Sony KDL40W5500 Review

[oleemolee]

Thank you for the excellent review.

One question I've got is, what do you use to test the input lag?

I've used guitar hero 3 which I'm told isn't reliable, trying to obtain rock band 2, but for me the input lag seems minimal if there at all.

I played through a song on guitar hero on hard, in game mode and it felt spot on, tried playing on my mates 32" samsung a week ago and it was totally unplayable without being calibrated.

Oh also like others on here I would really appreciate it if you could share your settings as I'm pretty new to hdtv's and would greatly benefit from it.

Thanks.

edit> sorry forgot to mention I'm using an xbox 360 set to 1080p through hdmi.

[marv1]

Thanks for the great review Vincent, I got mine friday and I think that it is a great upgrade to my old sammy r74. The blacks or inky black and I havn't noticed any input lag as I game a lot on my 360. As other people have mentioned here could you please post the calibrated settings which you used. Thanks

[spl23]

The Sony doesn't support MPEG1 - it supports MPEG2 program stream, HDV and AVCHD formats. The MPEG2 program stream must include both video and audio in MPEG format, which means it isn't compatible with most DVD VOB files. (Which are MPEG2 program stream containers, but the Sony can't play back Dolby Digital or DTS audio.)

[calinz]

Excellent review. We bought the smaller model today - 32W5500. This is our second HDTV but I still don't know how to calibrate one.

Can you please post an explanation on how to calibrate this set to its optimal settings like you did in the review? Is it any similar to the way you calibrate a desktop monitor?

[klawd]

hi vincent

any comment on how the w5500 holds up against the z4500.

[CdC]

Hi there,
This is a great review - I'm waiting to get the 46inch version.
There wasn't much metioned about the DLNA capbilities.  Do you know which video formats are supported? And how reliably it works?
Thanks in advance.

Colin

[BARSi]

just got this tv today used vincent's settings on my samsung tv last years would really love the calibrated settings he used for this beast.

[HAMBALL]

Hi Vincent,

I have just taken delivery of the 32" & 40" W5500 versions but I am a complete Newbie - in both cases I will just be feeding them both SkyHD (more StandDef than HD) and an xBox360 each via HDMI - could you possibly post\mail your ideal calabration settings as I simply have no idea whats best in when I either watching Sky (HD&SD) or using the xBox (Gaming\DVD\Media streaming DivX & Xvid).

One of frriends suggested I purchase a copy of "Digital Video Essentials [DVD]" (as I do not have a Blu-ray player) to help with calibrating the sets - but this was released in 2003??

Many many thanks

[Greg]

Hi All,

Maybe the members of this forum can help me out with the following?

We had been debating buying an LCD TV for ages, and we always referred to this site for the reviews.
So, just before Christmas we were looking at the KDL40W4000 (when it was at £680), but later went up to £799 again and so we decided to wait for something else or a better deal again.

So when we saw Sony had launched a new TV that seemed to do it all for less than £1000, we finally decided to buy the KDL40W5500 (after 18 months of debating whether to get an LCD TV).  It was delivered yesterday and these are my initial remarks:
* watching standard Freeview TV was actually better than I expected, but there seems to be a big difference in quality of image depending on the channel and the production.  BBC seems to systematically be better.
* watching recorded Freeview+ over Scart is obviously not great, but I expected this.
* Bluray movies (using a BDPS 350) blew me away actually ... now this is all new to me, but I found the level of detail in "The Happening" quite amazing.

BUT, when switching sources and in cases where the screen would go Grey rather than Black I noticed some serious, what I think is, backlight bleed in the corners of the screen.  I had read about this being mentioned on a What HiFi review and they seemed to be making a big deal out of this, but then again the review is certainly not as "in-depth" as the reviews on HDTVTest.
On HDTVTest, the backlight bleed is indeed mentioned (linked to the inferior 8bit CCFL backlight panels) and in the conclusion it says "Mild clouding and LCD backlight bleed (negligible once calibrated)"

So, I have a few questions about this bleed:
1) What calibration settings might reduce this?
2) Some members on this forum have mentioned not seeing any bleed and I am now wondering if the TVs are consistent?
3) Would a KDL40W4000 at £750 offer better value for money?

I am really thorn now between keeping this TV, with the bleed issue, or returning it and picking up an "older" 40W4000 that costs 25% less?

What do the members of this forum think?
Does the Bravia3 engine and other Pros of the new W5500 outweigh this bleed issue (due to the downgraded panel)?

Many thanks in advance for your help,
Kind regards

Greg

[Damon]

I've purchased a Sony KDL40W5710 from Sony which is a prerelease version of the KDL40W5500 and essentially the same set.  I thought I'd put my findings up to assist anyone thinking about purchasing a 5500 or 5710.  Overall I would agree with the review by HDTVtest.  I had been waiting since Christmas to get a 4500, so I was happy to be able to pick up the new model this weekend.

I've tested all aspects of the TV myself, including the DNLA features.  The TV works well with my Freecom FSG NAS box, using Twonky media as a server.  I was able to stream my DVDs, pictures and music without any problems.  The Sony is connected using a CAT6 cable into the network so gets data as fast as the NAS can stream it.  I'm very happy with this as it's now a real way to access my content for the family without using seperate boxes such as a PS3 etc.  It is worth noting that the file formats are fairly limited to mainstrem stuff so DIVX etc doesn't work but this itsn't a problem for me.

In terms of picture quality, my set only demonstrates the backlight non uniformity when I'm using the slideshow mode with bright pictures.  On a portrait image of a snow scene with black borders at the sides you can see the black as being slightly lighter in the corners.  For me this is very slight and isn't something that I'm worried about.  I've also yet to calibrate the set so it could resolve this very minor issue.  On other sources, Blue Ray, SD etc I can't fault the picture quality it's excellent.

If you are thinking of buying one, I would recommend it.

[Greg]

Hi All,

Just came across an interesting post "8 bit panel vs 10 bit panel" on http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=967859
The reply from jsm22 makes this entire debate a non-issue.  I was a little worried about 8bit panels being inferior and that triggered some doubts as to my purchase... "should I have bought an older W model that uses a 10 bit panel?".
My mind is now made up ... keeping the W5500!

Cheers

Greg

[BARSi]

tried all i can to calibrate the tv the blacks seem a little too bright but i dont seem to be able to do anything about that. would still really like vincent's settings to see if they do the trick. so please can we have them

[justaview]

Hello Vincent,

It was an excellent review.

Do you have any plan to test the 37W5500 too? Just because it has a different panel than the 40" and therefore different parameters, may be less bleeding and so on...

There are a lot of people out there who would be very pleased to see such a test.

Best wishes
Justaview

[BARSi]

did not realise the 37w5500 has a different panel i have the 32w5500 for my bedroom and i know that their is no blacklight bleeding issue what so ever with this one. however i do find the theatre/cinema mode to be rather too greenish with flesh tones and too red with white text. which is why i would like the settings vincent had come to to see if this helps.

[justaview]

did not realise the 37w5500 has a different panel i have the 32w5500 for my bedroom and i know that their is no blacklight bleeding issue what so ever with this one. however i do find the theatre/cinema mode to be rather too greenish with flesh tones and too red with white text. which is why i would like the settings vincent had come to to see if this helps.

S-LCD does not make any 37" Full HD panel. AUO does.
The 37" has 50000:1 contrast ratio, but the 40W5000 has 100000:1.