32" 1080p Samsung LN32A550 pics

S

Somnambulator

Gawd
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Apr 13, 2008
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lots of interest for PC users about this display. few threads here have discussed it, and ive included my thoughts in 1 or 2 of them. thought i'd start a new thread to show some quick pics of it w/ my setup.

was postin this on a few forums so i copy-pasted it. this piost is my whole setup. next post will be more specific to the display itself.
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  • Antec nine hundred case
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    32" Samsung LN32A550 1080p LCD
 
I got one of these a550's in front of me. My first attempt at a 32" monitor was a Toshiba
32rv530u. The Toshiba had an amazing black level about EQUAL to a pioneer kuro plasma that I have (which is basically the best black level that exists). My main problems with the Toshiba were the buzzing sound from the monitor when changing brightness levels and standard def TV looked worse than just about any display I've seen but HD looked amazing.

This Samsung 32A500 I have now has a pretty crappy black level, HD looks worse than the toshiba, standard def looks better but not by a whole lot. Overall the Samsung isn't really good at anything. The Toshiba was at least awesome at HD programs and bad at everything else. Gonna return this Samsung too.

In terms of using them as a PC display or for gaming, the Toshiba looked far better in games by a longshot but it suffered a decent amount of black crush effect. The Samsung's mediocre black level makes me want to use my PC monitor for gaming instead (a samsung 245bw 24inch). So basically yea, the Toshiba looks much better in games.

The input lag for both monitors is rather bad. Should I get a Sony XBR6?
 
R0achTheWarHero said:
I got one of these a550's in front of me. My first attempt at a 32" monitor was a Toshiba
32rv530u. The Toshiba had an amazing black level about EQUAL to a pioneer kuro plasma that I have (which is basically the best black level that exists). My main problems with the Toshiba were the buzzing sound from the monitor when changing brightness levels and standard def TV looked worse than just about any display I've seen but HD looked amazing.

This Samsung 32A500 I have now has a pretty crappy black level, HD looks worse than the toshiba, standard def looks better but not by a whole lot. Overall the Samsung isn't really good at anything. The Toshiba was at least awesome at HD programs and bad at everything else. Gonna return this Samsung too.

In terms of using them as a PC display or for gaming, the Toshiba looked far better in games by a longshot but it suffered a decent amount of black crush effect. The Samsung's mediocre black level makes me want to use my PC monitor for gaming instead (a samsung 245bw 24inch). So basically yea, the Toshiba looks much better in games.

The input lag for both monitors is rather bad. Should I get a Sony XBR6?
Click to expand...
the XBR6 is usually a lot more pricey than the A550. you cant really compare them directly as the XBR series is among Sony's top of the line. Samsung's equivilant model series is the a750, which debuted alongside the a550 and a650. i do know the a750, and possibly 650 too, runs @ 120hz.

setting up my a550 w/ my PC for gaming and general use took a long time to get it acceptable. you need to disable Digital Noise Reduction ("Digital NR" in the menu system), turn off Power Saving, and set DNIE to ON and HDMI black level accordingly. "Normal" is bright and "Low" is dark. i still fiddle with that setting b/c i cant figure out which i like more. Digital NR is the biggest setting for gaming. this HAS to be off or else you get artifacts in fast-moving scenes. it's also probably why SD looks better on the Samsung. previous models couldnt disable Digital NR but the a550 and up series changed that.

Also turn Sharpness way down. i set mine to 3 but b/w 1 and 5 looks good.
 
Hey I was just about to buy this LCD till I read what you said about black levels , damn I read all threads from sharp aquos GP1U (having issues with red pushing , color shifting and dynamic contrast no possible to turn off) GP3U Supposedly better but color issues as well, then I read about a Pana viera 32lz800 for around 950U$s but I don't think it's got a descent panel, finally I just thought this samsung would cover all my expectations as samsung it's one of the greatest manufs on panels this sammy has a S-IPS panel what do you find bad about it? does it have a high picthed noise coming from the PSU ? I have this kind of noises.
If you can help me out I'd be reallly grateful , I'm kind of lost in the middle of the desert now. I thought I was going to came up with someone really enjoying it's sammy eeks
by the way do you know if the panel on this sammy is 10bits (capable of reproducing 24bit color range)? if it's 100hertz , and if you're able to calibrate R G B in usermode .
 
i'm not a super-HDTV user. i did do a lot of research before buying but i've been biased twds Samsung for years.

there is no buzzing whatsover. if it's on, you cant tell unless you're looking at the screen/blue ambiant LED below screen.

it's 60hz refresh rate, not sure what 100hz pertains to since LCDs are either 60 or 120. maybe im not thinking of the right spec.

you can calibrate virtually anything. RGB, contrast, gamma, black level, backlight brightness, normal brightness, all dynamic features are toggable, D Noise reduction is toggable, DNIE is toggable...basically every setting, spec, and option is either toggable or adjustable.

i dont have a HW calibrator but i followed a post on a thread elsewhere as a basis for my software calibration. i dont use this for any TV at all. it's 100% a PC monitor and calibrated it inside a game.
 
