Zenith 32" TV With 2-Tuner PIP (C32A26)

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Value
Review: I just bought one of these to replace my 8-year-old Zenith 27" and I'm very happy with it. I was originally considering a JVC, but it was $100 more and the picture was only _slightly_ better. This Zenith has a 2-line comb filter while the JVC has a 3-line filter (_any_ comb filter is way better than a TV with none -- the filter makes the pixels of the TV less noticeable). But this unit has 2-tuner picuture-in-picture (PIP). I've never had a TV with PIP and it's something I wanted. The picture quality on this TV is excellent, far better than my old TV, and while it's not a flat screen, the curve is hardly noticeable. At first I thought maybe a 32" wasn't enough of an increase in size over my 27", but my 27" was not a "true" 27" diagonal (more like 25") and this TV is a true 32" (the actual image is little closer to 31.5" but it's very close). I find that Tivo's menus are MUCH easier to read, and letterboxed DVD's are larger than full-screen ones on my old TV (that's the main reason I was wanting a bigger TV, to watch letterbox DVDs).

There were two key reasons I bought this particular model. One, the price: this felt like an excellent value (it came with a $50 Circuit City gift certificate, making the net price even cheaper), since few others in this price range included dual-tuner PIP, and I didn't want to spend much knowing that digital TV/HDTV is in the future. (In four to six years I plan to buy a huge HDTV LCD screen when the prices have dropped and HDTV is actually available in my area.)

The second reason I bought this model is the size: it's remarkably compact for a 32" TV. It _just_ fits in my entertainment center which has a 30.5" x 27.5" hole for a TV! All of the other 32" TVs I looked at would have required me to purchase a new entertainment center. This TV is also not as deep as most, being only 21.5" deep. It's not that heavy, either, at 107 pounds (most are closer to 150 pounds).

For me, this combination of features proved to be the winner. Now that I have the unit installed at home, I'm enjoying it immensely. In my small living room it feels very large, the picture quality is outstanding, the features just what I wanted, and I'm delighted. It also turned out that since my old TV was a Zenith, I didn't even have to reprogram my third-party universal remote!

Some of the nice features I've discovered: it has two S-Video inputs, one at the front and one at the back (that's rare; there are also RCA inputs). The speakers are surpisingly good (and loud), though I use them rarely (I have a surround sound system). In terms of TV features, I was surpised to find that there are two sizes for the PIP window (nice), and there are features like "EZ-Sound" which supposedly equalizes the sound volume so commercials don't get extra-loud (since I use a separate sound system, I haven't tried this). There is a convenient closed captioning feature where it automatically goes on when you mute.

In terms of negatives, I have a few minor gripes. The mute button doesn't immediately mute: it goes to a "soft mute" (barely audible) then mute when you push it again. The soft mute's okay, but generally when I press mute, I want mute, not soft mute. I wish there was a way to disable the soft mute feature. Of course, since I don't use the TV's speakers much (just for the PIP window), it's not a big problem. There were also some features that aren't well explained in the manual. For instance, the TV's clock said it needed to be set, and I had it on "automatic" but it still wouldn't set. The manual said, "Choose automatic if you want it set automatically." Duh. But why wouldn't it set? I finally discovered that when I switched to the local PBS station the clock suddenly set. That makes sense, because I have a VCR that sets when you tune it to a PBS station, but it told me that. This TV didn't say it needed to be on PBS to automatically set the time. But again, a minor gripe.

Another minor issue is the TV has a cool feature where it will obtain program info (show name, show length, time remaining) from the TV signal if it's there. But when you turn this on and have a second picture in the PIP window, every time you change a channel in the small PIP window, the program info updates (for the main screen, not the PIP window), covering the main screen. I like to use the PIP window for surfing while I watch something else on the main screen and this feature made that useless as surfing obscured the main screen. I had to turn off the feature. Kind of a dumb design. Also related to design: the transparent channel info box is fixed to the upper right corner. When you move the PIP window there, it gets covered by the channel info box. Other PIP systems I've seen will move the channel info box to a different quadrant of the screen when you move PIP there.

I gave this four stars: for me it's five, but I realize that this TV may not be as perfect for everyone else. It's definitely a mid-range model. Also, if your old TV is more recent than my old Zenith, the picture quality may not be as dramatically better (for me it's night and day). It's a great value, though, especially if you eventually plan to go HDTV and are just looking for something to tide you over.