Matsui 1420T

I bought this TV when I was moving to university. I needed something small and compact that I could easily transfer from my home at university back to here. I needed it to be cheap but sturdy and trustworthy enough to last for at least the time I was at university, so opted for this...

~*~ The Look ~*~

As Ive already said, it's a portable so small and compact. It's silver plastic (although I've seen it in black as well). There are a lot of vents over the top and sides, the speakers aren't obvious so I assume theyre hidden inside the casing somewhere. There are five black buttons just below the screen, the power, two for volume and two to change channel.

It has a carry handle at the top to enable you to transport it easily.

~*~ The Picture ~*~

The picture's not great, you get an aerial with it but its not brilliant, it will pick up a picture but if you want good sound then the picture will be fuzzy, if you want a good picture then you compromise the sound!

I bought a new aerial for it and this works better. You need to move the aerial everytime you change channel but you can get a very clear picture with very clear sound. To achieve this though you will need to upgrade the aerial.

~*~ Sound Quality ~*~

This TV only has mono, so if your used to stereo you will notice a difference.

The sound quality is good, so long as you have a good aerial! It can sound a little 'plastic' but it is clear and there are no distortions.

~*~ Features ~*~

Teletext - This works well so long as the channel your tuned into is tuned in well otherwise it wont work at all!

Remote - The remote is probably the best part of the TV! It has all the 'normal' functions you'd expect with a TV remote. Channel numbers, sleep timer, channel up/down, volume up/down, teletext and mute

Sleeper timer - I love this feature, maybe thats just because I'm lazy! but it works brilliantly, you set the time length you want before it automatically turns off and it will count down for you. There is a small box that flashes in the top right hand-corner of the screen every fifteen minutes to remind you the time you have left before it turns off, during the last five minutes it flashes every five minutes.

~*~ Connections ~*~

At the back there is space for the power lead and aerial (obviously!). It also 1 scart connection

~*~ Other points worth noting ~*~

If the channels arent tuned in correctly (as it's practically impossible to do with the aerial you get with it!) then when you use the channel up and down buttons it will skip the channels that arent tuned. You can still get to those channels by pressing the appropriate number on the remote control but that is the only way.

It has 9 programmable channels

The channels are easy to tune, it will not automatically tune all of them for you, you have to go through each of them and search then fine tune them in which is a hassle if your used to TV's with auto-tune. However, although it is time consuming it is easy and the instruction manual explain it to you in easy to follow step-by-step instructions

~*~ Overall opinion ~*~

It would be good as a spare or second TV but I wouldnt recommend it for use as your main TV.

However, for the price it is good and mine is 5 years old now and still working well

~*~ Price and Availability ~*~

The TV is available in most electronic stores but I bought mine from dixons for £69.75