Hi thanks so much for your reply, I'm in between a panasonic viera 32LZ800 and this samy lcd , basically the negative aspect of the viera is that you can't adjust RGB settings and has supposedly better viewing angles. Let me ask you something are the blacks on this samsung to noticeable towards other colors?. Could you take some pictures say watching some dvd movies and post them I would be really grateful.
What would be the negatives sides of it?
 
that PC is down for about another week pending evga GFX card step-up. current PC doesnt have HDCP-compatible gfx card
 
I just needed to say, thanks for the settings you posted a few replies up :) I just received my LN32A650 and the picture was just.. so bad out of the box. But I adjusted the settings based on what you said, and it looks great so far :) Just regular TV, have to go get the HDTV cable box tomorrow.. and I'm not going to use it with my computer either.

Any other tips or adjustments that you could recommend? ;)
 
Nice lotion, Somnambulator.


dssence said:
then I read about a Pana viera 32lz800 for around 950U$s but I don't think it's got a descent panel, finally I just thought this samsung would cover all my expectations as samsung it's one of the greatest manufs on panels this sammy has a S-IPS panel what do you find bad about it? does it have a high picthed noise coming from the PSU ? I have this kind of noises.
Click to expand...

Panasonic uses Alpha-IPS panels in its 800 series LCD's. They are flat out amazing. Hands down the best viewing angles of any LCD. Which is to say, basically no image shift at any angle. Very natural colors. Excellent response time. Super sharp, too sharp, really. I've got my LCD set at - 11 sharpness so that everything doesn't look ridiculous! The best implementation of 120hz/motion enhancement that I've seen. Many people complain that most brand's 120hz makes things look fakey, like it was shot on a camcorder. I've NEVER viewed anything on my Panasonic LCD that suffered this fake effect.
 
I agree that the panasonic as a breathtaking panel. I am surprised of how much better this is actually compared to H-IPS panels.

As with the fake 120Hz in the panasonic, I have it turned off because I can notice the screen flickering very slightly when it is turned on. Maybe I am more sensitive to this than others...
 
LA32A650A1F2oz.jpg


If you're going to get a Samsung for PC, you need this model.....it has the 15 000:1 cr vs the 10 000: of the 450.
 
thefurion said:
I agree that the panasonic as a breathtaking panel. I am surprised of how much better this is actually compared to H-IPS panels.

As with the fake 120Hz in the panasonic, I have it turned off because I can notice the screen flickering very slightly when it is turned on. Maybe I am more sensitive to this than others...
Click to expand...

oh? can you turn it off now? I have the 2007 modle 32LX700 and its 120hz feature is always on.

Screen flickr sounds like a problem to me. Exactly opposite of what 120hz should produce. Maybe you got a lemon? I dunno, can't say I've spent quality time with the 2008 models.
 
So I also just picked up this panel and have run into a problem when hooking it up to a computer

when i use a dvi->hdmi cable, the text on it becomes unreadable. when i use the pc input though the text is a significant amount more clear. Am I suppose to use a different kind of input? I thought dvi->hdmi was suppose to be more clear?
 
I'm curious to know what resolution you guys are using on 32" tvs. If it's 1920x1080, I think it's an especially waste of space only being able to go up to 1080P resolution on anything 30 or higher. Might as well just get a 24-26" monitor.
 
Well ofcourse they are using 1920x1080 FULLHD resolution because its max for TVs. I just wonder why people buy 32A550 when 32A650 might be better.
 
turn the sharpness down to 0-5. sharpness is way up by default but adds artificial edges to objects that makes text illegible. i like mine at 3, but many people turn it off completely @ 0.

as for the 650 series...my 32 550 was $928 shipped in may. the cheapest i found the 32 650 was 1150 shipped from a quality store.
 
celwin said:
I'm curious to know what resolution you guys are using on 32" tvs. If it's 1920x1080, I think it's an especially waste of space only being able to go up to 1080P resolution on anything 30 or higher. Might as well just get a 24-26" monitor.
Click to expand...
as a gamer, the GFX card power required to run 2560x1600 is outrageous assuming i always play new games. 1920x1080 only requires mid-level cards to max at the quality in most games and is a very respectable size.

also, 1080p TVs display digital broadcasts better b/c of their advanced technology like DNIe and can "upscale" low-def signals with Digi noise reduction. they make better TVs for sure.
 
