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Samsung LE32C580 review

Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £379.95
inc VAT

The Samsung LE32C580 is aggressively priced and looks great, but its picture quality isn’t as good as we'd hoped for.

Specifications

32in, Freeview HD, analogue, 1,920×1,080 resolution, 3D: no, 4x HDMI

http://www.rgbdirect.co.uk
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Picture quality is a bit of a mixed bag. HD pictures are undeniably sharp, but black levels simply aren’t as deep as we would have liked. Dark City simply didn’t look, well, dark enough – blacks looked a bit grey, and tweaking the settings to get the blacks darker, we ended up losing significant amounts of shadow detail.

Likewise, Alan Wake on the Xbox 360 lost much of its atmospheric impact, with the dark, spooky locations looking a little washed out. And when you’re playing a game that hinges on being suspenseful and scary, a lack of darkness is a major problem.

Even the colours in Coraline weren’t as vivid and striking as they should be, while the overall dark environment just wasn’t deep and black enough. The situation is better with high intensity scenes, like the chase in Casino Royale, but blacks and colours still appear paler than they should.

Samsung LE32C580 side

Standard definition content is watchable, but there are noticeable compression artefacts, especially when watching a low bit-rate Freeview channel. It’s a similar situation when streaming XviD encoded video from USB – the LE32C580 scales the image well in most cases, but there are noticeable artefacts in bright scenes.

Sound quality is quite poor, and you’re not going to get much impact from movies. However, to be fair, that’s pretty much par for the course with a 32in LCD TV.

Samsung LE32C580 remote

It’s a good-looking TV with a lot of features, but the image quality wasn’t quite what we were hoping for. At this price you can get a TV with better picture quality.

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Basic Specifications

Rating ***

Physical

Viewable size 32in
Native resolution 1,920×1,080
1080p support Yes
Aspect ratio 16:9
HD ready yes
3D capable no
Speakers 2x 10W
Bezel (top/side/bottom) 42mm/46mm/46mm
Screen depth 78mm
Screen elevation 210mm
Stand size (WxD) 445x240mm

Connections

DVI inputs 0
D-sub inputs 1
HDMI inputs 4
Component inputs 1
SCART 1
S-Video input 0
Composite inputs 1
Audio outputs optical S/PDIF out
Other Headphone out, optical audio out

Tuner

Tuner type Freeview HD, analogue
EPG 8 day

Environmental

Power consumption standby 0W
Power consumption on 83W

Buying Information

Warranty one year RTB
Price £380
Supplier http://www.rgbdirect.co.uk
Details www.samsung.co.uk

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