humax 20.1 tft lcd tv free sample

It"s a common refrain: consumer electronics are too complicated and cumbersome for the average user. And even if you"re a "power user" who enjoys the latest and greatest tech gear, you"ve still got to deal with the inevitable rat"s nest of cables and wires that invades your living space once you connect two--let alone more--devices together. It"s those two problems--complexity and cable clutter--that the Humax LD2060 aims to eliminate. This 20-inch flat-panel LCD TV includes a built-in DirecTV satellite TV tuner, so subscribers can receive hundreds of channels of programming without the need for an external receiver.

From an aesthetic standpoint, the LD2060 looks similar to any other LCD flat-panel you"ll see--which is to say, pretty nice. The screen is ringed by a black border, while the stand and nonremoveable side-mounted stereo speakers are silver. Controls are split along the top and bottom edges: nine satellite control keys on the top side, five TV controls--volume, input, power, and settings menu--below. Of course, you"ll never have to touch those controls, thanks to the Humax"s unified remote. The well-designed clicker puts all the satellite and TV controls within reach. A slider on the remote toggles its controls between the built-in satellite receiver (such as scrolling through DirecTV"s onscreen programming guide) and the TV itself (picture and sound adjustments and so forth); it can also be programmed to control two other A/V devices, such as a DVD player or VCR.

Getting the Humax LD2060 up and running on DirecTV was about as easy and straightforward as we could hope. Because CNET"s New York office has an existing DirecTV subscription, we just popped the RF coaxial cable off our existing box and screwed it into the back of the Humax TV. After sliding the included access card into the slot on the side, a quick call to DirecTV customer service had us up and running in less than five minutes. (You"ll be charged the same for using the LD2060 as you would for adding a standard DirecTV box to your account--so if you"re replacing an existing box, it"s a wash.) All in all, the LD2060 delivers an experience that"s all but identical to a standard DirecTV receiver--you have access to the same onscreen guide and basic functionality that you"d get with a standard satellite receiver, as well as access to all of the same channels in your package--excluding any high-def ones, that is.

The Humax isn"t going to compete with larger and more expensive TVs in terms of picture quality, but it does offer a basic complement of picture controls, including four picture modes (dynamic, mild, standard, and movie) and five color-temperature presets (two warm and cool settings each, plus a baseline "normal"). We didn"t bother with a full calibration, opting instead to eyeball the basic picture-control settings (tint, contrast, color, sharpness, and brightness) on the Warm 2 preset. As to be expected with an LCD, black levels were lacking. We also noted a bit of red push, but edge enhancement wasn"t overly pumped up, and off-angle viewing was better than average for an LCD. In other words, picture quality was resoundingly fine on DirecTV programming and DVDs--the same that we"d expect from other non-HD LCD panels of this size and native resolution--640x480.

The LD2060 also offers a "="" rel="follow">vertical compression mode, so you can see the full resolution of anamorphic DVDs at their proper aspect ratio. What was annoying, however, was the lack of independent input memories: if you customize the settings for watching DVDs or video games, for instance, you"ll need to readjust them when you return to the DirecTV programming.

If you want to use the LD2060 to watch only satellite TV, just two wires need to be connected: the power cord and the satellite line. (Add a standard telephone wire to the equation if you want to take advantage of any of DirecTV"s pay-per-view offerings.) Thankfully, though, the Humax isn"t a one-trick pony: It has three other A/V inputs--one component and two composite--so you can connect as many as three other video sources. While that will certainly introduce more of the wire clutter that the integrated satellite receiver is designed to avoid, the flexibility to add, say, a DVD player, a VCR, and a game system will certainly be welcome for anyone building a mini-entertainment center. A single set of A/V outputs lets you record your DirecTV shows to a VCR or a DVD recorder, though anybody used to a TiVo or other DVR will lament the dearth of a built-in hard drive. Furthermore, if you buy the LD2060 and subsequently decide to dump DirecTV, the additional inputs guarantee that you"ll always have a usable flat-panel monitor--you can hook up a cable box or even a Dish Network receiver to any of those inputs. Interestingly, the component inputs accept 480p and 720p/1080i high-def sources. But given that they"re all scaled to the LD2060"s 640x480 native resolution--and the fact that it"s a small 20.1-inch screen to begin with--there"s no big advantage to using HD video sources. Likewise, you won"t find any DVI or VGA inputs on the LD2060, but the low-res screen wouldn"t be conducive to doubling as a PC monitor anyway.

