DLP! Sound system can make you forget to turn on Home theatre system. Inputs galore.

No fire wire input or memory card input

I matched this set against the Sony LCD. After weeding out other technologies, these were the 2 left standing. After reading up, shopping and visiting helpful forums like this, I went with the Samsung. Every salesman favored it. And the picture quality was considerably better. DVD movies look awesome. I now have HD service through my cable company. Although it's only 7 channels, it's jaw-dropping! I'm also glad they changed the remote. The one I tried at Best buy had a joystick to control functions and was a pain to set up. Colors on the screen were vibrant and bright! I actually had to tone them down a bit. Although I just upgraded from a 60" Mitsubishi projection, I am truly overwhelmed by what this set has to offer. Considering other technologies and their prices, I found this to be a great buy. Being an avid game player, this baby is the one to get. No burn in!

Similar Products Used:

Sony LCD Projection, Mitsubishi 60'

Compact and light weight cabinet, bright and clear picture, excellent PC monitor, beautiful HDTV performance.

Low contrast ratio does not display detail in nighttime scenes. Greenish cast when displaying sources input through component video.

I actually purchased the older model, the HLM-5065W and spent more than 12 hours most days during the two weeks I had it, checking it out thoughly. I returned it not because I didn't like it (and it was a hard decision, considering the closeout price and excellent maintenance contract), but as a very expensive TV, it lacked convenient features found on even lesser TV. Samsung will continue to improve, and many other manufacturers will also have better and cheaper sets out over the next 12 months and I don't mind waiting. For example, the lack of discrete codes for menu items and the ability to remember screen aspect settings for each input are already fixed in the 2003 HLN models. The HLM-5065 works as advertised, the picture being very sharp and clear, and the colors quite true through DVI and the PC inputs. It really shows its stuff with a PC and certain HDTV programming, but is also good with DVDs and SD digital TV. The display of regular cable channels varies with the quality of the channel, but nothing really annoying. I do not have satellite and did not test it with sat TV. This is one of the few TVs I've found where the manufacturer gives instructions for connection to a PC, and for good reasons. The Windows desktop and anything displayed on it, including DVDs played on the PC, are just stunningly beautiful. Using a program called Powerstrip, the PCs output from an ATI card was set at 1280x720 where it is mapped pixel-to-pixel to the Samsung's screen. And with DLP, there is no chance of screen burn-in. I, like others reporting on the www.avsforum.com, found that the DVI and VGA inputs give the sharpest image. I connected the PC to both with about the same results. The VGA (RGB or PC) input was also used to connect an old RCA DTC-100 HDTV and a Zenith HDV-420 receiver with outstanding results. However, using the component video inputs with the Zenith HDV-420 receiver and Pioneer DV-365/563 DVD players, the picture takes on a greenish cast. I had seen many Samsungs in stores with the greenish picture, and were probably connected to the CVI jacks. The PC, DVI and antenna inputs do not have this "green push" problem. Avsforum.com members have been successful in removing the green push through the service menu. Likewise, a lot of other items can be tweaked. A problem connected to single panel DLP sets is that under rather rare circumstances, one can see separation of white light into rainbow colors. This occurs when small white images are displayed against a black background, like when movie credits roll on a black screen. When one shift the eyes away or if the credits roll fast, the white letters are seen in their rainbow colors for a few milliseconds. This does not occur when watching brightly lighted scenes. Other factors with the current implementation of DLP are limited contrast and inability to display black in dark rooms. I used the Digital Video Essentials DVD to check the calibration of the TV and found that the contrast range (actually the ratio) can barely show all the test materials. Here, the CVI and s-video inputs have better contrast than DVI and PC inputs. The latter two really do not have the range to display all the test patterns on the DVE DVD. Laying test patterns aside, this TV display daytime scenes like sports and nature scenes as good as or better than any consumer product I've seen in local stores. Another complaint, internal reflections, many avsforum.com members have logged was not seen in the set I had. These are also seen under very rare conditions, such as when a bright light is displayed on the upper left of an otherwise dark screen. Another outstanding feature of the Samsung HLM/HLN DLP sets is that they are the only projection TV worthy of the name "tabletop." Where other manufacturers of LCD, LCoS and DLP projection TVs put the speakers on each side of the screen, Samsung puts then underneath the screen. The result is a very compact cabinet that will allow a 42, 46 or a 50-inch Samsung to fit many nooks designed for 36-inch tube TVs. Would I buy another one? You bet. I'm just waiting another year for a Samsung or another make with the right feature set and price.

Similar Products Used:

None, but I've spent a lot of time in stores comparing plasmas, direct LCDs, and projection CRTs, LCDs and LCoS tvs.