Samsung PN50A550

I, too, chose this TV because of the great rating it got on the Consumer Reports website. The price just keeps on dropping. I paid about $1240 for it in Feb 2009. It was a great TV and picture while it… lasted. Five months in and all it's good for now is a boat anchor. No power. It cycles on and off, and the red light flashes, but that's it. I tried the troubleshooting guide with no success I called Samsung and they are sending someone out on their dime to fix it. Stayed tuned for results of that visit in the comments section here. One thing I didn't like was that it wouldn't automatically adjust to the picture size it was showing. My dad's Panasonic had a feature where if the picture format was 4:3 it would adjust after a few seconds to fill up the whole screen. SyFy and AMC channels show a lot of stuff that is formatted for a 4:3 screen in 19:6 letterbox format On this TV there is a BIG black border around the whole picture. Getting it to fit on this TV's screen is a nightmare. Something is either cut off on the sides or the top and bottom are black and the picture is stretched. There are two zoom settings, but you can't adjust the size of the zoom, just the position, so you get to choose which two sides you want to cut off. It does have a cool feature where if the TV is turned off and you have a DVD HDMI connection, all you have to do is load the DVD and the TV turns itself on. But for now, it's dead. Samsung customer service was excellent, no wait time and I called at 11PM on a Friday night!! Stay tuned...

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What can one say that hasn't already been said? This television is amazing, I've owned mine since Feb 09. I had to refuse the first shipment due to the glass being cracked in several places, but Diedre… helped me out big time. Hope I spelled the name right. I bought this with the intention of using the NFL Shop Rebate and Amazon came through making sure I didn't miss the deadline. Now if only NFL Shop would get my size of jersey. Anyway, If you're looking for a very nice HDTV, this is it. I've seen some complain about the speakers, but I think they're just fine. I also switch between them and my Samsung HT-Z310 Home Theater System (for movies). I originally had my eye on a Panasonic, but when I saw the two together, Samsung won.

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If you're looking for a 50" plasma at a good price, you have found it. The picture is wonderful. The colors are very accurate. The blacks are excellent; not a Kuro, but also not $3000. I'm not sure that I… would even notice the difference witout benchmarking it. I also looked at Panasonic, but any difference in picture quality is virtually imperceptible, while the $500 difference was. You need external speakers or home theater system since the built-in speakers leave much to be desired. But then TVs never have sound commensorate with the display - never! If I had to do it over I would go with the Samsung every time.

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