Well, I talked to a local person in my area who charges $275 for a 6 hour calibration session on my Sony 51" and now I'd like an honest opinion on whether it would be worth spending $275 on the real deal or spending $24.99 on the DVE dvd and doing it myself. Will the difference between having it done professionally outweigh that of doing it via the DVE dvd to justify the cost? I just don't want to spend that kind of cash and not really be able to notice much of a difference. If it won't be different to the point of making me think "oh wow, what a difference" then it might not be worth it. The guy did say the WS series of Sony is his favorite t.v. to calibrate.
Also, I have a wife to contend with if I spend that money and she can't notice anything different.
Please, honestly now, what do you all recommend?
Thank you very much,
Justin
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YES...it is worth it.
And I must say I am often confused by this question....
what did you pay for your TV???
$2,000.....$3,000????
And you are balking at $275
(seems very CHEAP for 6 hours of calibration time)
I pid more for less time....but I paid per input.....
anyway.....
comon.....
Secondly...where do you live / are you close to a big city / transmission towers?
I get all the majors in HD FREE Over The Air (OTA).....
can't imagin buying / owning an HDTV without any availbale content?????
Thats nutz!?!?!
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Get the calibration - there is no way for you to even get close to the same result doing it yourself with a DVD. I bought DVE the week it was released, spent hours tweaking, achieved minimal results. I then spent $500 on my ISF cal - and would have happily spent twice that for the improvement to my PQ (my set is a Hitachi 42HDT55 pdp, so there were not even any convergence issues to deal with).
regards, billb....
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The wife thing? My wife could care less about HD...but her view is that she'd rather see me spend the money for home hobbies instead of spending it at bars and/or for gambling!
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I live in Fargo, ND. The only station I can get OTA is PBS. That's after I buy a $300 set top box. I talked to the guy who will do the calibrating again to clarify some things. He said he calibrates all connections that I am using ... cable, dvd, etc. He will calibrate the connection being used in conjunction with the HD receiver if/when I get one as well. I'm just saying, I had to hear about how much I spent on the t.v. for a year and I just don't want to spend another $350 on calibration if the results aren't spectacular .... i.e. something my wife will agree was worth it. I have a little one on the way too so if I go and spend another $350 on my theater and the results are less than spectacular well, that wouldn't be good. That's why I was asking if I should just buy the DVE dvd. If I can't obtain anything close to the results I'd get with ISF calibration then I might think about it.
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I can't state opinions against your personal situations and where you need to spend money(btw...congrats on the little one coming), but buy the DVD and give it a try.
Me? I was a WOW person after calibration, but I was able to clearly see flaws in the display (some letters had red shadows) before caliration.
Let us know what you decide.....
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Oops..forgot to add that I used a setup DVD, from Sound and Vision, and my personal results from getting my set calibrated were a heck of alot more that using the DVD......
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Get the calibration - there is no way for you to even get close to the same result doing it yourself with a DVD. I bought DVE the week it was released, spent hours tweaking, achieved minimal results. I then spent $500 on my ISF cal - and would have happily spent twice that for the improvement to my PQ (my set is a Hitachi 42HDT55 pdp, so there were not even any convergence issues to deal with).
regards, billb....
I did NOT send this twice - not a brain fart, just a good old Microsoft Moment, I guess.
This message has been edited by bbroach on Feb 19, 2004 5:18 PM
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In your situation I would first ask you how long you have had your set? If it is brand new I'd wait until you have at least 100 hours on it. The degree of improvement visible will depend on how bad it looks out of the box. Do you have issues with the picture as you view it right now? In other words it will all depend on factors we don't know, as to how great it will look after the calibration. Normally I'd just say do it but I'm taking into consideration your financial situation and the fact that your wife may very well not see a difference.
There is no comparison between the DVD and a good calibration. The DVD will help with some minor problems but you just can't compare the two. And remember that all calibrators are not created equal, be careful.
This message has been edited by HughRFC on Feb 19, 2004 6:15 PM
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Hi,
I'm an early adopter when it comes these units and HDTV Magazine, (I was a subscriber before I got a tv).
I spent $7000cdn for a 65" Tosh in Oct 2000. After the set was poperly broken in I spent another $600cdn to have it ISF'd, including reversing the stacks (getting rid of the shiney reflective screen).
Picture quality was the #1 thing for me and over the last few years I've seen lots of fancy in home theatres (popcorn machine and everything), but no one has invested in ISF yet.
I guess it depends on your priorities but I would do it again in a heartbeat.
It's amazing how we think nothing of changing a $40,000 car every 3 years but won't spend a few bucks on something thats going to last us 20.
Peter m.
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Peter, good luck to you if you get 20 years out of your TV. I don't think much of anything will last 20 years anymore, including marriages and most of the houses they're building these days...
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