While there"s a lot to like about the Humax LD2060, it"s worth remembering that it"s designed to appeal to a fairly small segment of the market: DirecTV viewers looking for a small, no-fuss, flat-panel television. At its original $700 price tag, the lack of wide-screen aspect ratio, high-definition display, PC monitor support, and a built-in DVR were all the more glaring.) By comparison, 20-inch LCD TVs from no-name and top-tier manufacturers are readily available for less than $400.) But Humax has since dropped the list price of the LD2060 to $600--with online pricing coming closer to $549. That makes this TV a much more palatable buy, and it"s a big reason we"re not grading it more harshly.

If you like the idea the of the LD2060 but want to hold out for an HD version, stay tuned: Humax is planning to release a 32-inch wide-screen LCD flat-panel HDTV with a built-in high-def DirecTV tuner in the fall, though pricing has yet to be set. In the meantime, if you"re a DirecTV viewer looking for a no-hassle second television--and you can find it at a discount--the Humax LD2060 is certainly worth your consideration.

Once we got the LP32-TDR1 out of the box we started a thrilling game of "hunt the on/off switch" -- Humax keeps its power button well hidden. Eventually we discovered it towards the bottom-right of the screen.

Other than its secret power switch, the screen has a simple but pleasant design. The bulk of the TV is finished in a shiny "piano" black with the stand finished in silver. There"s a long speaker strip that runs along the front of the TV. We wouldn"t describe it as the best-looking TV we"ve ever seen as there"s a fair bit of cheap plastic used.

The usual connections are present on the Humax -- it features one HDMI input, component video in and two Scart sockets round the back. There"s also digital audio out for connecting the TV to your surround-sound amplifier. S-Video and composite inputs are located at the side of the TV under a flap. The solitary HDMI is a shame -- at some stage you"re going to want to plug more than one HD source into the telly.

The main feature of the Humax LP32-TDR1 is the Freeview PVR functionality offered by the television. Adding this to an HD Ready set for such a low cost -- typically around £800 at the time of writing -- is a boon.

Although the Humax sports two TV tuners, you can"t record two channels at the same time. The second tuner is simply there to make sure you can carry on watching a different TV channel when a recording is taking place. You aren"t even able to use the trick play features we"d expect to see, such as being able to pause and rewind live TV. Not the end of the world, perhaps, but it is worth knowing before you splash the cash on this set.

Standard-definition performance on the television was good. Colours were bright and the image was neither too soft nor artificially sharp. We were able to see the usual Freeview picture problems, but the Humax doesn"t exaggerate them or use unpleasant processing to hide the problem.

The back levels of this set are a little off. It"s especially noticeable when you move to the left or right of "dead centre", where black looks a little blue, but even when you are looking at the screen dead-on, you can tell that blacks aren"t perfect. Adjustment of the backlight level can improve this, and anyone buying an LCD should remember that the factory default for the backlight is often far higher than necessary. Reducing the brightness is especially important for watching in darker rooms where the light bleed is far more obvious.

The sound quality of the television was fairly good. We could hear dialogue clearly, bass was audible, although, like most LCDs, a little weak at times. For built-in speakers we doubt anyone will have any serious complaints, but for serious movie viewing you"ll probably want to get a separate surround-sound amp.

We"ve seen better performers in the high-definition picture-quality stakes. While we weren"t disappointed by the picture quality from HD sources, it didn"t take our breath away either. This makes this set ideal if you just want a flat screen for watching regular standard-def TV.

Ultimately, if you"re trying to cut down on the clutter in your front room, buying this TV with a built-in Freeview PVR will be just what the home electronics doctor ordered. Otherwise, take a look at some of the other PVR-less options available.

Usually when you’ve got a 32in TV going for just £390, you’re talking about some no-name model you can pick up from the shelves of your local supermarket. But today that paltry sum can bag you the LGB-32DST from Humax, a brand which, while hardly premium, is certainly generally considered to sit at a slightly higher level than the Bushes, Goodmans, Prolines and Fergusons of the AV world. So here’s hoping the 32DST turns out to be as big a bargain as it initially appears.

