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EDITORS’<br />
PICK<br />
Samsung LN-T3253H<br />
$1,100 • samsung.com<br />
This 32-inch LCD’s film-like color and<br />
natural-looking noise reduction together<br />
create an eye-popping movie experience.<br />
It’s gamer-friendly, too: A game<br />
mode eliminates annoying HDTV<br />
processing delays to keep your Rock<br />
Band timing on track. And its impressive<br />
8,000:1 contrast ratio serves up<br />
enough detail to target your frag-ready<br />
buddies even in the darkest shadows.<br />
WIRED Lots of ports, including sidemounted<br />
A/V jacks for easy camcorder<br />
access. Rotating base.<br />
TIRED Struck out on one of our<br />
processing tests, failing to deliver full<br />
resolution from a 1080i source.<br />
Sharp LC-37D43U<br />
$1,600 • sharpusa.com<br />
Its candy-coated case only hides the<br />
off-flavor center until you hit the power<br />
button. Sharp’s 37-incher failed to<br />
re-interlace some HD sources correctly<br />
in our tests, which led to ghosting and<br />
annoying visual artifacts. It <strong>sm</strong>oothed<br />
some noise out of our Blu-ray movie<br />
but produced an overly black picture<br />
that lacked detail, knocking its moviewatching<br />
scores down to average.<br />
WIRED Virtual surround sound great<br />
for minimalist bedroom installations.<br />
TIRED We expect more for this kind of<br />
scratch. Spendy features like a low-glare<br />
screen are wasted when you have to<br />
boost brightness to get a decent picture.<br />
Toshiba 32HL67U<br />
$950 • toshiba.com<br />
Embarrassing its 42-inch big brother,<br />
this Toshiba turned in the poorest movie<br />
performance in our test, converting an<br />
expensive Blu-ray disc into Loch Ness<br />
Monster footage. Even the distracting<br />
automatic backlight adjustment couldn’t<br />
bring definition to the inky-black pools<br />
in its dark picture. Meanwhile, poor<br />
video processing yielded fuzzy, blurred<br />
edges. At least it’s not budget-busting.<br />
WIRED Easy-access side A/V ports.<br />
CE-link feature controls certain Toshiba<br />
HD DVD players via HDMI cable.<br />
TIRED Failed to keep the beat in some<br />
24-fps film sources, generating ugly<br />
patterns. Miserable noise reduction.<br />
Vizio VX32L<br />
$650 • vizio.com<br />
Vizio’s low-budget 32-incher falls<br />
below the $700 barrier, bestowing<br />
HD glory on the PBR crowd. After we<br />
added contrast and dimmed the backlight<br />
to correct the washed-out default<br />
image, it delivered a notably good<br />
movie-watching experience. But<br />
Donkey Kong–like menu icons and stairstepped<br />
diagonal lines remind you<br />
you’re watching a Hyundai, not a Lexus.<br />
WIRED Good noise reduction <strong>sm</strong>ooths<br />
out crappy video sources. $650 price<br />
tag could possibly cure cancer.<br />
TIRED Ugly: The LCD panel says 2007,<br />
but the thick, gray plastic case screams<br />
“1997 computer monitor.”<br />
WIRED TEST<br />
0 7 3
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