Toshiba 42X3030D Review

[R41]

The Toshiba 42X3030D specification sheet here and the owner's manual (page 32) both stated the audio to be 2 x 10 watt giving a total output of 20 watt, is there any reason you believe it to be otherwise?

Toshiba.de says otherwise: 2x25 watt, total output 50.
And also says that HDMI ports are 1.3 revision (with Lip Sync) and support 1080p (50Hz, 60Hz) / 24Hz (24p).

http://www.toshiba.de/consumer/content/defaultid1_1_id2_3_id3_165_id4_5.aspx

[PatHou]

The review should be out soon.

I have contacted Toshiba about the audio and 24 fps compatibility, so I will update you guys when I have a response.

Thanks!

All Toshiba's new televisions, including this model, support material that uses the 24p standard, which means you can watch movies from Blu-ray or HD DVD at the rate they were intended. While this isn't the sort of feature many people will have missed in the past, it is good to have. The addition of this mode means films played on one of the high-definition players will look more cinematic and won't be speeded up by 4 per cent, so the audio won't be distorted.

(Toshiba Regza 37X3030D Review)
http://reviews.cnet.co.uk/televisions/0,39030218,49289377,00.htm

[Colin]

Thank you R41 & PatHou.

The audio sounds like a 2 X 25 W to be honest. It was better than the C series.

I don't know how to check the HDMI version on HDTVs. It seems weird that Toshiba has not advertised it's HDMI 1.3 version. Someone's not doing their job in marketing, or maybe our HDMI isn't 1.3.

24fps input is a good thing to have and does future proof in some way. No film mode deinterlacing will be required in the HDTV. I wished that it would output in 24 Hz multiples as well to remove 3:2 judder.

No wide colour gamut with Toshiba 42X3030D, and that's a good thing.

This is Toshiba's weakness really. I don't know why they have hidden their greyscale controls in service menu, like the Sony W . It makes newbie calibration dangerous. We made some changes in the service menu but we will not post them I'm afraid. We are justified in this; just look at the Samsung M86 settings thread. Someone posted service menu changes, and ALL hell broke loose. We will post all our settings outside the service menu, if there's a demand.

[philippe]

according to toshiba german site, the specs mention clearly HDMI 1.3 and 2x25W  !!http://www.toshiba.de/consumer/content/defaultid1_1_id2_0_id3_165_id4_5.aspx

[friedkat]

Hi Colin,

I'd definitely like to see the settings you used post calibration, it seems a bit disingenuous to post all these wonderful charts of the performance you managed to obtain from the unit as experts in the field, when the vast majority of readers haven't a hope in obtaining that performance without the aid of professional equipment, particularly considering how many variables there are to tweak in the 3D colour settings menu alone!

I completely understand your reservations concerning Service Menu settings.  Then again, anyone who has made changes to their computers registry risks buggering up their computer; hopefully readers would approach SM settings with the same care, so wouldn't a disclaimer and the strict warning on not changing anything else but the greyscale settings to the specified values suffice?

[RockySpieler]

Thank you R41 & PatHou.

The audio sounds like a 2 X 25 W to be honest. It was better than the C series.

I don't know how to check the HDMI version on HDTVs. It seems weird that Toshiba has not advertised it's HDMI 1.3 version. Someone's not doing their job in marketing, or maybe our HDMI isn't 1.3.

24fps input is a good thing to have and does future proof in some way. No film mode deinterlacing will be required in the HDTV. I wished that it would output in 24 Hz multiples as well to remove 3:2 judder.

No wide colour gamut with Toshiba 42X3030D, and that's a good thing.

This is Toshiba's weakness really. I don't know why they have hidden their greyscale controls in service menu, like the Sony W . It makes newbie calibration dangerous. We made some changes in the service menu but we will not post them I'm afraid. We are justified in this; just look at the Samsung M86 settings thread. Someone posted service menu changes, and ALL hell broke loose. We will post all our settings outside the service menu, if there's a demand.

Hi I have the 42X3030D, and my AVFORUMS.COM posts have already linked in this forum.

I have an issue with the 42X3030D which I would like your extended review to address. It is the colorspace which can be accepted by the HDMI socket from my PC (DVI>HDMI). The TV seems to only accept Video colorspace (15-240) and crushes the PC colorspace (0-255) which my video card sends.

Described here:-

http://www.avforums.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4824707&postcount=123

I would greatly appreciate if you could test with a HDMI graphics card, as opposed to a DVI card with DVI to HDMI lead, to verify if this solves the colorspace problem.

I am happy to recieve a pm about the service menu, I have tried changing some values (such as RCUT, GCUT, BCUT, BRCT etc) without solving this issue. I also have a 1-2 pixel overscan on the width (PC mode and active scan mode) identified using Ntest (the BDWID option did not resolve this).

I am going to borrow a SpyderPro2 colormeter at the weekend to create a custom gamma ramp, to try and overcome the crushing, although I am unsure if this will only sort out my desktop / photos, with video colours remaining unchanged.

Thanks for a great review.

ps I now get 1080p24 using powerstrip with my SFF PC on-board ati XPRESS200 (but it crushes just like my NV 6800gt)

RockySpieler

RockySpieler

[the face]

...This is Toshiba's weakness really. I don't know why they have hidden their greyscale controls in service menu, like the Sony W . It makes newbie calibration dangerous. We made some changes in the service menu but we will not post them I'm afraid. We are justified in this; just look at the Samsung M86 settings thread. Someone posted service menu changes, and ALL hell broke loose. We will post all our settings outside the service menu, if there's a demand.

Sorry, but itīs not a good thing not to release the service menu options. Everybody should be aware of the risks, a simple disclaimer would do the trick. But I would really love to get the best out of my Toshiba set, but I havenīt the equipment to calibrate everything in such great detail. So please release all your settings, if only per PM. Thank you very much for your great work

[basje13]

So which tv is better on overall performance, the Toshiba 42 X 3030 D, or the Samsung 40 M86 B?
I'm kind of doubting between the two of them, and can't really find if one has a better overall performance.

Thanks in advance,

Basje

[Yungstar 2006]

having always owned Toshiba TV's and wanting to move onto LCD (Sony was going to be my choice), it was nice to see this review, but could i ask....

how does it perform when a Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 are hooked up?

regards

[LEEROY_UK]

having always owned Toshiba TV's and wanting to move onto LCD (Sony was going to be my choice), it was nice to see this review, but could i ask....

how does it perform when a Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 are hooked up?

regards

Very well 

Forza 2

[friedkat]

Freeview

[friedkat]

Xbox 360

[byron_hinson]

Got the 37" version and overall its great apart from the Component video connection - running the 360 at 1080p I find the picture quality really low and the colours are so overblown it looks awful, I can't seem to get any decent look out of it.

[Vowani]

Please discuss the Toshiba 42X3030D review article here. Thank you.

Great review of the 42X3030 guys, keep up the good work!

Questions:

• When connecting a computer to it via VGA, max resolution is 1366x768. If I would have a computer with a video card with an HDMI connector, would I then get 1:1 mapping of 1920x1080?
• The only flatpanel-tv's I know of which support 1920x1080 via VGA are the models in the newest Samsung "LE"-series. Do you know of any other ones?

Thanks,
Vowani.

[LEEROY_UK]

Can we please have the calibration settings there is a number of us that REALY need them.

Pretty please with a cherry on top