Sharp Aquos LC52D64U 52-Inch 1080p LCD HDTV

I purchased the Sharp LC52D64U via a direct promotion with Sharp USA. The deal I was offered was too good to pass up. I have never bought a large format TV in my life and always got by with a Sony CRT 27" in my bedroom running SD TV. I was just fine with that for many years and when I moved into a new apartment with a nice big (and empty) living room and ordered HD cable, I decided to consider purchasing a large HD panel TV.

When I did my research, I was overwhelmed at the number of choices, formats and connections types, such as LCD, plasma, projection, 720i, 720p, 1080i, 1080p, Hdmi, HD channels recievers....argh!?!?!?!

Well after I did enough research, this Sharp LCD has everything that I need for at least the next 5 years. I am running a Tivo Series 3 HD reciever pumping 1080i HD channels over digital cable into one of the 3 available HDMI ports. The image quality is, to say the least, MAGNIFICENT!!!! The deep blacks and rich colors really cut through... Read more

Read this entire review , it will clarify a lot for you with the facts.
Excellent physical design with minimal bezel around screen and also very slim depth and light weight making it as ideal as possible for wall mounting. Excellent anti reflective screen, always clear and vivid in all room lighting. Descent sound and picture factory settings~ easily rectified and improved with adjustment to the settings. Great picture quality overall especially in HD, I enjoy watching the TV with an HD dvd player hdmi connectivity and an HD dvd the most, its also fun connecting my laptop to it with its VGA input. I have written a previous review of this set elsewhere, all in line with the very words in this review only this time regret to have to add that I have noticed the notorious banding issue on the screen. keep in mind that in 80-90% of the scenes you'll watch you wont see the banding, only superb contrast ratio and excellent response time/processing of all content. However, the banding... Read more

We didn't buy from Vanns, but have been enjoying this set at home for four days now. We haven't experienced the banding that others have complained about -- and I have been very vigilant looking for it. Set-up was fairly straightforward. The stand is gratifyingly solid. Connecting cables for inputs 1 & 2 was a little more difficult than I expected, the angle you hold the connectors is really important, much more so than on other sets -- although once done, everything is nice and tight. One nice surprise so far: the built-in speakers sound much better than I expected.

The picture is gorgeous. Even DVDs from an old non-progressive scan player are excellent (the progressive scan player I ordered arrives today). We watched Monday Night Football in 1080i and newscasts in 1080i, the image quality and detail were amazing. I didn't realize before what nice clothes the anchors wear!

We're very happy so far. We'll see how we feel in a few months.