Sony Bravia KDL-40X2000 high definition LCD television - REVIEW

Adam Turner
Thursday, 16 August 2007 05:21

Your IT - Entertainment

High definition television finally hit its stride in Australia this year, with Sony aiming for a slice of the action with its Bravia X Series.

The Bravia KDL-40X2000 is 40 inch, widescreen 1920x1080p LCD television described as "Full-on Full HD resolution", so you don't confuse it with Sony's plain old ordinary "HD" televisions with can't actually display HD signals in their full glory. The KDL-40X2000 has onboard analogue and HD digital tuners, plus two HDMI inputs for connecting to HD sources such as Blu-ray and HD-DVD players. Its built-in stereo speakers, 11 watts each, offer virtual surround sound but are accompanied by a optical digital audio output for running real surround sound from digital TV tuner to your amplifier.

The television's well-designed menus are easy to navigate using the somewhat chunky remote control, which has a sensible layout and is designed to control all your components including a DVD/HDD recorder. It even features separate "stop" and "stop record" buttons, the latter hidden under a sliding panel so you don't press it accidentally. Advanced features include picture-in-picture, picture-by-picture, PAL/NTSC compatibility and an onscreen details of the current program on digital channels.

The inclusion of analogue and digital tuners is very handy if you have digital reception problems at a crucial moment. Bad analogue reception means a fuzzy picture, but bad digital reception means the audio drops out and the picture can freeze up. Given a choice we'd take bad analogue - especially when watching sport.

The KDL-40X2000 has an attractive, clean look with controls hidden on the right side of the display. It is stand or wall-mountable but disappointingly the stand doesn't swivel, yet thankfully the rear HDMI, component, composite, s-video and VGA inputs are still easily accessible. There are also component, composite and s-video inputs down one side of the television, along with a headphones jack, but nothing fancy like a memory card reader.

Forty inches is a good size television for those with a medium-sized budget or lounge room - it's big enough to show the detail of high definition, with 1080i HD broadcasts looking razor sharp along with 1080p from a Samsung BD-P1000 Blu-ray player and a Mediagate MG350-HD video player. Colours were rich and vivid, with good detail in the shadows. Each input can be adjusted separately, so you an get all your components looking their best.

Unfortunately 40 inches is also big enough to draw attention to the imperfections in non-HD signals. The Bravia's onboard video processing did a far better job of displaying standard definition content then the Philips Cineos 37PF9731/69 37 inch LCD we had sitting next to it. When it comes to SD clarity, the KDL-40X2000 is one of the better LCD TVs we've seen but it's still not perfect. Pixelation and motion blur, such as from rapidly moving credits, was less prevalent on the Sony but it was still there.

The lower the response time, supposedly the less motion blur - but the fact the 8ms Sony has noticeably less blur than the 3ms Philips proves that you can't judge a display just on the numbers. Sport in standard definition looked disappointing on the Sony to the discerning viewer, but switching to the high-def AFL broadcasts was a siginificant improvement.

In this price range, the KDL-40X2000 is about as good as it gets in LCD - but it's still hard to get excited about it after seeing what a high end plasma can do. You could do a lot worse than this Bravia, especially considering it has a HD tuner. Still if we're going to spend five grand on a television, content like sport has to look fantastic and that's not the case with any LCD television yet.

AT A GLANCE: Sony Bravia KDL-40X2000 high definition LCD television

PRICE $AU4999

Pros - 1080p, HD tuner, HDMI

Cons - SD can be fuzzy

CONTACT Sony www.sony.com.au