV far outweigh the one con I have. To start, the Menu functions are great. You can do a lot of adjusting to get the exact picture you're looking for, and the default settings are good too. There are a variety of advanced settings, so you may really want to take some time to play around with those. I really like the picture control settings, you can control all aspects of the picture you're viewing. The Plug & Play feature is awesome. It sets up your language, channels and time. The TV will detect all of the channels available coming into it, HD included. It will then remove any that are scrambled automatically. The plug & play feature is great and makes things easy for you. From there you can add/delete, save favorites and even set a timer that will auto-switch to a channel when you're favorite show is on. The sound is decent. You aren't going to get theater sound from any flat panel TV these days, but as far as this model its pretty good. I have it hooked up to a home audio system with the TruSurround HD function enabled. This gives you a great 5.1 surround sound environment. It also has an equalizer if you want to tweek the sound. There are a ton of inputs available. 4 HDMI ports(one specifically set for DVI), 2 AV, 2 component and PC input. Whether you are feeding in your Blu-Ray player, PC or a camera, there are plenty of slots. There is also a USB port where you can do a variety of things. You can update the firmware of the TV,or you can view photos and listen to Mp3's. So you can feed a bunch of toys into this TV. The quality of them all is typical Samsung, meaning it's outstanding. One last feature to talk about it the Anynet+ feature that enables you to control all connected Samsung devices with the TV remote. I didn't think I would even have this available to me considering my Blu-Ray player is a Panasonic, but it detected it and I can control it with my TV remote. Pretty cool. Now on to the best part...the picture. The picture on this TV is amazing. I looked at so many different TV's in the last couple months, but quite honestly this one had the best picture. I researched LED-LCD, Plasma and regular LCD. I'm a big sports and movie guy, so getting a TV to fit my interests was important. I found that many plasma's do better with the motion in sports, so thats why I started looking at them. This model handles it flawlessly, especially in Hi-Def. I've been watching the Olympics, the women's halfpipe snowboarding was one of the coolest things I've ever watched in Hi-Def. The colors are rich and deep, the black levels are perfect, and I'm not having any problems with glare that I've heard people have with plasma TV's. I have Hi-Def cable now, I'm blown away. And as far as movies go, Blu-Rays on this TV are spectacular. Unfortunately I'm blowing a lot of money now on Blu-Rays, but its worth it. So in a nutshell I'm highly recommending this Samsung. Another added incentive to plasma is the price. You'll be paying a lot more for a similar LCD, and quite frankly I think this has a better picture. Amazon had the best prices too, so look no further. I received free shipping, Pilot handled the duties. My recommendation is to be proactive with Pilot if you do deal with them. They weren't the greatest service but after a phone call to their local hub they came through. I am so happy with my purchase. If you are debating on this TV, don't. You won't regret it. Enjoy.

Reviews

it was been working really good for my tv i really happy it is strong and have good quality.

Great product at a great price! Not as fancy as others but sturdy and gets the job done. This is the second one that I purchase.

The mount works excellent!!!! Pivots very easily and the ability to push the mount snug against the wall is an excellent feature. With its pivot abilities I was able to use my flat screen for the option of two rooms. Very versatile and extremely sturdy!!!!

I have been looking for a wall mount for the past two years, I purchased the video secu articulating wall mount sold by Warehouseseller. I am impressed by the timely manner I received the product from them and the price was great. Since I have had this mount, I have found it easy to use, very secure and outstanding quality; usually for a lesser price, you get cheap quality, not with this product. Welds are perfect; hardware is great quality, easy install, heavy but worth it to keep my RCA 42" on the wall. Thanks again Warehouseseller Rusty Owens riogrande83@hotmail.com

A++++++ Best mount ever, i haven't used a better mount! Very Strong, easy instructions.