The 32DST’s connections are a touch disappointing in one sense, as they only include two HDMIs when we like to find three these days. The reality, though, is that the two HDMI situation is pretty much par for the course at the Humax 32DST’s price point. And you do at least get some pretty reasonable accompaniment in the form of the de rigueur component video port, a D-sub PC jack, and a digital audio output – among other things.

On a bigger TV this would be a serious crime. But we guess we can live with it on a 32in TV, where the extra finesse of 1080p/24 is harder to appreciate anyway. It’s also worth considering that had such a budget TV tried handling progressive signals and, especially, 24Hz feeds, it might actually have ended up making a royal mess of things. So perhaps the 32DST’s decision to top out at 1080i playback is merely the action of a TV prepared to accept its limitations.

It’s imperative that we point out here, too, that the 32DST is not a Full HD TV, boasting instead a native resolution of 1,366 x 768 pixels. This is only to be expected of such a cheap set, and obviously makes 1080p/24 compatibility less of an issue as there’s going to have to be image scaling to translate a 1080-line source to the TV’s 768 lines of pixels anyway.

Humax claims a contrast ratio of 1,000:1 for the 32DST – hardly one of the highest around. However, in a move typical of the LCD market, this ‘native’ figure can be boosted (to an unspecified level) by a dynamic backlight arrangement that adjusts the picture’s brightness in accordance with an assessment of the image content. As in, the darker the image content, the lower the backlight output, to improve black level response. You can adjust the backlight to any of three ‘manual’ levels too if you don’t fancy the auto setting – an important touch for reasons we’ll come to later.

The 32DST’s reasonably tidy onscreen menus have one or two surprising tricks up their sleeve given its price. You can, for instance, call up picture-in-picture functions, and adjust the way the set delivers skin tones. Plus there’s a multi-level noise reduction facility, and SRS TruSurround XT to deliver a pseudo surround sound effect using just the TV’s speakers.

Happily the 32DST has more success with its pictures. With HD sources, for instance, the picture is considerably sharper than might be expected given the set’s 1,366 x 768 resolution and lowly price tag. There’s precious little of the general softness and lack of detail that afflicts many cut-price rivals, and even better, there’s nowhere near as much LCD motion blur to contend with as we would have expected.

At this point I’d normally expect to have to bang on about how severely the budget Humax’s picture quality drops off with standard definition. But actually, while there’s certainly a small increase in motion blur, and obviously not as much fine detail in evidence, the picture is nothing like as noisy and indistinct as with some, nay many other (especially budget) LCD TVs we’ve seen.

I also like the way you can watch the 32DST from a really quite acute angle before the contrast and colour response start to drop off to any large extent – we still see some quite expensive TVs still struggle with this problem.

Also, if you use the ‘Auto’ backlight mode that on paper should give you the most effective contrast throughout a film or TV show, the screen sometimes adjusts its brightness so frenetically that the picture almost seems to be flickering.

Does Humax’s LGB-32DST set new standards of picture and sound prowess? Of course not. But does it nonetheless perform markedly better than you might expect of a 32in TV costing south of £400? Definitely.

We test every TV we review thoroughly over an extended period of time. We use industry standard tests to compare features properly. We’ll always tell you what we find. We never, ever, accept money to review a product.

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TVs└ Sound & VisionAll CategoriesAntiquesArtBabyBooks, Comics & MagazinesBusiness, Office & IndustrialCameras & PhotographyCars, Motorcycles & VehiclesClothes, Shoes & AccessoriesCoinsCollectablesComputers/Tablets & NetworkingCraftsDolls & BearsFilms & TVEvents TicketsGarden & PatioHealth & BeautyHolidays & TravelHome, Furniture & DIYJewellery & WatchesMobile Phones & CommunicationMusicMusical Instruments & DJ EquipmentPet SuppliesPottery, Ceramics & GlassPropertySound & VisionSporting GoodsSports MemorabiliaStampsToys & GamesVehicle Parts & AccessoriesVideo Games & ConsolesWholesale & Job LotsEverything Else