Philips 42PF5521D

...securely in place. The Philips screen comes with a plastic stand. I was quite nervous at first when setting this up, as I use the stand rather than wall mounting, and was worried about the amount of weight and pressure being placed onto a plastic base ( although the holding lets are metal ) im sure though that Philips have had the stand engineered to hold the screen, which it does, but think that they penny pinched on using plastic rather than a ...
...- however on this Philips screen, the speakers are actually really decent. They dont sound 'tinny' like most plasmas do, it really does have some bass that kicks from it. This showed me that they really did think of most things when designing this screen, not everyone has a surround sound set up that they would hook the screen to, so you would need to have decent speakers so that the sound doesnt let it down - which I really dont think it does.
more

Well, my old plasma ( well 10 months old ) I decided I wanted to change.

I previously had a 42" plasma, but unfortunately I bought it at the time that HD (High Definition) was still 'new', and my old screen wasnt HD Capable/Compatible. As I now have Sky HD - I decided to have the HD in its full entirity, then I needed to upgrade the screen, to be able to display the HD pictures.

I was browsing online for a HD Plasma, and had a budget of around £1,500. I then decided to check out Argos - as this is where I purchased my previous 42" plasma, which I have been happy with.

As I was looking online, I found this model, and was quite impressed with the features and the resolution details of the display, it was also with £200 off, and was reduced to £1,299

After looking into the screen information further ( which you really need to do if you are buying a plasma, check the resolution and also brightness details - basically the higher the better for both )

I decided to order the screen from Argos ( and found a £50 voucher which I also used against the purchase which was quite good for a further saving ). I was advised they could deliver in 2 days, which I thought was pretty quick.

The delivery guy came, and with a drivers mate, unloaded the huge box which is actually on a pallette. They brought it into the house, and I decided to leave it boxed, and where it was while I went to work. This is quite a good idea with plasmas, as it actually gives the screen some time to settle down, rather than just plugging it in and getting it going straight away, remember that Plasma TV's actually have a gas inside the screen - which is why its a good idea to let it settle down first.

I couldnt wait to get home from work, and play with the new toy.

The box that it comes in is designed really well, undoing the top flaps of the box, and then removing the plastic 'handles' at the sides of the box, allows you to then literally 'slide' the top of the box off, leaving the bottom of the tv still in a seperate part of the box, and with protective corner polyfoam cushions, and also still on top of the pallette. This is quite good as its easier to get it out of the box, and if you are anything like me - you tend to rush because your excited :-)

The tabletop stand is also provided with this screen, in case you dont want to wall mount it. However, I was disappointed with the stand. On my other plasma it was a very solid metal stand, which you slid the screen onto, and then used a screwdriver to turn the securing screws, which held it securely in place. The Philips screen comes with a plastic stand. I was quite nervous at first when setting this up, as I use the stand rather than wall mounting, and was worried about the amount of weight and pressure being placed onto a plastic base ( although the holding lets are metal ) im sure though that Philips have had the stand engineered to hold the screen, which it does, but think that they penny pinched on using plastic rather than a quality metal stand which would of been much better I think.

The screen itself is quite heavy, coming in at 19.2kg. However, please remember that most plasmas are heavy, thats just the nature of the beast.

Once the screen is put onto the stand, you have retaining screws to keep the screen in place, which is easy enough to do. One thing I do like about the base stand, is that it has a channel on the bottom, that all your cables run through, so you dont see them sticking out and running everywhere, its very clean and tidy, and the cables are then invisible, which I like. In this day and age, we always seem to have cables / wires running everywhere, and I personally even though being a gadget freak, absolutely hate, and think it looks really 'untidy'

I powered the screen on with the remote control, which I think is a bit of a weird design, with the buttons laid out quite badly. Thats just a personal thing for me, but the remote has been designed so that it is rather long and thin, and I think it would be better as a shorter remote, but wider.

The screen initially goes into 'Setup' mode, where you have to select your language, country etc. It then starts to search for any channels which it will then store into memory. After setting the language and country, I skipped the auto scan feature, as using Sky HD I dont use an Analogue aeriel ( one thing to mention at this point, is that it does have a Freeview receiver built into the TV, so if you connected an aeriel to it - and you have a Freeview enabled TV aeriel, then it would actually pick up all the freeview channels for you - which I think is good for people that either dont have sky, or currently use freeview - saves having another 'box' out on display as its all built into the TV ) - I connected my Sky HD box to the TV screen using a HDMi cable ( which I received with my Sky HD box, and didnt receive any with the TV, which I thought was a little disappointing.

The display on the screen was literally crystal clear - and then I noticed that I had it on Sky One, which isnt being broadcasted in HD at the moment. I changed the channel over to one of the Sky Movies HD channels, and I really couldnt believe the difference. I am really, really impressed. The image displayed on the screen, is so much better than your usual compressed images that we are forced to receive. The picture quality of the screen itself is very high, and I couldnt see signs of any shadowing or 'artifacts' being left as a result of any delay.

So far, so good, I really cant fault the picture quality on this screen at all, after having it for about 2 weeks now, and watching literally dozens of HD Films, and normal Sky TV. Its excellent.

Also - one thing to mention as a plus for this screen is the speakers. If you read my review on my Grundig 42" plasma, you can see that the sound quality / speakers were a bit of a moan for me ( although it doesnt really matter as its all connected a cinema system in my home, using a seperate home cinema system with external speakers ) - however on this Philips screen, the speakers are actually really decent. They dont sound 'tinny' like most plasmas do, it really does have some bass that kicks from it. This showed me that they really did think of most things when designing this screen, not everyone has a surround sound set up that they would hook the screen to, so you would need to have decent speakers so that the sound doesnt let it down - which I really dont think it does.

The screen ( same as my old one ) can also be used as a 'monitor' so that you can hook your PC up to it if you want. However I was a little disappointed with Philips with this. The signal from your PC graphics can only be received on the TV screen - through a HDMi slot ( the TV has 2 ) however, they do not supply a cable to do this. I managed to pick one up on eBay for around £10 delivered, which isnt bad ( and you will need a Male DVI - Male HDMI lead ) I thought that they could of supplied one with the screen, seeing as usually it retails for £1,500.00 - its not exactly cheap.

As a comparison, this is the difference between my old/new screens.

Grundig 42"
Contrast 3000:1
Brightness 1000cd/m2

Phillips 42" HD
Contrast 10000:1
Brightness 1400cd/m2

As you can see the contrast ratio on the new screen, is much greatly improved, and this is visable even when not watching a HD source, as the image being displayed on the screen is much clearer, without the image looking 'pixalated' or distorted in any way.

However, on a summary, and a wrap up of my review, I am really, really impressed with it. I know I have mentioned some 'disadvantages' but in reality, remember what these are. They are not disadvantages, or disappointments with the picture quality, and this is the main point for this item. It is a HD Plasma tv, so the picture / image is what you are paying for / what you want to be excellent, and I really cant fault it. I think that they could of improved the whole 'package' with regards to slightly better design on the remote control, and also a more 'sterdy' feeling stand, but it all still functions, and is excellent.

I am really pleased with it - and on a plus side now, I also have my old 42" Grundig in the bedroom !!!!

If you are looking for a new TV, especially wanting a HD Plasma, then I would definately recommed you look at this one.

 

...less