Toshiba 46XV645U

Entering the 46 inch screen category, the Toshiba 46XV645U high definition television is a LCD screen that comes in at the expensive end of its class, but from what we have heard it is more than worth it. This is a television that is bang on the mark, so we were very excited when it arrived in a box for us to get our sticky fingers all over, and in the name of research load our favorite Blu-ray DVD’s and sit back and watch the results. Honest, we were not just slacking off. We even found time to write this review so you can see what we found.

Overview

Yet again we have been left cold by the marketing techniques of Toshiba. Talk about laid back advertising, but we fear in this climate they could do serious damage to their sales figures if they don’t buck up a bit. The key feature of this product, going on their own website alone, is its 1080p full HD display. And that’s all, folks. So, we contemplated not getting the television out of the box, because if that’s it, we are bored already. Thankfully we were in a good mood so we did open the box, and actually the Toshiba 46XV645U has an awful lot more going for it. We really like it.

Key Features

It is a sleek black design, and is another in the Deep Lagoon design range that Toshiba are so proud of. They say it has taken inspiration from nature and given it a natural 3D shape. Not sure it makes that much difference; however, in our opinion this is just a good looking unit and we didn’t really think nature though, to be honest. The glossy black frame is about an inch thick around the screen which is pretty much spot on, framing it nicely without impeding on the clarity of the screen. It boasts a key combination of two of Toshiba’s favorite bits of technology, the REGZA‚ Engine and Clear Frame 120Hz, and the two combined do give an amazing quality of picture which is certainly something to be admired. We were more than happy to watch longer than was really needed, just because the picture was so excellent.

Again the ClearScan 240™ emulator that Toshiba have developed is also present, making this 120Hz unit perform as if it were a 240Hz, which certainly helps with anti-blurring. However, it doesn’t actually help with the black depths. As we have seen before on Toshiba televisions with ClearScan 240™ the black varies between so dark that you lose shadow level details into one solid black mess or are too pale, bordering on grayscale which then gives the picture a washed out effect which again is a shame.

The Clear Frame technology comes into its own when viewing sports programs, and it is best that you turn this off when viewing films. Toshiba have preprogrammed this function to go off if you put the Toshiba 46XV645U into gaming mode, so from their point of view it is not gaming technology. When we were testing the unit we did notice that it comes pre-calibrated but to the ‘Store’ settings, which will be somewhat bright as this sets the contrast and backlight functions to 100%. Our advice is to recalibrate to the ‘Home’ setting, which also has the added benefit of being less power hungry and you will get a financial saving over the course of the year by using the home setting through choice.

The true bonus of the Toshiba 46XV645U is that it also comes with another clever piece of technology, AutoView™, which sorts pretty much every setting out for you. Think brightness, contrast, color saturation and sharpness, which means you can just sit back and watch and not have to worry about the settings as the set will identify and select the best settings for the picture.

Conclusion

The Toshiba 46XV645U is an excellent high definition TV, and it really is value for money. The slightly superior technology means that the issues with Toshiba’s 240Hz emulator surrounding black depth are not quite as bad as we have seen on some of their other sets. If anything the black has certainly gained depth, just sadly a bit too much in shadowy areas. However, overall this television does not disappoint and we are very impressed with it and the way the technologies blend together and produce some exceedingly crisp images. So in our opinion yes, we would purchase this particular set as it does perform really well.

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