It's been a while since we reviewed a straight up 32-inch LCD - something for the entry level consumers in the HDTV market. The last time we covered Hitachi, it was for their Ultra Thin series, which was superb but pricey. Now we have a no frills 32 incher by them, called the Hitachi L32S02A LCD TV.
Design and Features
It seems Hitachi has cordoned off all their design ideas and fancies to their UT series, as this model is quite a basic looking piece, and could use a bit of pizzazz. It’s got a gloss black bezel, with a old fashioned speaker grille on the bottom panel. This is something that should have been concealed better. There is a silver strip outlining this grille, plus we have the Hitachi logo etched bang on center, also in silver. The stand is oval and of the same gloss black finish.
The back panel is bare, with the input terminal window facing downwards, another iffy for me. Though it's not such a big deal, a little bending backwards doesn’t hurt. Speaking of inputs, we have 2 HDMIs, one VGA in (mini D-SUB) for PC, 2 component ins and a couple of composite video inputs. There is a set of input on the left panel too: a headphone out and a composite video in. The model might be new, but the design sure seems old.
As for rated specifications, we have native contrast at 1000:1, with a 500 cd/m2 brightness. Response time is 5 ms, and the main thing with Hitachi LCDs that is advertised in bold: an S-IPS panel. This technology boasts very good viewing angles, and they actually do have good angles, though backlight bleed can be an issue, something we have observed in past reviews.
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Performance
As a regular process/ritual in any review, we calibrated the TV first, and used display patterns to check the technical performance. Firstly, speaking of pure luminance information (only black and white) we have medium, or average black levels. We had to raise the brightness to about 65 (out of 100) to get detailed low blacks. On the opposite side, the whites were pretty accommodating, no real clipping or blooming even on higher contrast levels, but there is an issue.
The whitest white (100 IRE) had a trace of yellowish tinge. The temperature of the gray values was more or less around 6500 K, except highest white. This is not ideal, but practically speaking I do not mind cutting the TV a bit of slack as it's an entry level LCD.
Colors were very accurate, barring a little oversaturation in the reds. On the menu, colors should be kept at ‘normal’ temperature, and at 50 or less in the color setting. Another thing I loved about the TV was the detail, and of course the viewing angles. All this combined makes the image really vibrant and well focused, from a wider range of viewing. Motion also was really good. I played the latest Street Fighter on PS3 on the TV, and the colors and movement were spectacular. The only issue was that as mentioned earlier the blacker levels were a little smudgy.
Conclusion
The S32S02 costs Rs. 41000, which is almost reasonable. I think its worth it, as the build quality is good and the image is vibrant with lovely colors. The only iffy is the blacks are not up to the mark. Motion is again noise and clutter free (relatively), thus it can definitely be an option for someone entering the LCD TV market.
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