Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 68
 A beautiful television -after firmware update May 12, 2010
Daniel Belisle (Winnipeg, Manitoba)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I purchased this tv for 825.00$ on display and I cannot find a single flaw with this tv after I received the firmware update through Sony.
For an LCD television, the blacks are incredible and blu-rays looked unbelievable!
I use my PS3 for games as well and with the GameMode On, there is no lag when playing games.
You always pay a little more for Sony products but it is well worth it! I compared this television to many other models like Toshiba, Samsung and Panasonic and I found the Sony to be the best out there.
 Can We Just Go Back to the Trinitron? April 28, 2010
James Schumaker (San Clemente, California USA)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
In the past, I have always had good luck with Sony TV's, and during the 1990's I had a Sony 32" Trinitron that provided a picture and sound that was superb in every respect, the state of the art for the time. It was with some disappointment, therefore, that I found that the TV industry's venture into the Brave New World of HD has saddled an entire generation of TV viewers with substandard sets that are in many respects far worse than the non-HD sets they have replaced. The Sony Bravia series is, unfortunately, no exception to this rule.
The Sony Bravia KDL-40V5100 is best when viewing live sports events. If you like to watch golf, basketball and football, and little else, this is the TV for you. Unfortunately, the Bravia does not do as well in other situations. Here are some of the flaws I have noticed:
(1) Picture problems. The only settings that produce an acceptable picture are in the Vivid range. Turning off the automatic contrast enhancer helps, but the picture quality in most cases is still unacceptable. At its best, the picture is sharp and crisp, giving great definition, but even on many HD channels there is considerable degradation of picture quality, with feathering and blurring quite noticeable.
The less said about non-HD channels the better. The picture performance in non-HD is abysmal, with dark scenes turning black and light scenes whiting out.
Similarly, no matter what the player, non-HD DVDs upconvert poorly. Using an ordinary non-HD TV to play DVDs is a far better choice, and an important one if, like me, you have a large collection of these now obsolete items.
Moreover, for anyone who has a multi-system non-HD TV set (i.e., one that can play PAL and SECAM in addition to the inferior NTSC format used in the USA), the picture quality for DVDs is so much better than on the Sony Bravia that there is really no comparison.
In addition, of course, the Sony Bravia series has significant fading problems when viewed from the side, and it is grossly inferior in this respect to Plasma and normal non-HD TV sets.
(2) Screen. The high gloss screen and plastic borders are totally unsuited to TV viewing. A Matte screen and non-glare borders would provide far more comfortable viewing in all but a darkened theater situation. Any light source reflects off the screen, and is worse than for a regular non-HD TV. In this respect, Plasma TVs are vastly superior.
(3) Sound. The sound is OK most of the time, but there are periodic and inexplicable dropouts, as well as hissing and popping, problems that are not helped by changing the connections to HDMI. There is something fundamentally wrong with the sound system on the Sony 40V5100, and Sony better fix it fast if they don't want a class-action lawsuit. Sound levels also vary markedly from channel to channel for reasons that are not immediately apparent.
(4) Controls. The remote control is awkward to operate, with switching from TV to DVD to PC taking up to 15 seconds. Similarly, it takes about 15 seconds for the TV to turn on, once you have pressed the "on" button for a sufficiently long time to persuade the little green "power on" light to finally put in an appearance. When changing channels, the lengthy handshake procedure results in a two-second delay from HD to HD, and five seconds from HD to non-HD, and often a green screen before the next channel displays. Once again, why am I supposed to view this as an improvement over a regular non-HD TV, where channel changing is virtually instantaneous?
In sum, the Sony Bravia series is a big disappointment. Its one indisputable advantage is that, in comparison to Plasmas and non-HD TVs, it is very light, so when the time comes to throw it away, it won't present a heavy lifting problem. I still have a couple of serviceable Sony WEGA non-HD TV's. They aren't as good as the old Trinitrons from the 1990's, but at least they are tolerable. I'm going to see how long I can keep them going. The Sony Bravia is going too, right out the door.
I have a request for anyone reading this review: please let me know when someone finally produces a decent HDTV. As far as I can tell, no one has accomplished this feat quite yet.
The best LCD TV ever April 6, 2010
Jesus Rodriguez (Caracas, DC Venezuela)
It is impresive as soon as you plugin and watch TV on it, it is outstanding, since the picture quality is not compared to my 720p former Sharp LCD screen... I have PS3 and a Sony HT, and they interact really good, as well as the remote controls, they TV's work with the PS3.
The games with the Motion Flow, as well as Bluray movies are out of this world, the movies look so good that it seems that you are watching through a window than a TV screen. It looks so good that you can see special effects flaws and details not seen on my other TV.
The PS3 resolution changed like 200% better with the sony, and the motion flow helps a lot when changing scenes on a fast action game.
I updated the firmware connecting it to my router at home, it was simple, and the internet features as the gadgets, YOUTUBE, are ratter awesome, it is a huge leap on tv functionalities not present on the past.
I have windows 7 on my computer and I have no problem on viewing my pictures from my tv! as well as listening to the music and watching video files as well!
I did alter some of the custom settings on the screen and the image is nothing compared as any other TV screens on the market.
Sony Bravia V-Series March 22, 2010
R. Palmer (East TN)
I have had this TV for about 5 weeks and it was easy to set up and the color after some minor adjustments is great. I have owned several Sony TV's and they have all been great. This one rates a 5 star rating also.
 issues with the volume March 19, 2010
Alan (California,USA)
I just recently purchase this television and was wondering if anyone has the same problems with the volume? I have a ps3 and am using the HDMI cbl. I was watching a movie and noticed that the volume would go up and low and back up in some scences for the entire movie.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 68
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