Sony Bravia KDL22S5500U 22-inch Widescreen HD Ready LCD TV with Freeview

 

 

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I have been in the market for a 22" TV/Monitor for several months now, and have been doing a lot of research into my various options, I decided a high-end TV with a VA or IPS type panel would best suit my needs, and so I took the plunge with the Sony's only 'current' 22" TV, namely based on specs and my experience with the rest of the Bravia range - as there were no written reviews at the time of purchase!

Initial impressions:
When the box arrived I was quite surprised at its size, It was far closer to that of the 32" Sony V4000 than the other 22" TV's I had seen before, but all this meant was more polystyrene padding which I can't complain with! The pedestal stand and remote are both of good quality and aesthetically pleasing. whilst the TV itself is beautifully designed. I was a little concerned with the thickness of the bezel apparent on the pictures provided by Sony, it seemed quite chunky compared to many other modern day rivals, but it really adds something to the TV thats difficult to explain, namely of all the contrasting textures: A glossy piano black of the outer bezel with a matte black forming the main, inner bezel! This to me is perfect, as I like piano black but i find it distracting because of glare close to the screen from external light sources - in the Sony however this is eliminated.

In traditional Sony practicality some common connections and controls can be found on the sides of the set, something which should be completely standard by now. To run through there are 2 HDMI's, one of which has a dedicated audio in (3.5mm jack) for PC connectivity at the back of the TV, the other is on the side. One set of RGB connectors, a headphone socket and a USB port are also on the side. Moving to back we have 2 scarts, 1 component and a 15 pin D-Sub (with dedicated audio in 3.5mm jack socket) as well as a phono audio out.

General usage:
Straight out of the box I connected freeview, and was pleased, if not thrilled at the picture quality, but my external aerial has been split 4 times, making it difficult to judge its true ability, it is safe to say however it is by far the best freeview picture i have received, even if that is not so great. I am, however, thrilled with the sound quality, which is the best on any of the 22" TV's I've heard to date, reminding me of the good old CRT's and their large deep speakers.

I then connected my PS3, and instantly knew something was a miss, a quick check of the picture settings and I discovered that contrast, brightness, backlight and sharpness were almost all set at max, destroying black levels and overall image quality, so with the above settings turned right down I retried with the PS3 and was amazed at the level of detail, depths of the blacks, the natural but vibrant colours and again the sound quality - topping once again every other 22" i've seen so far, and thanks to the VA (I think) panel viewing angles are good whilst colour is brilliant (but also note that this means response time may not be as good as some TN panels. although I've not noticed anything significant).

As a monitor it continues to be just as fantastic, being the only TV i've ever connected my Mac to not to give a horrible blue or yellow overtone. but instead it remained true to OS X's intended colours - but note that sharpness and backlight are best turned down, otherwise text can look way-off, once this is done however, the results are spectacular.

My biggest gripe is in the operation and control of the TV, it takes forever to turn on, switch between inputs and change channel, and the remote control can feel buggy and twitchy on occasion. Certainly not deal breakers, but for a TV much more expensive than competition, its something you'd expect to be sorted. Also, the Photo/mp3 feature is useless, excruciatingly slow to navigate and lack of image scaling means your better off connecting your PC/Mac/Camera directly. Another issue is that this TV is excluded from Sony's 3 year guarantee scheme, despite the fact that the larger TV's in the same model series (xS5500) qualify.

Overall, whilst this TV has its flaws, this doesn't take away from what really matters - image & sound quality, and this TV performs in this area like no other (get it) small 'bedroom' TV i've ever used, I would fully recommend this to anyone willing to pay that bit extra for the best there is.

I've just bought this exact model from Tesco and the picture is out of this world once you've set it up correctly. You have to set the contrast just past half way, the brightness around halfway, the colour less than halfway and the sharpness to maximum then you've got the best picture quality the only flaw is the price its more than any other brand but you only get what you pay for!.
Watching movies is now a great pleasure I'm just glad I.ve got rid of my old CRT set and the worst of all the video!.

An excellent product that more than lived up to the other reviews on this site. Typical Amazon efficiency in processing the sale / despatch.

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3.0 out of 5 stars Poor with dark (e.g. night time) images
This model comes with the ability to control the brightness of the picture to suit a room. Forget it! Read more

Published 3 months ago by Nigel HS

3.0 out of 5 stars Don't buy it from Amazon
Bought my original from Amazon Wharehouse but it arrived late with cracked screen surround. It was not in the original packaging so suspect it was either secondhand or 'grey'... Read more

Published on 25 Sep 2009 by Brad Kernow

4.0 out of 5 stars Does the job well!
Looking for second tv and this was the perfect size. So easy to navigate all the features. Picture superb as long as you are far enough away (5-6ft). Read more

Published on 3 July 2009 by S. Oddy

4.0 out of 5 stars SONY 22" Television

Very pleased with purchase, but, as always, disappointed with the sound quality as with all the flat screen televisions I have purchased. Read more

Published on 2 Jun 2009 by Sydney J. Staplehurst

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