Sharp Aquos LC52D64U 52-Inch 1080p LCD HDTV

I bought this TV on sale from Circuit City, on the black Friday, so I have the TV for almost a month now and I think this is one of the best purchases I have ever made. Some more details to help you.

Oh, yes, there's no banding on my set, and that's all I was worried about before buying this set.

1. Read all the reviews and see for yourself, this TV can handle dark scenes better than any other, and yes it handles different black tones way better than much costlier rivals. Just look for the dark hair in front of a dark background in different sets, or look for shadows in a night scene to make this comparison.
2. Secondary color adjustment are just great, for some movies you need to use it, but overall the defaults are great. Also this TV come with 3 HDMI and host of other inputs, very useful when you want to hook it up with various toys.
3. I use Philips DVP5982 1080p Upscaling DVD player for watching movies, using the HDMI and I am convinced that you don't need a Blue-ray, at least for now. Because I watch the Pirates DVD and I have seen it on BR in Circuit City, and mine was very close.
4. This TV has fantastic sound out of the box, in my setup I use my Home theater speakers only while watching movies, for regular TV viewing the TV speakers are just great.
5. 60hz vs. 120hz, well unless you are willing to pay that extra dough I think you should be very happy with this TV with motion smoothing option that it comes with it. It artificially enhances the fast moving scenes to increase clarity, again it will not beat an 120hz set, but then the difference in most cases are hardly visible in naked eye.

IMHO this is a good buy for the money, we all know that you get better items when you pay more, but try to look for the optimum price-performance mix, and this TV hits the bullseye.

Go ahead and get it, check for the banding, if there is no banding you probably made a very good decision, if there is banding just return the damn thing and get another set. Btw, most newer sets manufactured after May'07 has lot less banding issues.

I am completely satisfied with this TV and with the entire purchasing process.
I purchased this set directly from Amazon (not from one of their authorized sellers). Delivery was fast, and the white glove service was the best! Since I bought it directly from Amazon, I got the 30 day price protection guarantee. The price when down three weeks after purchase, and Amazon credited me the difference.

The setup was a breeze, and the picture and sound quality is great.
I did a lot of research before selecting this LCD TV. I was not disappointed. This is the best 52" 1080P LCD out there for the price!

Picture on regular channels is just, OK. On HD it's better but not what I expected. Some pixilation and ghosting. For the money I should have spent an extra $300 for a Sony or Samsung same size lcd or new Samsung LED 61" dlp tv. In fairness, I probably need to learn more about calibrating the set's picture. But why does the consumer have to be a techie or electronics guru to get a TV to yield a good picture? I yearn for the days of the old CRT that lasted 20 years and had a good picture the whole time! And all you did was turn it on, off, bright, dark!!

Just bought this TV on a great black friday sale for $2199. Love the case design, the picture quality is near perfect, tons of ports. My only complaint so far? The tuner. Changing channels is painfully slow, literally about 3-5 seconds for every channel...
UPDATE - 1-10-08 Update - 1-9-2008 Tv has stopped powering on. Power and OPC light flashes. Was told by tech support to unplug for at least an hour (conveniently tech support closed in 45 minutes) to "reset" the TV. Of course this fix didn't work, and called back to Tech support. 1.5 weeks before I can get a Tech to my house to look at the TV. Good thing I bought at Circuit City and they have/had extended return policies for the holidays...Will exchange and hope for the best. FYI - a quick search will show that this is a widespread problem with no known remedy on models purchased (from what I can tell) from around 11-20 until around 12-26...It's a shame because the picture and style on this LCD are fantastic. One more side note...annoyingly when watching movies via coaxial cable (I havent purchased a blu ray yet) i get/got a menu box in the upper right every time it thinks the audio track has changed...Presumably because my coaxial connection is not 100%?

UPDATE - 1-11-08
Return and exchange went great...including a free $499 Sharp Aquos Bluray special that is going on right now with CC. $1700 for TV $499 for Bluray...Total still $2199 for black Friday Deal...

Now only if I could have switched for a PS3 for BluRay AND Digital Media Server. Might Try...

New UPDATE - 1-14-08
Ended up with PS3 HOWEVER after 1 day of perfect picture, Sharp LCD now shows a very "grainy" picture...have checked all inputs and all seem to show this low detail grainy picture...I guess I will have to return AGAIN. ALSO when changing TV Channels, TV "Froze" Had to unplug to "reboot" as the power button would not even shut down tv...AM regretting my purchase at this point, change my shars to 2 star recommendation...

We didn't buy from Vanns, but have been enjoying this set at home for four days now. We haven't experienced the banding that others have complained about -- and I have been very vigilant looking for it. Set-up was fairly straightforward. The stand is gratifyingly solid. Connecting cables for inputs 1 & 2 was a little more difficult than I expected, the angle you hold the connectors is really important, much more so than on other sets -- although once done, everything is nice and tight. One nice surprise so far: the built-in speakers sound much better than I expected.

The picture is gorgeous. Even DVDs from an old non-progressive scan player are excellent (the progressive scan player I ordered arrives today). We watched Monday Night Football in 1080i and newscasts in 1080i, the image quality and detail were amazing. I didn't realize before what nice clothes the anchors wear!

We're very happy so far. We'll see how we feel in a few months.