Samsung UE46B6000 46-inch Widescreen LED TV Full HD 1080P Ultra Slim with Freeview

After only six years of usage my fantastic 36" Sony CRT (100Hz) gave up the ghost; I couldn't believe that it would fail so soon! Clearly they don't make 'em like they used to; my Grundig portable was bought from a second-hand electronics shop and lasted me 14 years and then worked for my Mum another two years after that! Anyhoo, I was absolutely gutted but it did give me the push I needed to get the screen I had had my eye on for more than a year!

I had been sold on the idea of a Samsung plasma ever since my grandparents bought theirs but it was all pipe-dream territory for me mainly because of the expense; it wasn't until I saw how cheaply you could pick up a Samsung 50" plasma that I started to look into it a little more deeply. Unfortunately after downloading a few manuals from the Samsung website I discovered that to score a full-HD plasma I would have to fork out for a Series 5 or better; couple that to the fact that I had grown accustomed to a 100Hz screen and wouldn't compromise on that so I would have to save for the Series 7... 50"... over twelve-hundred quids worth of TV at the time! - Ridiculous And it wouldn't end there: Who else is put off by the power cost of the plasma screens? As pretty as the 50" Series 7 (PS50A750) is, it was expensive to buy and it's 750W power consumption was probably going to make it expensive to keep!

Then I discovered the Samsung LED range in PC World demoing the Pixar flick: "Cars" - OH MY WORD! A truly stunning picture, Full HD, 100Hz, Light (as in not heavy!), thin (less than 30mm deep) and pushing its eco-friendliness as its power consumption is comparable to your more conventional screens - That's it then... That's the one for me!!!

Crunch time came a month or so ago; the Sony died, I made a bee-line for the PC and Googled Samsung LED Televisions... I didn't even consider any other manufacturer as I've only heard (and seen!) good things from my in-laws and my grandparents who both own Samsung TV's - I've always adored the piano-black finish and the software in these TV's is fool proof; as far as setting them up go, they pretty much take care of themselves!

Originally after the 55" screen I was immediately slapped into place by the cost so I 'settled' for the 46" Series 6. Amazon actually offered the second cheapest 46" Series 6 LED TV that I was able to find on the Internet but I trust Amazon over pretty much any other retailer because they're slick with the delivery and they seldom give me any nonsense on the very rare instances in which I've needed their after sales support or where I've had to deal with their returns and refunds!
I tell you, when this baby arrived I was grinning like a kid at Christmas as I unboxed it and appreciated how big a 46" screen is in my living room; I think I let out an involuntary laugh! - When you screw it to its stand which is a sheet of black-tinted safety glass it really does look the business!

You're really not doing this screen any justice if you just scart it to your standard DVD player, your Sky-box or Freeview-HDD recorder as even on strong signals the picture quality can get pretty pathetic and I'm simply too damned tight to pay the monthly subscription to Sky-HD and to be frank, I couldn't care less about Eastenders coming through the box in HD! All these new screens are really rewarding if you exploit the HDMI sockets for your DVD watching; I'm most entertained when I'm watching crash-bang-boom blockbuster-type FX-heavy movies so I can't impress upon you enough that an upscaled 1080P-DVD player or BlueRay player really is the only way to enjoy the potential that these screens offer.

Something that I think is very noteworthy: Until this screen came along I had yet to see a successful application of the digital noise reduction feature. Every time I've tried this feature on other screens (including my old Sony) the improvements in picture quality has always compromised the fluidity of the picture motion (most noticeable on fast scrolling credits) so I usually just switched it off as a matter of course... Until now! It looks as though Samsung have actually written some good Digital NR software as not only can I have this feature switched on with this screen, I can have it set to Medium before I notice any compromise in the quality of the picture motion and that's only with very fast moving scenes! - A big well done to Samsung for that as this has significantly improved the picture quality on both the Freeview and the Skybox.

I only have two negatives to offer: The first is the sound! These speakers are rear facing for a start which is a bit silly and they lack guts which on such a lovely bit of gear suggests to me that Samsung have deliberately cut a corner here so as to tempt you with their 5.1 surround system - The sound coming out of my 2004 Sony CRT was far superior and it's equaliser software was just as comprehensive!

This next one would appear to be a real sore point amongst the owners of Samsung LED TV's and that would be the Auto Dim feature which is a function you can't access through the user menus (not to be confused with the dynamic contrast which can be switched on and off). Auto Dim is a simple little trick that Samsung employ which I suspect is to give you better black or near-black colours whilst at the same time allows the screen to fall into the eco-friendly category; it automatically adjusts the brightness of the LED back-light to approximate the ambient brightness of the scene you are viewing at any given instant.
For the most part this feature is no big deal but if like me you enjoy allot of science fiction, allot of Star Trek then you are going to have scenes set in space which for the most part is black; so black in fact that on this screen it won't even let you see the stars!!! If in the distance all on its lonesome the Enterprise will have a shadow cast over it which gradually lifts the closer to the foreground it gets, brightening the stars as it approaches! White text on a black background (like with film credits) is another real noticeable clanger dropped by the Auto Dim feature; if it's lots of text then everything is of an appropriate brightness however if it's just one or two lines of text then the text will get really dark! Even the screen's user menus will be affected by the Auto Dim feature!!
This is a really silly function and can't be switched off! I've checked with some forums and have read many dead-end complaints regarding this feature as Samsung acknowledge the issue but refuse to release a fix that allows the user to control the severity of the Auto Dim from the user menu; at the time of writing this the downloadable updates from the Samsung website have yet to address this issue - come on boys!
You can minimise this effect by customising the picture settings with particular focus on the backlight brightness, brightness, contrast and darkness settings however what looks good for Star Trek will look less so for say BBC News! - After a month I'm still tweaking trying to find a manageable balance!

Okay, I'm done! My verdict remains very positive!! Buy this screen people; you'll love it, I guarantee it!!!

top notch tv picture quality is stunning in normal definition and out of this world in hd ...... great tv for the money if you have around about 1k to spend on a tv i would strongly recommend finding that little bit extra and buying this tv you wont be dissapointed ...............

Have spent the last two years wondering whether to upgrade from an older Phillips Plasma 37" TV (pre-HD). I was never sure enough that the HD TV's were better by enough to justify the cost.

I bought this TV from Amazon (by far the best price and 2 day delivery). On freeview or standard Sky TV the result is only OK, actually not good enough to justify the cost.

On HD source eg Sky HD or Bluray the result is truly excellent. Natural tones, supreme brightness. I find myself watching incidental detail; peoples faces in a crowd, dry gravel on the ground, blades of green grass, and loosing track of the film. To be honest there is some motion blurr, but this is present on ALL screens and it is not a problem for me.

Pulling up JPEG images via a USB stick are also stunning - pin sharp and rock solid.

The sound quality is not a selling point, but not as bad as to be tinny or harsh, in normal watching its fine. We have 5.1 separates system when we watch a film and want more sound impact. This sound and picture combination is Dram-atic :-P)

Build quality is top notch and very good looking

By the way the HDMI cable I run cost me a fiver - don't waste your money on any more, but do think that a wall mounted TV will probaly need a 3Metre run

I'm well fussy about the kit I buy. I love this TV!!

Go for it!!