My wife and I have had an old Philips TV in our bedroom for some time. When we decided to go HD, we actually bought a Philips 47" for the family room--and loved it. So it seemed a good idea to buy another Philips to replace the one in the bedroom. Bad move.

I was really happy with the specs on this TV. No, it's not 1080, but for our bedroom, that's really OK. There are generous inputs for DVDs, satellite, Playstation, etc. It also looks nice, the stand swivels, which is great for the location we chose. And the picture is quite nice. DVDs look great, and HD looks even better.

The trouble with this set is the audio. It sounds *horrible*. No, beyond horrible. The speakers are located in the back, and are supposed to be "Incredible Surround" more like incredible Tin Can. Seriously, they have absolutely no low end, the mid-range is muddled. I played around with moving it to different locations--thinking maybe it was a reflection problem, since the speakers are in the back. No dice. It still sounds like the speakers are coffee cans with string. Seriously, I've heard better quality of sound on pay phones. The sound on this TV sucks so hard I was ready to return it. The only saving grace is that it does have outputs (Dolby Digital and a headphone jack). I've actually used the headphone jack to hook up a pair of $20 Altec Lansing PC speakers that sound *much* better than the built in speakers on this t*rd of a TV.

Seriously, save your money. There are other TVs in the Philips line that don't feature the rear speakers, and I'm sure they are great. This one is a total dog. Stay away.

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I received this Tv and it would not turn on? I could not fine a manual button on Tv to turn on. Messing with remote I did get it on but it would not respond to remote you press 20 and get channel 66. I called company that verified Warrantee and said tv was not the problem it was remote and one was ordered. But to date I do not have tv back. It has been a month. I cannot believe it could take so long to receive. Repair shop has had it. Frustrated out the money and yet to receive a working TV.

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In all honesty I can't really complain as I got this as a Christmas gift from my brother-in-law. We took a ride out to a big box retailer since he had some gift cards he wanted to use towards the purchase. I already own a Panasonic 50" plasma which I love in the living room and this model is now in my bedroom.

I always preferred plasma over LCD's mainly because of the deeper blacks. The store we went to didnt have much of a selection which I'm guessing is because they sold most of their stock during the Holidays. We went on the 28th when there seemed to only be left overs in stock. Being that I had no idea how much he wanted to spend I kind of just followed him to see which model/price range he was looking at.

I personally would have preferred a cheap Vizio 42" plasma, but I was more than grateful for this LCD. We paid 550 but I see theres places online selling them for 500 which is great for a 32" LCD. My 24" computer monitor was 500 bucks just 8 months ago! On the same token I seen the 42" Vizio plasma for $700 but I didn't want to push my luck with my brother in law. :P

The TV itself has 3 HDMI inputs, an S-video input on the side, and I believe two component inputs. Right now I have it hooked up via component cables as the HDMI cable is in the mail and on its way. The stand is glossy and looks nice but its not adjustable at all. The sound is more on the tiny side and the built in surround sound mode didn't do much to add any oomph to the sound at all.

I never cared too much about sound as you can always buy a cheap 5.1 setup, and inputs never concerned me as you can always buy a cheap receiver to add tons of extra inputs. The bread and butter has to be the picture quality and I wasn't very impressed with this set. There is very noticeable pixalation and a good amount of ghosting in fast moving objects. SD channels don't look very good at all even when upconverted through my cable box. HD content looked good but not nearly as clear as my plasma. Color reproduction was decent when tweaked, and even using one of the preset color modes were OK.

The set offers Sports, Movie, Game, Custom, and Power Saver modes to quickly adjust color. Just be aware that they also effect audio levels! It's the first TV I noticed that when changing color modes the audio level also changed. One feature I always appreciated with Philips sets is the audio level feature that keeps commercials and other sources from blasting the audio volume up on its own. With this feature enabled all sources will be kept the same. Thats one feature I never realized how great it was until I didn't have it and some commercials would nearly blow my eardrums out!

