Convincing done! I went to brand shops of these four brands to review them. I didn't visit
multi-brand showrooms since most of them have very few models of each brand and brand shops usually have well trained sales staff.
Here is review of each TV in the order of visiting these showrooms.
1. Samsung brand showroom at Satara road, Dhankawadi.
Surprisingly they didn't have 50F6800 model I found on Samsung India website. They had two other models 48H5500 and 48H6400. 5500 is a lower series, so I didn't bother reviewing it. 48H6400 is from 6 series so I went ahead and played all my test videos and images. 2D was only as good as my current samsung 6 series TV. Soap opera effect wasn't visible, possibly due to a lower refresh rate. Images were crisp. 3D was excellent, however the flickr from Active switching glasses was disturbing. This was daytime, so it wasn't due to a conflict with flouroscent lights.
It played Avatar 3D trailer well. Images were crisp with crosstalk visible only if I specifically looked for it. It didn't recognize 3D MPO files.
Although I was overall satisfied with the demo, the sales person checked whether I was serious about this product and then went on to urge me to see all their demos. The sales person was exceptionally knowledgeable about the product and also about plus and minus points of competition. I must say I am impressed with Samsung's sales training!
The sales person them played Samsung's own demo videos. They were simply amazing. Colors were vivid and 3D depth was very well controlled with no crosstalk visible even when I was looking for it.Their demo of various product features was excellent. Smart features are excellent. Samsung's new remote is superb. It moves a spot on the screen with movement of the remote when placing a thumb on the designated area on the remote. Making precise cursor movements was very easy. Typing with virtual keyboard on the screen was very smooth. This is the best remote out of the four TVs I reviewed.
He said that they had offers on the product. I didn't bother to ask details or price since I wanted to review other models in any case.
Later I didn't find any reference to 50F6800 on Samsung India website. I found it on Samsung US website. It was kind of uncomfortable. However since I had visited Samsung brand showroom, I assumed that warranty etc won't be a problem.
2. LG showroom on Karve road, Kothrud.
They didn't have 50LB6500 model on display. However they had 55LB6500 which is from the series and only a little larger, so was ok to review.
2D videos were very impressive. They were very smooth with soap opera effect clearly visible. Note that it can't be turned of for purists who insist on avoiding any interpolation of frames to play them at higher than usual 25frames/s. Videos were crisp and supersmooth. It was configured for noise reduction, which did it's job exceedingly well.
This TV has a passive polarizing 3D glasses. 3D was very impressive. My avatar 3D test video was played really well. There was absolutely no cross-talk visible even when I knew where to look for it. Colors were quite impressive and vivid.
It recognized 3D images in MPO format. They looked crisp and excellent depth control.
This sales person also was very well trained and insisted on showing all features of their product. This tv comes with a good remote. Almost as good as the Samsung remote, although precision of movements isn't as good. Overall moving cursor on the screen was quite smooth. Virtual keyboard is also good. LG has an android App which enables using an smartphone as input device for the TV. Since we are all used to the screen keyboard of a smartphone, it's supposed to make things very easy when browsing web through TV. He didn't have a demo of the app though.
LG also seems to have trained their sales persons very well. He knew about the product features quite well and the large number of technologies involved in the product. Also what features and drawbacks of their competition.
He said that they had offers on the product. I didn't bother to ask details or price since I wanted to finish reviews for all brands before making a decision.
3. Panasonic brand showroom, near yashwantrao chavan natyagruha, Kothrud.
They had the 50AS670D model I wanted to review. However it wasn't all that impressive. 2D looked very good with a smooth and crisp video. This TV comes with passive polarizing 3D glasses. 3D wasn't at all impressive due to ghost images. Ghost images appeared on both sides of object. While brightly lit scenes weren't a problem, scenes which contained only one bright object against a dark background showed the ghost images clearly.
It recognized 3D images in MPO format. Depth control didn't appear so well. Overall not very satisfactory.
Interestingly the sales person wasn't at all trained. He didn't know all features of the product he was showcasing. Didn't ask me any feedback. He didn't know much about the smart features. This showroom is long and narrow. They have placed TVs on opposite walls. So the sales person turned off TVs on opposite wall. However later someone else turned on a TV on the opposite wall while I was reviewing, that made the review less impressive. All the three other showrooms were setup so that TVs weren't placed opposite to each other. So with all the other showrooms, I didn't face this
problem of reflections.
I am surprised that Panasonic's brand showroom setup and staff is in this state. No wonder they haven't been able to make a mark in Indian TV market. I walked out in 10 minutes.
4. Sony brand showroom, Sinhagad road near P.L. deshpande garden.
They had the 50W800B model on display. 2D movies were very impressive. Soap opera effect was clearly visible. Images were crisp and changes on the screen were super smooth. Colors were quite impressive. This TV was configured for soft images, which works very well for movies. I like soft images for movies. It also had noise reduction turned-on. The noise reduction and color quality in this TV is best of the 4 TVs I saw.
It played avatar 3D trailer quite well. Absolutely no crosstalk was seen. This TV comes with active 3D shutterglasses. The flickr was very well controlled. I reviewed this TV after sunset, so they had fluroscent lights. Overall flickr was observable but wasn't disburbing. I am not sure about whether it'll cause headaches after hours of viewing.
It didn't recognize 3D files in MPO format.
This TV comes with a regular remote and also a separately priced smart remote. The smart remote isn't as impressive as the samsung and LG remotes. It takes a while to get used to it. It has a laptop like touchpad and is not very comfortable. Getting precise on screen movements of the cursor is a challenging task.
The sales person showed me another model which comes with passive polarized 3D glasses - W90B series. While 2D was as good as or better than the W800B series, 3D wasn't. There were ghost images similar to panasonic TV. No flickr was seen as these are passive glasses. I didn't bother to review this further for smart or web features.
There were zero interest finance offers on the product. I didn't bother asking details.
The sales person I talked to was very knowledgeable. A lot of customers were visiting the showroom and other sales persons kept pulling him out for technical queries. Sony's sales training seemed to have done it's job. He knew all technologies and had knowledge of competition as well.
After seeing all the 4 models - panasonic didn't justify a consideration. The samsung TV model I saw wasn't as impressive as the others for 2D movies. Hence Sony 50W800B and LG 50LB6500 were the contenders.
Both of the final contenders offer an equally good 2D movie experience. Sony has slightly better color quality. LG's remote is clearly better. Flickr from Sony's active glasses was annoying, where LG scored a lot of points due to passive glasses. Overall all things very comparable, it finally came down to flickr from active glasses as the deciding factor. I decided to go for LG.
Then I went back to the shop to ask about the offers. They had two combo offers: buy an LG home theater at a heavy discount alongwith the TV. The other offer was to buy an LG
soundbar and subwoofer at a moderate discount alongwith the TV. Since I already have an excellent home theater system, I wasn't interested. Then he told me that they had direct discounts on the MRP. The final price he quoted was Rs. 1,01,000, which I found very reasonable. Finally paid for the TV.
LG provides a 6 month produce replacement guarantee and a 1 year warranty.
The TV is going to be delivered today. I'll post more when I configure it.
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