'Generic' vs premium brand flat screen TVs

hellfire

hellfire

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Been doing a bit of TV research... beyond spec-to-spec comparisons between TVs (which are often subjective at best), is there a reason to buy a premium brand flat screen (Samsung, Sony, LG) over a 'generic' brand (AIM, Sinotec, Telefunken, Hisense)?
Is there a difference in the panel quality? Are they using cheaper components, or is it a case of paying for a brand name?
 
I wouldn't put hisense in the same stable as AIM,SinoTec etc. as they are OEM whereas Hisense is its own brand and is kinda like Kia/Hyundai was when they launched - real value for money.
 
GhostSixFour said:
I wouldn't put hisense in the same stable as AIM,SinoTec etc. as they are OEM whereas Hisense is its own brand and is kinda like Kia/Hyundai was when they launched - real value for money.
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Fair enough. Hisense doesn't manufacture from scratch, though. They import parts and assemble here (probably avoiding duties on importing finished products).

That said, does Hisense TV compare to a Samsung/Sony?
 
Definitely reason to go with premium brands.

Perhaps the best way to prove this, is to view the TVs in a dark room with a black image displaying.

Cheapies will have so much more inconsistent lighting, light bleed, LED spots, etc.

Of course, when you are in a Massmart store under thousands of watts of lighting with all the TVs set to Torch mode, you'll never pick it up.
 
My Sony now has 3 lines of what appears to be dead pixels running the entire width of the screen 3 months after the warranty ended. My friend has a Sinoteq that is still going strong after 5 years - give or take a year.
 
eehellfire said:
Fair enough. Hisense doesn't manufacture from scratch, though. They import parts and assemble here (probably avoiding duties on importing finished products).

That said, does Hisense TV compare to a Samsung/Sony?
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4 year warranty on hisense vs 2 year on most others. Picture quality etc will most likely be similar, but with regards to having back-up and support for an additional 2 years, I think this is quite significant.
 
PostmanPot said:
Definitely reason to go with premium brands.

Perhaps the best way to prove this, is to view the TVs in a dark room with a black image displaying.

Cheapies will have so much more inconsistent lighting, light bleed, LED spots, etc.

Of course, when you are in a Massmart store under thousands of watts of lighting with all the TVs set to Torch mode, you'll never pick it up.
Click to expand...

Our company recently purchased a lot of Samsung TV's from the big 65" to the 46" approximately 40 TV's. The light bleeding on them isn't something to write home about and we had to send back 8 of them as OBF's.
 
Generally the panels themselves are lower grade and often from top tier manufacturers like Samsung but the ones that failed their own QA tests.

Then there's the scalers built-into these sub-brands which simply aren't put to scratch.

So it's all about picture quality at the end of the day.


But if you aren't the type of person to be bothered by blacks not being black or colours not being accurate, then you probably wouldn't notice anyway.
 
GhostSixFour said:
Our company recently purchased a lot of Samsung TV's from the big 65" to the 46" approximately 40 TV's. The light bleeding on them isn't something to write home about and we had to send back 8 of them as OBF's.
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Are you saying that the light bleed is bad? Well, that's the nature of LCD/LED-LCD, I guess.

If you're saying that it isn't bad, then that's great. Would have been a helluva lot worse with cheapies.
 
GhostSixFour said:
Our company recently purchased a lot of Samsung TV's from the big 65" to the 46" approximately 40 TV's. The light bleeding on them isn't something to write home about and we had to send back 8 of them as OBF's.
Click to expand...

Even fancy brands have their cheaper product lines.

I wouldn't be surprised if the "no name" brands are better than the likes of Samsung 3 or 4-series TV's but when you start running into the Series 5 leagues it becomes a different story.

Much the same like you can't compare a Vivo to a Polo to a Golf to a Passat.
 
PostmanPot said:
Are you saying that the light bleed is bad? Well, that's the nature of LCD/LED-LCD, I guess.

If you're saying that it isn't bad, then that's great. Would have been a helluva lot worse with cheapies.
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It's quite bad on some of them.

SauRoNZA said:
Even fancy brands have their cheaper product lines.

I wouldn't be surprised if the "no name" brands are better than the likes of Samsung 3 or 4-series TV's but when you start running into the Series 5 leagues it becomes a different story.

Much the same like you can't compare a Vivo to a Polo to a Golf to a Passat.
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I don't know the model numbers etc. but it's the thin ones with the silver stands..
 
SauRoNZA said:
Generally the panels themselves are lower grade and often from top tier manufacturers like Samsung but the ones that failed their own QA tests.

Then there's the scalers built-into these sub-brands which simply aren't put to scratch.

So it's all about picture quality at the end of the day.


But if you aren't the type of person to be bothered by blacks not being black or colours not being accurate, then you probably wouldn't notice anyway.
Click to expand...

Definitely care about blacks being black, not so sure about colours being accurate. I have an oldish Samsung HD Ready LCD, the blacks aren't very black and often contain blocky image trails, sometimes get weird overtones/shadows on other colours e.g. yellow patches on caucasian characters
 
My Sinotec 42" Full HD LCD is still going strong after 5 years. I bought it on special at Makro for R8500 back in December 2008.

I would agree that premium brands are sharper and are more vibrant in colours, but its not really that noticeable unless they are side by side, or if you have a premium and generic in your home and often watch on one and then the other.
 
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