The zoom features seem to work very well and they offer a few options (I believe 5 or 6 options) on how to stretch 4:3 images. I found the best option to be the super zoom option as it only cuts a very small piece off the bottom of the screen and doesn't stretch the image to make everyone look fat. They also have an Automatic mode which lets the TV pick the best option depending on the souce coming in. I noticed once I switched from using an S-video cable to component cables I no longer could pick between zoom modes on the TV. All the options were greyed out except for the wide-screen option. This was fine since my cable box also gives the option to leave HD content in its native widescreen and it stretches 4:3 content to fit the screen. It does a good job but SD content stretched makes everyone look short and stumpy. I really liked the TV's stretch options better so it's unfortunate you lose those options when using component or HDMI.

The remote control is very basic in feel and function. It's not very comfortable to hold and the buttons are awkwardly laid out. It also has 3 buttons on the top that are just labeled with colors which is hard to see at night. Luckily I was able to program my cable boxes remote to control the TV's basic functionality.

All in all I'm happy to have upgraded to a larger set for the bedroom, I just wish the picture was better at displaying SD content. The pixelation and ghosting is really amplified on SD channels. I also would have liked for the stand to at the least be able to be adjusted up and down. If it were up to me I would spend the extra $150 and get a nice 42" plasma but if money or size constraints is an issue this should do ya fine.





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Bought August 2nd, 2008. Dead December 23rd, 2008. Just stopped working. Doorstop or boat anchor. When it worked, it was great. But an HD set should last some years.

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Our TV just gave out after owning it for less than a year. The power button is lit red but wil not advance. The TV will not go beyond a black screen. I called customer service to be told, for a fee of $274.62 plus tax they will replace it. I can buy the same tv on the web for the $240 range!

Not good customer care or product.

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I bought a 47" Philips LCD TV about a year ago and was very happy with it. When the time came to re-do the bedroom (her wish) it was time for a new TV (my condition). I bought my first one around 4 months ago and installed it up on the wall in the bedroom (with the mount I used I did it myself, but it was a workout).

Picture - The first thing I have to say is there are times the picture is spooky good. I was watching a regular DVD of 'Stargate Atlantis' on it and remember when the dead girl crawls out of the TV screen in the movie 'The Ring'? It looked like the actors were coming out of the screen at me. 'Journey to the Center of the Earth' in 3D? Man is it hard to duck in bed! I think part of that is the upgrade to 120 Hz. The 'Power Saver' mode is nice in the bedroom because it darkens the picture when someone wants to watch TV but someone else wants to sleep. One annoying thing, it's minor and I only mention it because the 47" Philips I own does not do it, but when you turn this TV on a black screen goes to a brilliant bright white screen with 'PHILIPS' in blue across it. Not really necessary or appreciated in a dark bedroom 1st thing in the morning.

Sound - This TV hands down has the best sound for a LCD it's size that I've come across (I've installed about 10 LCD's' so far for friends and family). Controlling the sound environment for this TV seems to be driven off of the picture mode you select. Example - If you select 'SPORTS' for the picture, along with a change in the picture the surround effect is enhanced greatly so the crowd noise increases. There are multiple picture modes to play with though so it's not hard to find one that's pleasing to your audio and video tastes. I also wish it had an output for a subwoofer. It has a 'S/PDIF' output for a stereo but no other connections that go out other than a headphone jack. It does have equalizer settings that you can tweak.

Other - Upgrading to newer software is slick. D/L the newest version from Philips onto a USB drive and plug it in. Read the directions the first time though to explain what you'll see. I've done it once on my TV with no problems. The remote is well laid out, but is not backlit and the buttons are not raised like most TV remotes I've seen. That makes it a little harder to tell what you're doing. I liked the TV enough and thought it simple enough to operate (though Vizio still wins that category IMO) that I bought my 80+ year old parents one of them for an early Christmas present. No complaints so far. They're out in the country and get their HD from OTA stations. Spectacular picture and they are at least 40 miles away from the nearest tower so the built-in tuner is no slouch either. Philips has a winner on their hands with this TV.

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I have had this TV for almost a year now and in the last month it has gone wonkey. At first it started out with a lot of static when you first turn the TV on, but now whenever it is turned on it emits a very high-pitched noise, the screen goes in lines, and then it shuts of, only to turn itself on again and start the process over. It is really frustrating, and quite frankly, very hard on the ears.

