hitachi electronics closing doors in australia

[Woochifer]

Wooch, come back to earth, you are really stretching to try to make a point. Are you saying no one buys TV's by looking at them in the store? I'd say 99% of people make their buying decisions on TV's by how they look on display. Maybe only you or Sir T would bring one home and tweak it before making a decision. A TV isn't like an amp you can throw in the back seat and bring home for a test drive. The only thing we have is how they look on display and what we can find out by research. I adjust my set when I get it home.

I'm not stretching any point here, you're simply missing it.

People do buy TVs based on how they look in the showroom, that's precisely why manufacturers purposely use factory default settings that bump the brightness and sharpness and color balances that are way off from reference specs. It's all about what stands out, not about what's accurate. In assessing picture quality in a typical big box showroom, it's easy to equate brightness and sharpness with picture quality.

If you want to accurately assess a TV's picture quality, you need to adjust the settings to get the brightness, contrast, sharpness, and color balances as close as possible. Otherwise, it would be no different than trying to evaluate amplifiers with the tone controls set to different "zero" levels.

If they all turn up the brightness and contrast as you say, then I guess they all are still on an even playing field, aren't they.

That statement would be true only if all sets were similarly inaccurate, but they are not. The adjustments needed for different TVs to match up to the same calibration specs are all over the map. On websites like the AVS Forum, whole discussions are dedicated to the different adjustments needed for different TV models. They're not the same, and are often way different. Like all other TVs, neither LG nor Panasonic are accurate out of the box, but they are inaccurate in very different ways. This is exactly why you need to get the adjustments as close as possible.

If they all looked the same then there wouldn't be much of a decision to make, would there. I've been buying TV's for some time, in and out of stores, and I haven't noticed anyone in stores doing anything different than me. If we are all doing it wrong maybe you should enlighten us on the proper steps to TV purchasing. Or, at least tell me how you go about it. Maybe my next TV purchase will be quite different.

Are you going to tell me TV's are all basically the same and can be tweaked to one standard?

TVs are not the same, but they can be calibrated to a reference specification. AT THAT POINT, you can make an accurate comparison. Ever heard of Avia or Digital Video Essentials, or even the THX Optimizer that comes with all THX-ceritified DVDs? Those are all tools that can be used for video calibration. Some people on this board have spent the extra money to have their sets calibrated by an ASF technician. Panasonic TVs in particular, benefit greatly from calibration. By most accounts, their plasma HDTVs are very high quality, but their factory settings are highly inaccurate. A store where my friend used to work calibrated their TVs, and that makes a huge difference in showing the true advantages between different models.

That's great that LG builds for others but I'm saying they haven't shown me anything to impress me. And, you can try to twist things around to make it look like I can't tell a good picture from a bad or make excuses for them all you want but until I see a product from them that convinces me it's quality, then in my book they aren't and therefore will not be in my house.

How can a product impress you if you don't even know what it's capable of? If you don't calibrate your TV at home, you haven't seen what a picture is supposed to look like with the settings properly balanced. At home, you wouldn't just take the factory settings and leave them in place, so why would you rely on them in a showroom? Believe me, if you get a calibration disc for your TV's video settings, it's like buying a new TV. (FYI, from what I've read over the years, Toshibas seem inconsistent as to the degree to which they need extensive changes to the factory settings. Some models are closer to spec out of the box than others.)

I'm not saying that all products are the same, but I am telling you that relying on the factory settings will give you comparisons that are far from apples-to-apples. You wouldn't audition speakers using different volume settings, and the same difference applies when comparing TVs.

[pixelthis]

Nobody in their right mind would buy a high end product from Goldstar, thats why they changed their name.
As for Hitachi, a friend bought one at sears the other day, got it for half off.
Hitachi always had the rep, but they stayed in rptv too long, probably thought LCD and other flat panels were a "fad".
The fact that they are pulling out of aussieland, a major market, doesnt bode well.
BASICALLY A GREAT PICTURE, poor marketing, and marketing is important in an industry where no one really needs your product(higher end electronics)

[Woochifer]

Nobody in their right mind would buy a high end product from Goldstar, thats why they changed their name.
As for Hitachi, a friend bought one at sears the other day, got it for half off.
Hitachi always had the rep, but they stayed in rptv too long, probably thought LCD and other flat panels were a "fad".

Try reading the rest of the thread before firing this kind of an ignorant missive. Hitachi was one of the early flat screen TV pioneers with their partnership with Fujitsu. Their problem has been with the market, and the competition catching up with them.

Wooch, you keep flipping your points from the show room to home. I've never seen anyone or even the sales staff offer to calibrate the settings in a showroom. The showroom is the only place I referred to.

This is why you need to take the initiative yourself and tweak with the controls whenever you're looking at TVs in a showroom. The showroom is not about picture accuracy, it's about the wow factor, which is why the factory settings are as inaccurate as they are. The sales staff is all about steering you to the sets that provide them with the highest margins, not setting up apples-to-apples comparisons. If you want to do a valid comparison in the showroom, you have to take the initiative to make sure that any comparisons you do are conducted as evenly as possible. The remotes are usually accessible in the showroom, you just need to take a few seconds to use them. Just taking what's given without any adjustments would be no different than comparing audio equipment and not making an effort to ensure that the levels are even.

I've used the Optimizer and my Toshiba has been right on. I set it to a recommendation I found on the web from some one who used a calibrator, the adjustments looked pretty good to me. Do you think Avia or similar would do anything more? I'm willing to adjust the settings inside the menu but I'm not going to take the back off, I don't feel qualified to do that. I enjoy audio and video to a point but I am not a technician to be sure.

The THX Optimizer is fine for a showroom comparison in that it provides a color pattern that you can use to try and eyeball the settings between different sets. But, for home calibration it's actually useless. Avia and Digital Video Essentials are much better for video calibration because they include a color filter viewer that you use to set the color balances, sharpness, brightness, and contrast to reference specs. Nothing fancy, just a set of color transparencies, but it's an ingeniously inexpensive way to ensure consistency from one setting to another. It doesn't require going into the service menus (or opening up the TV), though some people swear by professional ISF calibration, which does involve tweaking with the service menus.

Let's put this another way, have you, seen LG have a picture quality on a TV that you thought compared to a Sony, Panasonic or Mitsubishi? If so, which technology, because manufacturer's seen to have one or the other they do best.

Absolutely. Once my parents' LG set was calibrated, its image quality was very comparable to other plasma sets in that price range. LG probably wouldn't be my first choice, but it's certainly not out of league with those other brands. Out of the box, the colors were very bland and required big adjustments, though the brightness and sharpness were closer to spec than other HDTVs I've seen. That's probably why they wouldn't fare too well in a showroom comparison if they're simply reset to factory specs.