Picture quality musings
General usage and picture quality
The Evesham V32EMRO-ZE3 specifications list the panel's contrast ratio as 1000:1 and the brightness as 550cd/m². Contrast ratio can be defined as the difference between the absolute whitest of whites the LCD can produce and the blackest of blacks. A higher contrast ratio generally translates to deep blacks and pure, but not overblown, whites. Testing through a variety of inputs we found that the display had a OK black but a decent white level. The black level, for instance, wasn't as good as a well-tuned Sony CRT TV, or, for that matter, a 32-inch Samsung 32R51BD LCD TV.The general brightness, however, was good enough for watching detailed clips in broad daylight, and the TV's viewing angle, quoted as 176o both horizontally and vertically, offered a decent picture from acute angles.
We tested the screen's image quality via a variety of sources and with the panel set to its factory-shipped standard mode.
TV (tuner) quality
It's no secret that when high-definition LCDs are fed with low-quality SD signals the resulting image quality is less than optimal. That proved to be the case with the V32EMRO-ZE3's analogue tuner, with image quality suffering from quite severe blocking and poor-ish colour reproduction. The processed image quality was a touch poorer than a Samsung 32R51BD's. That's not saying much, though.
SCART quality
An NTL Digital cable box was connected via a high-quality SCART cable into the screen's RGB-capable socket.
We appreciate that a photograph rarely conveys the quality of an LCD's picture, but the Evesham panel outputs a softer, green-tinged image than the comparison Samsung. Changing the settings somewhat helped, yet we feel that its Standard-Definition performance is sub-optimal, even for a £749 LCD. Again, we noticed greater blocking and comparatively poorer colour reproduction with extreme blacks.
DVD quality
We then connected a Sony DVP-NS730 DVD player (non-HDMI) via SCART and played a 3-minute action-packed sequence from Star Wars: The Revenge Of The Sith (1:46 - 1:49). The fast pace of the scenes failed to trip the V32EMRO up in terms of trailing associated with low-quality displays that ship with high response times. However, it must be noted that the image quality wasn't as sharp and vibrant as we'd like. Tweaking the options helped a little, but we weren't able to push the PQ quite as high as the Samsung's. For example, the fine lines in Yoda's face and the reflective glint in his eye were a little softer and less focussed than on the Samsung display. That remained true even when sharpness and contrast were increased.
LCDs look best when displaying animation. This is why the majority of retailers tend to showcase them with, say, Toy Story running on multiple displays. We ran a portion of The Incredibles and found the Evesham to be of a decent standard, with no hint of trailing and a reasonable amount of detail.
PC input quality / HD quality
Video was output from an ATI Radeon X1800 XL 256MB card's DVI port to both the V32EMRO's D-Sub and HDMI interfaces.
Ignoring the banding present in the photograph, the panel's 1366x768 resolution was high enough to allow for reading of fine text. In common with other large LCD TVs, we can see little reason why you cannot use this as your main PC monitor, assuming you can sit far enough away to take in the entire screen.
HD ready is the hot term in the industry right now. Sky have announced details of its HD-based offering and the BBC is offering HD content this year. In view of this and the fact that the V32EMRO is designed for HD usage, we ran a number of WMV-based HD 720p demos.
Needless to say, the photograph is for illustrative purposes only. Increasing image quality by feeding in a 6MBit/s 720p stream highlights just how decent the Evesham display can be. Detail and clarity were, obviously, greater than an SD feed. Colour was generally good but not quite perfect, but the fast-paced action again failed to trip up the display in terms of smearing or trailing.