I contacted Philips about the issue and they have yet to respond. If you are looking for a good TV that will last about 9 months, this one is for you. If you want longevity, steer clear.

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Philips 42PFL7403D/27 42-Inch 1080p 120Hz LCD HDTV

I've purchased this TV in early August and the picture quality can't be beat in my opinion. On the other hand, the on screen controls don't measure up. For example, type in a channel number and you'll see a number that can't be much larger than one inch square show up on the screen camouflaged among the current TV picture, then once the channel changes, huge bars cover a large potion of the screen displaying all the program info; looking like a huge horizontal bar chart. The remote while complete and intuitive is not laid out well nor is it ergonomically shaped.

Since it is a TV the picture quality is my highest priority and I'm very happy about that, but I would have thought Philips/Magnovox would have had a better handle on the design of the on screen documentation and remote layout.

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We bought this TV at sams club and we got a 300 dollar in store gift card. We bought the TV for 1200, do the math...good deal!

Anyway, we were pleasantly surprised by how this tv makes our regular DVD's look HIGH DEF. For this, we're going to hold off on Blue-ray for awhile.

The TV is 120hz so the motion of the camera and subjects in the movie seem to move around different, but the quality is awsome.

I don't have a lot of Electronic jargon to throw at you but you need to know you won't be disappointed with this TV. The TV even has audio plug ins for 5.1 surround sound...I've only seen this on computers and receivers.

I'm not sure when the best time to buy a TV is since the price are always coming down. My advice is don't buy a TV with less than 120hz and 29,000:1 contrast ratio (depending on your budget). Because this is the cream of the crop right now...well you can get a contrast ratio better than that, but realistically, you shouldn't get anything lower than that.

Sears or most stores give you 60 days to keep your reciept for price matching. if you own a club membership, I highly recommend you look there first and ask about free giftcards with a large purchase like this.



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I am extremely happy with this TV.
it says on a lot of sites that this TV has an 8ms response time, but when you look in the owners manual it says its 5ms.

I think watching SDTV on this TV is great. I work for the cable company, and that being said, I have seen A LOT of pricey/cheap whatever price range of TV, look like crap when it comes to standard def programing. its not really something you want to see after spending X amount of dollars on a new TV. this one pulls it off very well.
honestly its not spectacular, but it pulls it off very well.(and I have it in my bedroom sitting 5ft or less away from it)

I also have an upscalling DVD player(samsung) works great with it. but not ALL movies I watch get put into 1080P. like, I put in AC/DC Live at the Donington today, and it looks a little worse than my cable SD. but that's ok with me. I put in Batman: the Dark Knight. it looks F-ing amazing. I also checked out a couple other movies like Kung-Fu Panda and The Simpsons movie: they look great too.

as for games, I really have only played GTA:IV on it once and I was playing it with the AV cables rather than the HDMI/component(whatever 360 uses) and it looked ok. looked better on my SD tube tv than it does on this TV, but I am hoping to get the HD cables for my 360 soon.
if I am able to update this later, I will.

and for the HDTV: its great. picture looks better than it does in the store.
its too bad I only get 1080i off of cable, but it still looks amazing.
this TV is just flat out amazing for the price. this is worth more than I payed for sure.

now as for the title "be carefull what they give you in the store"
the model I asked for at the store (which was the TV I REALLY wanted was the 42pfl7403d) that one had the computer connection that I wanted on the back, 120Hz, 2ms response time, and 30W audio output. which is what I really wanted for the sports, action movies, and high speed games.
but honestly the 42pfl3603d is just perfect already, other than the computer connection I wanted.

there is no blurring when it comes to fast picture.
I love this TV. its great.

**UPDATE**
I picked up component cables for my 360 yesterday after I wrote this review.
after I plugged it in and checked it out, looked a little better, but still a little crappy. but after a few setting changes on the 360 and TV itself, it looked great. just as good as I thought it was going to be.
(I tested out GTA4 at full 1080p)

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