A Review of the LG 32" LCD Television.
LG RT-32LZ50 - Being the best LCD TV that LG have on offer in South Africa.
I feel that, having paid close on R20,000.00 on this TV that I should make some attempt to document its shortfalls.
The device itself is nice, 32" is a respectable 82cm with a resolution of 1366x768.
What are the shortfalls? Well, that 768 vertical resolution isn't going to support the 1080i or 1080p modes of the new HDTV formats. With pal being 480, NTSC being 576, and low res HDTV being 720 scan lines, there is no standard movie signal that "fits" naturally into 768 scan lines without an asymetric stretch.
Next, the stretching modes are lacking. The TV is a widescreen with an aspect ratio of 16:9. This does not mean you can watch widescreen DVDs. DVD players play widescreen DVDs by squashing the 16:9 to form a horizontal bar across the middle of the standard NTSC/PAL 4:3 signal. The LG has a number of ways to stretch a 5x4 signal to fit - all of them either crop the side edges or leave the top and bottom with black bars leaving one with a vertically compressed image.
Then there is the strange collection of connection types. The TV takes RF - which supports standard UHF and VHF NTSC and PAL signals. A Composite input (AV), SVideo & Two Component inputs. Oh, and a DVI connector, but I don't recall the DVI being enumerated when sycling though the inputs on the remote. Oh yes - there are no buttons that take you straight to an input, and each input takes about 5 seconds to "take" before you can hit the button to try the next.
Now, all of that can be lived with. The limitations of the system when dealing with my PS/2.
The PS/2 has 4 possible video cables. There is a RF adapter. That gives truely shocking video quality. There is a composite adapter. That gives better video quality. There is a s-video cable. That gives ok video quality. And there is the component video cable. That gives a rock solid picture with nice crisp edges.
There is a choice between two component inputs on the LG: Component 1 supports the full range of progressive and interlaced modes from 480i & 480p to 1080i (not 1080p though). Component 2 supports only two modes: 480i and 576i (i.e. PAL and NTSC), so PS/2 games that support progressive scan (480p) arn't supported.
Now, heres where the problem comes in: Component 1 is bugged. It doesn't handle interlaced signals properly - at least in 480i and 576i it is mixing the wrong odd & even buffers - the result is any moving images "tear" and get horizontally ghosted. It doesnt seem to have visual problems with DVDs however, so perhaps its some problem with the PS/2.
Anyway, that leaves Component 2 as the only viable input choice for the PS/2. And Component 2 shares its audio input with the SVideo. Which is perhaps not a problem if an external amp is being used, but if the TV's speakers are being used then its a case of swapping connectors, or only having the audio for S-Video OR Component 2 connected.
Component 2 on the LG TV conflicts with the SVideo. They both share the same audio input. Component 2 on the LG TV supports only 480i and 576i - not progressive scan versions of these modes. Some - very few - PS/2 games support a progressive scan mode: 480p. However,
I feel that, having paid close on R20,000.00 on this TV that I should make some attempt to document its shortfalls.
The device itself is nice, 32" is a respectable 82cm with a resolution of 1366x768.
What are the shortfalls? Well, that 768 vertical resolution isn't going to support the 1080i or 1080p modes of the new HDTV formats. With pal being 480, NTSC being 576, and low res HDTV being 720 scan lines, there is no standard movie signal that "fits" naturally into 768 scan lines without an asymetric stretch.
Next, the stretching modes are lacking. The TV is a widescreen with an aspect ratio of 16:9. This does not mean you can watch widescreen DVDs. DVD players play widescreen DVDs by squashing the 16:9 to form a horizontal bar across the middle of the standard NTSC/PAL 4:3 signal. The LG has a number of ways to stretch a 5x4 signal to fit - all of them either crop the side edges or leave the top and bottom with black bars leaving one with a vertically compressed image.
Then there is the strange collection of connection types. The TV takes RF - which supports standard UHF and VHF NTSC and PAL signals. A Composite input (AV), SVideo & Two Component inputs. Oh, and a DVI connector, but I don't recall the DVI being enumerated when sycling though the inputs on the remote. Oh yes - there are no buttons that take you straight to an input, and each input takes about 5 seconds to "take" before you can hit the button to try the next.
Now, all of that can be lived with. The limitations of the system when dealing with my PS/2.
The PS/2 has 4 possible video cables. There is a RF adapter. That gives truely shocking video quality. There is a composite adapter. That gives better video quality. There is a s-video cable. That gives ok video quality. And there is the component video cable. That gives a rock solid picture with nice crisp edges.
There is a choice between two component inputs on the LG: Component 1 supports the full range of progressive and interlaced modes from 480i & 480p to 1080i (not 1080p though). Component 2 supports only two modes: 480i and 576i (i.e. PAL and NTSC), so PS/2 games that support progressive scan (480p) arn't supported.
Now, heres where the problem comes in: Component 1 is bugged. It doesn't handle interlaced signals properly - at least in 480i and 576i it is mixing the wrong odd & even buffers - the result is any moving images "tear" and get horizontally ghosted. It doesnt seem to have visual problems with DVDs however, so perhaps its some problem with the PS/2.
Anyway, that leaves Component 2 as the only viable input choice for the PS/2. And Component 2 shares its audio input with the SVideo. Which is perhaps not a problem if an external amp is being used, but if the TV's speakers are being used then its a case of swapping connectors, or only having the audio for S-Video OR Component 2 connected.
Component 2 on the LG TV conflicts with the SVideo. They both share the same audio input. Component 2 on the LG TV supports only 480i and 576i - not progressive scan versions of these modes. Some - very few - PS/2 games support a progressive scan mode: 480p. However,