Has anyone else had problems with these new 100Hz televisions? We bought one of these super duper Philips 32” 9616 TVs just over a couple of months ago. All the stuff we’d read about it indicated we were getting the best there is – European Telly of the Year and all that sort of stuff.

When we had it installed we weren’t as delighted as we thought we were going to be with the picture but it was OK. Since the start of the footie season, however, it’s become obvious that even the digital footie pictures are poor. Mr Jacko said he kept thinking the ball had gone flat! We got the satellite man to come and check and he showed us how strong the signal was and said it was the telly. We rang John Lewis, from whom we’d bought the telly, and the engineer basically told us that he dealt with calls like ours about six times a day – 100 Hz tellies are bad for watching sport where there are fast moving objects! John Lewis have been excellent – after talking to the service manager she agreed to let us swap our 2 month old telly for a new Panasonic 50 Hz and has even refunded the difference. Excellent service. But what’s the point of selling TVs that cost four figures that are useless for watching footie on?

Has anyone else had these problems?

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

Answers

Awful Picture

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

I think Man U wanted to do the same with their purchase from Philips but all they ended up with was an even older French model whcih they hoep will cope with the fast moving ball a bit better.

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

Thank you for that very helpful contribution Macbeth - now bog off!

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

Jacko,
I'm not sure I understand the problem you experienced. We bought a 100mHz, 32" Sony Flatscreen TV about 12 months and it is excellent - we've have always bought Sony TV's as we've had such good experience with them.

Having got used to the 100mHz, "flicker- free" picture I can't stand watching a 50 mHz set now.

When watching footy I have noticed that the grass tends to blur slightly when the camera is panning after the ball, but haven't noticed any problem with the ball - except when it happens to finish in our net, of course! I always thought this was a standard problem with digital transmission rather than being related to the 100mHz sets, but not being a techie I suppose it could be.

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

I was told about this before I bought a 100Hz last Nov. I asked around all of the telly shops, and the concensus was that 100Hz are terrific but not for sports, as there tended to be a problem, as already indicated above, with fast moving items. (Fine for watching Warren Barton then?)

Discovered that Sony had added some doodah (techie speak eh?) to combat this, so I stumped up for a big feckoff Sony 32", and what a telly it is. I have had NO problem with sports, and the picture is fantastic. I go round to my mates on the odd occ. who has a 50Hz 32" widescreen, and I am SO glad I went for the 100Hz. It really is a better picture, and more to the point my mate agrees and wishes he'd spent his hard-earned on the 100

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

What model is it Nick?

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

Aye, we've got a 100Hz model. The trick is to turn off Flicker Reduction if you are watching something with fast movements which basically puts the telly into 50Hz mode.

The colours aren't as good though, I'm fine with 100Hz on all the time, great in widescreen :)

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

So do none of you get this problem where you can't read printing properly on the screen either? You know when you switch channels on Sky and you get that big box at the bottom of the screen telling you what channel you're on - well ours is really distorted at the corners. Also you know when you have some of the interactive channels on and it says something like "quiz" in the bottom corner - you can hardly read that on ours. I've tried all sorts of picture adjustments and can't get this right at all.

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

Yeah, that is a downside to 100 Hz tellies unfortunately, but there are so many more upsides.

If I really want to read the credits for a programme (Sky Sports News ticker is fine) then I can switch it to 50Hz mode in a flash and I can read it.

We bought ours for DVD's which are fantastic with it, so it serves its purpose well.

However, 100Hz is a matter of personal taste, some people like it, some don't. If you don't like it, just stick with the 50Hz models, and save yourself a canny bit of money :)

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

What model is yours Paul?

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

Panasonic 36PF10

We got it last year, as it got 10 out of 10 reviews for picture quality, and it really did stand out from the crowd in the shops we were looking at them.

I think it's been replaced by a new model with built in Dolby Digital - not something I would really want to pay for (separate system sounds much better)

As I said before though, it's down to personal taste, some people like them, some don't.

-- Anonymous, August 30, 2001

Sorry for the delay in replying Jacko - I've got the (hold on, need to go and have a ganzee) Sony KV-32FC60 56108. Yup. Means nuffin to me neither. It's the Art Coutoure one. Got it thru LetsBuyIt.com before they nearly went tits-up, at a greatly reduced price. It's still at £17-1800 in some places, though I have seen it recently for about £12-1300 (still more than I paid) cos it's probably at the end of it's cycle now.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Same TV as me then Nick :))

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Well then Jacko.... just looked back through some old posts....

You asked for advice on this in December.... my reply contained:

"You'll see arguments over 50Hz sets and 100Hz sets. In theory 100Hz should give a better, more stable picture. In practice every one I've seen gets jitters on moving objects (eg. a ball when watching Sky footy). "

Nee symapathy as you ignored my advice ;-)))

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

My advice Jacko? Don't go backwards. 100mHz is the best technology - just get your telly from a top manufacturer, like Sony. You'll pay a bit more, but it's worth it.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Jacko, I've always hated the bluring grass on sky satallite football games. Does the same thing occur on terestial TV football games at 100mhz?

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Better still save a grand buy a bog standard telle, and GO and watch LIVE footy. Failing that and if theres no footy on telle go outside its a beautifull world out there.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

....now why didn't I think of that? Bloody top idea KB - and actually the sun is shining now!

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Sorry Geordie - nowt personal! I got so much conflicting advice about this that it took me bliddy ages to make me mind up - then I chose the wrong one anyway! This Philips one is supposed to have summat called Digital Natural Motion which gets rid of the judders but it doesn't. Just like you said! I'll know better next time!

Anyway I've gone for this Panasonic 32" 50Hz which is described as "practically perfect in every way" in What Video and TV". If I don't like this one, I'll stick with it and save up for one of those super flat hang on the wall plasma jobs!!!

Thanks to all of you for taking the trouble to reply to a soft owld git who doesn't know what the hell she's doing!

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

BTW Kennyboy - if you think I need telling to go and watch "LIVE" football, well you just don't know me!!

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001

Rik, the blurry grass on Sky digital is something to do with the compression Sky use to send the pictures. As they add more channels, the quality gets worse overall as all the channels have a certain amount of "space" to share between them.

Its similar to a picture on the internet, many are compressed to save space at the expense of quality.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 2001