Can Samsung Do No Wrong? (Samsung LE-19B450)

Member Name: Great_reviewer07

Product:	Samsung LE-19B450
Date:	16/10/09 (438 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Crisp clear picture, perfect sound quality, easy installation

Disadvantages: May no longer be widely available

A new TV is always a big purchase, whether it's a 50" for your living room or a more modest one for your bedroom, you want to know that you're making the right purchase because most people keep their TV's for a good few years these days so you want to know that you're investing your hard earned cash in a good one. Well this is what I think anyway therefore when I was looking around for a new TV for my bedroom I wanted to shop around for the best bargain possible. My old bedroom TV was a thick Sony one with a built in video player that I barely watched however with the impending switchover happening I knew that I needed to modernise my old faithful to an up to date LCD screen I could be proud of.

*** Availability ***

After looking around for many weeks, both online and in high street stores I came across this Samsung 19" LCD screen and was instantly taken with it. I've had good experiences with Samsung in the past, I find them to have brilliant customer services and after owning numerous Samsung mobile phones in the past as well as at the present I knew that they were a make I could trust. I first came across it in Comet where it was being marketed at £350, as I know that Comet tend to be quite an expensive shop I decided to look around and see if I could get a better deal and it turns out I could; Argos were selling the exact same TV for £277 so without further ado I ordered it online before going to Argos to collect it.

It seems that this TV has been on the market since July 2006 however it still looks fresh and modern, although I paid £277 at the time, it now seems to be available from Amazon for £215 however it doesn't seem to be available from Argos anymore so it may not be in production anymore. It's definitely a good idea to shop around though. A 22" set was also available at the time but I found the price not to reflect the 3 inches in size difference therefore went for the 19inch.

*** Setting Up ***

Setting up couldn't be simpler, I had planned to wait for either my Dad or my boyfriend to come and set it up for me because when it comes to electrics I'm a total girl however I was so eager I decided to give it a go myself and even a tech virgin like me managed to have it set up in a matter of 10 minutes. When you remove it from the slim line box you'll find the TV covered in see through plastic which is easily removed not like some products that seem to have the plastic super glued on! On the bottom of the TV you have a stand which needs to be pulled down so it lays parallel to the TV enabling it to stand up if you don't want to pin it to the wall (which I didn't). The stand did need to be pulled into place using a little force and at first I was reluctant to do this in fear of breaking it but it seems to be quite a sturdy piece of technology. The TV includes two scart leads so if you're planning on using this for gaming you'll have to unplug your DVD player and plug in your games console before playing but this wont take long.

Of course the TV, like any TV comes with a user manual which should tell you everything you need to know, in the first few pages you'll find the set up guide which will tell you where everything goes (a bit like sex education for tech nerds!). Everything in the set up guide is extremely easy to follow and I managed to have the TV set up in minimal time. Another great thing about this TV is that it's not at all heavy to carry, of course being only a 19" I wasn't expecting it to be very heavy but I was still a little surprised at just how light it was, I was able to carry it for 10 minutes to the car with ease. It's also light enough to sit comfortably on top of my DVD player.

So you've got everything plugged in the right places (hopefully), now you'll need to turn it on. When you've plugged it into the socket a red standby light will immediately appear on the bottom right of the set and to turn it on you either press the standby icon directly below the red light or you can use the remote control which of course comes as standard with the TV. You will then be required to enter all the usual information (date, time etc) which wont take long at all and then the tuning will automatically start. This TV has built in Freeview therefore it's inevitably going to take a little longer to tune than a TV with only channels 1 to 4 embedded in them however tuning only takes around 5 minutes and after this you're ready to go. It really is that simple.

Of course with the digital switchover which has already happened in my area but I believe is yet to happen in some areas you will need to retune your TV. When the switchover happened in my area I ended up being without a bedroom TV to watch for about 6 weeks, this was no fault of Samsungs but because I didn't know how to retune. I followed the instructions in the user guide to the letter but these failed to work for me so in the end I just gave up. Around 6 weeks later I found the urge to try again and ended up ringing the Freeview helpline who then referred me to Samsung; Samsung talked me through the process and it was sorted in 5 minutes, I just wish I'd have done it sooner. It turned out to be no fault of the TV's but it was just a little option that I should have clicked on instead of the one I was trying.

*** Picture Clarity ***

So now your TV is set up you're going to want to sit back and admire your crystal clear picture and thankfully you'll be able to do just that. The picture on this TV is superb, my signal is about 3 quarters of the way up the bar meaning it isn't perfect but even without a perfect signal I still manage to get a flawless and impeccable picture. Naturally the TV is HD ready so this may give it a little helping hand but for anyone who still hasn't purchased an HD ready TV I would highly recommend doing so as the benefits are clear for everyone to see. All the colours are very detailed and you can clearly see everything that is going on in the picture.

There are numerous options for altering the picture; you can alter the backlight, zoom, contrast, colour and sharpness which are all useful options but really the only thing you need to worry about is the picture alignment which you will be prompted to do when first setting up the TV. As long as everything is in line and you can see the whole screen then you should be fine as when the TV is first turned on the options are already set to what suits most homes.

*** Sound Quality ***

The sound quality, much like the picture is fantastic and I haven't had one single problem with the quality of the sound from this set. In the specification (which is available on the Amazon website) I'm told that this TV has SRS TruSurround sound effect and a Nicam stereo. I must admit that I'm not too sure what the first spec means but whatever it is it's great as the sound is crisp and clear at all times.

*** Freeview ***

Like most TV's these days, this set comes with built in Freeview. Considering this is quickly becoming the norm with TV's it's not exactly a USP for this set but I was very pleased with what I got. I had never had Freeview before, we have SkyHD on our main TV situated in the living room therefore I had become accustomed to the layout that Sky uses and thought it would take me a while to get to grips with Freeview. Fortunately Freeview is extremely easy to operate and works much in the same way as Sky does, just without the ability to record, pause, rewind or fast forward. Although I don't use the TV much, when I do it's nice to have an array of different channels to choose from instead of just the usual BBC1, BBC2, ITV1 and Channel4.

*** Remote Control ***

The remote control was strangely one of the things I was concerned about upon purchasing this TV. For some reason I was expecting to have to use two different controls for the set; one for Freeview and one for everything else. Luckily everything is incorporated onto one, smartly laid out control pad. The control isn't too flimsy and buttons are easily pressed with little effort. One of the most ingenious but something of a novelty inclusion with the control is the light button. This is a yellow button situated near the top of the control and when pressed it will light up the first few rows of buttons and also glows in the dark when not pressed. My only bugbear concerning the control is when I'm searching the Freeview TV guide the up and down buttons can sometimes stick and occasionally it takes a few seconds for the up and down buttons to be registered and move accordingly. Other than that this is an ideal remote control.

*** Overall ***

To summarise, this is a fantastic TV; from the light and little tune played when you turn it on, to the crisp clear picture, this TV does everything that you'd want it to and for a very reasonable price. Another one of my favourite features are the buttons on the side of the TV, instead of having to push them in like you'd expect from most technical devices, these buttons work with a single touch. Not something that will sell the TV on it's own but still a brilliant modern little aspect. This is perfect for a bedroom TV.

~ If you're having problems with retuning, call the Samsung helpline on 0845 7267864 ~

Summary: A superb 19" HD ready TV with built in Freeview.

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