I just got one LN32A550 of these over my other options I was considering which were the 32XBR6 and the LN32A650. From all the postings I read the set is a pain to set up for PC use but worth the effort, I can attest to that too. After a day or two of tweaking I arrived at the settings below and it looks damn good. Biggest hurdle for me was to discover that the ATI driver detected a TV and was setting a 10% under scan which had nothing to do with the TV settings of course.

So my overall opinion is out of the box sucked but after tweaking it's great.

One last thing I am hoping to eliminate: I have a touch of color bleed. Black text on white background is razor sharp per pixel accuracy but colored text bleeds a bit to the surrounding pixels. I could live with this but it is so close to being perfect. It looks as if it is trying to do clear type which I don't like at all and is turned off, as is evident with the black text. Not bad at all and as you can see I was unable to really capture it in a macro picture but you can see some of the green bold bleed a bit. Actually you can't see it at a normal viewing distance of say three or four feet or so, but when I am looking for something wrong I find it. Not a deal breaker for me, great TV/Monitor! Open to suggestion on this one for fixes?

My settings:
Mode: Dynamic
Backlight: 5
Contrast: 100
Brightness: 36
Sharpness: 0 *** this one is very important
Color: 40 down from 50 this helped the bleed a touch
Tint: still 50/50

Picture Options
Color Tone: Normal
Size: Just Scan ***very important for PC use.
Digital NR: OFF
DNIe: ON
HDMI Black Level: Normal

Video card is an ATI X1950XTX and I have an inexpensive DVI to HDMI cable so there are no extra adapters in the line.

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jriihi said:
Well ofcourse they are using 1920x1080 FULLHD resolution because its max for TVs. I just wonder why people buy 32A550 when 32A650 might be better.
Click to expand...

The 32" A650 isn't really any better than the A550 unless you want a glossy (instead of semi-matte) panel. The 32/37" versions of the A650 are not 120Hz panels, which is the primary reason for moving up to the A650 series.
 
R0achTheWarHero said:
I got one of these a550's in front of me. My first attempt at a 32" monitor was a Toshiba
32rv530u. The Toshiba had an amazing black level about EQUAL to a pioneer kuro plasma that I have (which is basically the best black level that exists). My main problems with the Toshiba were the buzzing sound from the monitor when changing brightness levels and standard def TV looked worse than just about any display I've seen but HD looked amazing.

This Samsung 32A500 I have now has a pretty crappy black level, HD looks worse than the toshiba, standard def looks better but not by a whole lot. Overall the Samsung isn't really good at anything. The Toshiba was at least awesome at HD programs and bad at everything else. Gonna return this Samsung too.

In terms of using them as a PC display or for gaming, the Toshiba looked far better in games by a longshot but it suffered a decent amount of black crush effect. The Samsung's mediocre black level makes me want to use my PC monitor for gaming instead (a samsung 245bw 24inch). So basically yea, the Toshiba looks much better in games.

The input lag for both monitors is rather bad. Should I get a Sony XBR6?
Click to expand...

No you should get the Sharp Aquos LC32GP3U, Blacks and HD is cumtastic (Im a little biased however as I absolutely LOVE the shit out of mine!) Though Sony is a decent choice
 
MaxBurn -- try renaming your input as PC and changing HDMI input, if necessary. ( HDMI input for PC will be indicated in manual.)

Some of those settings are really for TV not PC and will go away.

Also suggest movie mode and turning stuff like DNIe off...
 
SH1 said:
MaxBurn -- try renaming your input as PC and changing HDMI input, if necessary. ( HDMI input for PC will be indicated in manual.)

Some of those settings are really for TV not PC and will go away.

Also suggest movie mode and turning stuff like DNIe off...
Click to expand...


Wow, you the man!

Really too bad they didn't mention that in the "quick setup" guide but at least it is in the manual that I didn't initially read till after you mentioned it. All those useless TV settings like DNIe, sharpness and just scan turned off and greyed out and the typical settings I'm used to on a computer monitor showed up, even got the nice to have individual RGB offset and gain sliders hidden under the "white balance" menu. Best of all it fixed the small color bleed issue I had.

Funny thing though, I was playing around with clear type and I found this tuner tool:
http://www.microsoft.com/typography/cleartype/tuner/step1.aspx

This helps quite a bit being able to tune it, till kind of a tossup for me though on razor sharp text or one of the lower clear type settings.
 
MaxBurn said:
Wow, you the man!

Really too bad they didn't mention that in the "quick setup" guide but at least it is in the manual that I didn't initially read till after you mentioned it. All those useless TV settings like DNIe, sharpness and just scan turned off and greyed out and the typical settings I'm used to on a computer monitor showed up, even got the nice to have individual RGB offset and gain sliders hidden under the "white balance" menu. Best of all it fixed the small color bleed issue I had.

