Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV

The Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV is a brand I had never heard of when I went looking at different stores to find an HDTV. I looked at some name brand sets, and was impressed by the picture quality of this one.

The price of the Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV at Best Buy is $699.99.

The Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV has a built in HDTV tuner, which will receive over the air HD broadcasts, which allows you to watch all the local television stations, since the digital switch over on June 12, 2009.

The resolution in the Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV is 10204 x 768 which gives you the 720p high definition picture, with a 42 inch screen. This screen is big enough for small living rooms, without seeming overwhelmingly large. The screen has the 16:9 aspect ratio for widescreen picture.

The Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV has some great features including high brightness which gives you unbelievable contrast, and a 600Hz refresh rate. This helps to make transitions smoother during actions sequences.

The viewing angle on the Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV is 160 ° horizontally and vertically. There is no seat that would have a bad view of the screen.

The set design of the Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV is very slim, a mere three inches. One minor flaw is that the inputs and outputs are all in the back of the set. There are two HDMI, two component video and one composite video inputs and one RF. The Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV also has one audio input and one digital audio input.

The Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV does include the V Chip technology, to enable parental blocking of objectionable material. The set is also Energy Star compliant. These are standard for any television produced in this day and age.

The Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV comes with a standard remote control. (In other words it is not a Universal Remote.)

Downsides include the lack of any front connection capability, and poor sound quality. The sound on the Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV is disappointing, considering how sharp and clear the picture is. Many people these days connect their televisions to home theater surround systems, which would eliminate the problem here. However, if you don’t have a home theater system, the buzz coming from the speakers would be very distracting.

The picture quality of the Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV more than makes up for the negatives. When I looked at the Insignia 42″ Plasma HDTV next to 1080p HDTVs, I really couldn’t tell the difference.