Sony Grand WEGA KDF-50WE655 50 in. HDTV LCD TV

I have wanted to get a big screen TV for a long time. I moved out on my own about 5 years ago and struggled with a 20 inch and finally upgraded to a 27 inch Sony Wega which was a huge improvement soundwise and picturewise. This year after a recent promotion at work I decided to treat myself to a nicer TV set and finally settled on the 50 inch Sony Grand Wega. I asked my friend who works at an electronics store and got his opinion and from what he has seen the Sony was the way to go. Cheaper than LCD and plasma with a very good picture quality.

My main purpose for getting this TV is to have a great home theatre experience as well as to play X Box on it and watch regular TV. So far I have not been disappointed. I was initially thinking of getting the 42 inch model but with the price dropping so much on these TV's this year I thought it was a great opportunity to get into a larger screen. The price has significantly come down from a year ago and it doesn't show signs of slowing down. I can see another 4-5 hundred dollars of price movement on this thing.

First Impressions

I had this TV delivered to my home, I had the stand all set up which is a Sony stand for this particular model. It was much larger than my 27 inch model and it really impressed me. I hooked up my cable to it and watched some TV, then I popped in a DVD with some high action footage, it looked fantastic. The sound was awesome coming from the stock TV sound system. Remote is quite a simple layout with alternative functions for satellite and VCR/DVD. I really like how the buttons are hidden on the side and there is a large power switch on the front of the TV. Easy to access cable ports and very easy to carry the unit around with two people. Speakers are on the side of the TV and it has an all silver finish.

Functions

Lots of functions available on this TV. You can set the screen mode to Full (which is the standard setting if you are watching widescreen movies on DVD), standard (puts two black bars down the side of your TV so that you view it in standard square mode, good if you don't have HD tv signals), wide zoom (enlarges the picture so that it does not distort it horizontally too much), zoom (zooms into the picture equally horizontally and vertically). The TV has these various functions for everyone's viewing pleasure. I highly suggest getting a higher quality feed if you do purchase this TV as regular cable does not do it justice. HD would be the ultimate way to go with standard satellite being a close second. I personally just have regular cable and for regular TV viewing I tend to switch between the full view mode or the standard view mode depending on what I am watching.

There is a split screen mode that allows you to watch one program and surf other channels in a screen right beside it. With the tv being widescreen this definately helps and both pictures look like regular 27 inch screens or there abouts, you can also adjust the size of these screens. There is also a freeze frame function that allows you to pause the action if you want to take down a phone number/web address off of a program. Not really that useful of a function but I have played with it once in awhile. Finally there is a favourite channel listing where you can input 20 channels that you regularly view. Handy function for fast channel surfing, you also get a small preview screen when flipping through your favourites.

So far in my use this TV realy excels in watching DVD's, I wish I had a surround sound to really make this an ultimate home theatre experience but I am living in an apartment right now and the intense volume would be too much for my walls to handle. The stock speakers work great in providing a 2 channel surround experience. Gaming on this television is excellent, really provides you a great view of what is going on and multiplayer games are quite easy to play due to the large screen.

Compared to a traditional CRT tv it is much lighter which is a big plus if you tend to move a lot. There is a bulb that helps project the image onto the screen. I have heard various things about this bulb as it is prone to burning out but I have heard it was a first generation Grand Wega problem. If it does burn out it will do it within the first year otherwise it has quite a lot of life in one bulb. Hopefully it is covered under the warranty. You will find that the tv is not deep at all which is great for saving space. Screen lacks static so therefore it will not get dusty very often compared to the old static generators.

One thing to note is that the newer models, I believe the 2004 Grad Wegas, do not have a memory card slot, not sure why not but it is not something that I personally miss or wish was on there. First off it is technology that Sony has developed specific for their line of products. It will only work with memory stick style cards. I also believe that this was a cost cutting measure by Sony so that they could lower the price in their more popular sizes, 42 and 50 inch models. The newer models are all silver whereas the older 2003 generation have the black trim on the outer edge for both these models. Overall nifty function to have if it is on there but if I don't have to pay a higher price for the TV because it is not there I definately will not mind.

Viewing angles are great from side to side, vertically make sure that you are looking at the TV directly at the same level or the picture will degrade to a certain extent.