Funny thing though, I was playing around with clear type and I found this tuner tool:
http://www.microsoft.com/typography/cleartype/tuner/step1.aspx

This helps quite a bit being able to tune it, till kind of a tossup for me though on razor sharp text or one of the lower clear type settings.
Click to expand...

:)

Samsung has developed pretty good PC support over the years. My first Samsung DLP TV a few years ago had bad EDID data, which prevented a digital connection to my PC.

But the flat panel I'm using as a monitor today (got a deal on last year's 4065F) hooked up fine.

I do have to use ClearType though. Text is too harsh without given the limited depth of my desk....
 
Only thing I don't really like about it is I can't see the BIOS POST screens on the LN32A550 from my desktop with the X1950XTX. My Dell D610 laptop does show BIOS POST so I know the monitor can do it, wonder what kind of handshaking failure is going on that prevents that? I have two monitors on both computers and they used to both show BIOS POST info on both monitors. I imagine this will be annoying if someone only had the one monitor and had to do something in DOS...

Other minor things is there is no display driver available on Samsung's site, just says plug and play monitor. Mostly looking for the color management thing.

My Dell D610 laptop with 915 integrated graphics and docking station with DVI output doesn't seem to like doing this display resolution well at all, you can watch it open windows and a quick blip as it fills them with content, funny but 1600x1200 it was happy with. I thought bad 2D performance was a thing of the past! Anyway here's to hoping that the D620 with the 950 integrated graphics solves that, only another month or two to replacement. God I wish I could choose my own corporate laptop.
 
I just got the LN40A650 and I gotta say that the color and blacks are incredible. It's a 50,000:1 contrast ratio even though that doenst mean anything when comparing brands. The samsung simply blows the sharp aquos out of the water. Side by side comparison you'd see the difference. 120hz on the Aquos is decent, though it artifacts alot. The A650 is much better. Anyways, I'm totally happy and for 1300 bucks, I can't complain. Check out amazon!
 
Yeah even with all the dynamic contrast stuff turned off in PC mode the screen itself is still somewhere around the 2500:1 contrast ratio mark and maybe better, a bazillion times better than the 800:1 screen this thing replaced.

BTW after some more fiddling I got ALL of my issues sorted out with this thing and life is good, I think the 650's are a little easier to deal with from what I hear. 90% of my trouble was figuring out how to get into PC mode in the first place to disable all the fancy electronic TV image helper stuff. My understanding is that the Sony 32" XBR6 I was comparing with has the same LCD panel in it, for around three hundred dollars savings I can spend some time fiddling.
 
i'm still extremely happy with this display. if you play games, either PC or console, you dont want 120hz. if your set has it, turn it off when gaming. it only adds artifacts and input lag.

when gaming, i've been switching to Game E-Mode (Entertainment Mode) and there's a noticeable response time decrease. what sucks is that it defaults all color and sharpness settings and gives me a headache after a few hours. Now i only enable it for online FPS like TF2/CS:S/etc.
 
I'm really torn between buying a large monitor or a TV. I really do want an all-in-one solution as I will be playing my PS3, Wii, PS2, and hooking up my PC to one display. One question I need answered, and many of you have these monitors and have experience, is how bad is the input lag? When you are playing PC games, is it noticeable? If not, I really would like to go with a TV rather than a monitor because the panels tend to be much better.
 
Somnambulator said:
when gaming, i've been switching to Game E-Mode (Entertainment Mode) and there's a noticeable response time decrease. what sucks is that it defaults all color and sharpness settings and gives me a headache after a few hours. Now i only enable it for online FPS like TF2/CS:S/etc.
Click to expand...

So, in the E-mode, there's no way to adjust the settings? Too bad. While I see you're still happy with your purchase, would you recommend it to others? Lastly, as posted in the post above, is the input lag acceptable, and what about ghosting?

I'm really looking to get this, but I'm nervous at the same time...

Thanks for all the help...

Dave

Edit..one last question..while I'm assuming it's possible, and some cursory digging hasn't provided me the answer, but I'm assuming I can get 1920x1080 as a resolution option on my 8800 gts videocard...can anyone confirm this?

Thanks again...
 
Thejavaman1 said:
The 32" A650 isn't really any better than the A550 unless you want a glossy (instead of semi-matte) panel. The 32/37" versions of the A650 are not 120Hz panels, which is the primary reason for moving up to the A650 series.
Click to expand...

If any of you can get the A650 40 inch version I would recommend it over anything else just about , its got very rich deep blacks and wonderful color. Its pretty large I know but if you can get it , it makes an amazing PC monitor.
 
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