Excellent budget-minded HD widescreen

First, a little background on my situation. I'm a budget-minded student, who was looking for the most bang for my buck when it came to buying my first TV. Since I am quite technically-inclined, I really wanted to step up to a HDTV-ready model, but knew the $1200 (Canadian) starting prices were far out of my range. Searching locally, I found the best deal for my budget to be a Sony Wega 27" KV27FV310 flatscreen with a matching stand for $600. After doing some research, I walked into my local store ready to purchase it, until I took a quick look at other models just to make sure there was nothing better. And this was when I stumbled upon this Toshiba 26" Widescreen model.

Reading on the Toshiba website, this 26" model has just been introduced in August 2004, which is why I only could find 2 local stores who carried it. I quickly noticed that not only did it have the same features as the 30" model which retailed for $1299, but when I compared it to the Sony, it had the same features I loved(2-Component In, 2-S Video, Scanning Velocity Modulation, BBE & WOW audio), PLUS was a HD Widescreen model for only $40 more.

High praise for Toshiba for making a model that fits into the budget HDTV concept, without making a "budget" TV with no features and poor quality. Needless to say, after doing a quick bit of research, I quickly decided on and picked up the Toshiba.

TV quality is teriffic. Beautiful color, great picture. I love the design of the set, sound is good, but I have mostly used my Yamaha amp and 5.1 setup, so I'm not planning to use it very much anyways. At first I wasn't a big fan of the remote, but after using it a little bit, I have found that with all the tweaking I do to the picture, my main menu buttons are easy and intuitive for the most part.

After owning this set for just a short time so far, I have only two gripes. First of all, as with probably any new TV with full color control, having the correct settings are optimal to having a good picture. Everybody has their own preference, and since there are so many combinations of settings, sometimes you have to tweak quite a bit to get something to look good. I was playing NCAA 2005 on my PS2 just after getting the set, and my in-game footage looked terrible, almost jaggy and gross like it was an original PS game. Close-ups were phenomenal, but any action looked brutal. Then I changed my color mode pre-set from "Sports" to "Movie", which I thought would suck, but it completely reversed how the game looked. Just by darkening the picture the little bit that the pre-set did, it solved most of what my problems were. In game text and movement didn't contrast as terribly against the field/background, and it looked much richer and fuller in color. Now, I just can't stop watching the gameplay, even as I'm typing this review, it's addicting to watch it's so good! But, with so many types of games, DVD's, and cable/satellite/HDTV, I'm expecting to do a lot more tweaking yet.

My second gripe is mostly just because of the ever-expanding nature of the TV world. Back in my earlier years, just throwing the cable hookup from the VCR into the TV worked fine. TV's aren't plug-and-play anymore. Between all of the TV settings, the DVD player, the PS2, and the home theatre receiver, a lot of calibration is required to optimize the output. I'm still having issues getting certain DVD's to output properly, and I'm trying to learn as much as I can about aspect ratios, progressive scanning and 1080i. I can definitely say that for others who may not enjoy learning about new technology, and just want to buy a TV and watch it, they may not have the same positive experience as I have had so far.

Overall, even though HD prices are falling quicker all the time, nothing I have seen can come close to this Toshiba model in terms of value and bang for the buck. The fact that I can get basically all the same features as Sony's top Wega 27" model, and in exchange for a possible small loss in picture tube quality, gain a Widescreen HDTV model that will allow me to take advantage of all of the newest technology, speaks volumes about Toshiba's commitment to bringing new and expanding technology to the most consumers possible.