Sony Bravia KDL

Two thousand zero zero party over, oops, out of time, so tonight I’m gonna party like I have a last-generation games console built into my frickin’ television… as Prince is probably singing to himself today while he reads Crave. The new Bravia KDL-22PX300 LCD television is every bit as bonkers as His Purpleness himself, as it has a PlayStation 2 built into it.

The X300 is a 22-inch, 720p television with four HDMI ports, three USB sockets, and VGA and component inputs. A built-in Freeview tuner lets you watch Top Gear all day every day, with an Ethernet connection for IPTV viewing including services such as YouTube and Lovefilm.

The PS2 allows you to watch DVDs, and you can play PlayStation and PS2 games. That could mean a trip up into the attic or down to Cash Converters, seeing as the PS2 launched ten years ago and the next-generation PlayStation 3 has ruled the roost since 2006. A single controller is included with the TV.

While it is a kosher Sony product, Sony is keeping tight-lipped about the telly and wouldn’t give us any details because the company is “not ‘actively’ pushing the item”. We know the feeling: we’ve lost count of the days we’ve spent trying not to talk about something that seemed like a fantastic idea the night before.

We can see ourselves having a very similar conversation. “I know, I know, letsh put a PShhhh2, right, in a telly.” “Why?” “Because, right, itsh a PShh2… in a telly!” “Brilliant! Letsh do it!”

Twelve hours later: “Crave, can anyone explain to me exactly you have put this PlayStation 2 in this television?” “Sorry sir, we can’t talk about that. Er, do you have any Berocca?”

Even if it’s not owning up to this one, Sony is keen to stick a PlayStation in anything it can. A Sony Ericsson PlayStation phone is in the pipeline, known as the Zeus Z1. Any minute now there’ll be an original PlayStation One in a washing machine, just you watch.

The PS2 telly costs a very reasonable £200, and is only available by dropping into Richer Sounds.

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Sony Bravia KDL

Christmas — or Xmas as it’s now known, on account of Jesus being largely forgotten in the rush to sell tat — is coming and that means coloured TVs and other electrical goods. We saw the Sony Bravia KDL-20S3070U coming from a mile away, and we don’t just mean because it’s brightly coloured — each year parents seem to give their children increasingly extravagant gifts in increasingly ludicrous colours.

When we were nippers, we used to get awesome presents, but they were generally small and cost a little bit less than today’s child-pleasers. For example, we’d get an Optimus Prime toy, or if our parents weren’t pacifists, maybe a Megatron. We also didn’t have TVs in our bedrooms, but these days it seems that every 5-year-old in the land has a goggle-box in their room. Hence the pink Bravia.

Of course, it’s a great TV — the S series are good budget models — but we mean the word ‘budget’ in a relative sense, because let’s not pretend the word means the same to Sony as it does to, say, Goodmans. This TV is £445. Yes, that’s right: it’s a 20-inch TV for the same price as you could get a 32-inch one for.

The KDL-20S3070U has one HDMI, a PC input, component in and some Scart sockets. Obviously it’s happy with high-definition material up to 1080i, and will make a good companion for games consoles such as the PS3 or Xbox 360, especially if your children have one of those in their bedrooms too. The lucky beggars.

So, if your children are called Tarquin and Tamara and you live in a house with more than two floors, this is the sort of TV you’ll be interested in giving this Christmas. To prove its posh credentials, Sony calls it ‘Fuchsia Pink’ instead of just ‘Pink’. If you’re a regular Joe with kids called Frank and Sarah, you’ll probably just want to get a slightly more sensible TV for the kiddies — that’s if you really think letting them watch I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here in bed is a good idea. -Ian Morris

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Sony Bravia KDL

During the forthcoming festive period, many City folk are likely to receive very large bonuses, which they will need to spend on something to impress their snooty mates. Sony has cleverly targeted the super-rich pillock market — its Bravia KDL-70X3500 will certainly soak up a good chunk of that extra cash, and will definitely impress everyone in a 3-mile radius.

As well as looking good in a trendy Hoxton loft that was once a match factory, the KDL-70X3500 is also brilliant for watching movies. Of course, you’ll need a high-definition DVD player — Sony would like you to use Blu-ray, but HD DVD is perfectly suitable. To make the most of movies, the X3500 series — which is also available in more reasonable screen sizes, at prices normal people can afford — has 24p support, theatre mode and extended xvYCC colour space. Fancy.

As you can imagine, 1080p support is all present and correct, and the whole X3500 range has a 10-bit LCD panel and a special photo mode, which is designed to make your digital photos look great on the TV. The photo mode is actually a smart move, because while TVs are optimised for moving pictures, they don’t generally do a great job with still ones. Nice thinking from Sony there.

On the 70-inch model, the traditional LCD backlight light is replaced by one made up of an array of LEDs. This means the TV can attain a theoretical contrast ratio of 25,000:1 — an impressive figure and no mistake. The smaller screen sizes lack the LED backlight, but still manage a very respectable 18,000:1 contrast ratio.

There’s a built-in Freeview receiver too, but it would be fair to guess that at 70 inches a low bit-rate 576i standard-definition picture will look like abstract art. The good news is Sony has included a high-definition capable receiver, should Ofcom ever admit that HD is the way forward rather than 30 shopping channels.

The KDL-70X3500 is available on Amazon for £24,999 and amusingly, even though it costs as much as a nice Audi A4, it still wants £30 off you for delivery. And it’s not eligible for super-saver delivery either. -Ian Morris

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Sony Bravia KDL

We got some one-on-one time with the Bravia D3000 TVs at Sony’s annual event in March and we haven’t been able to stop thinking about them since. With the impending arrival of the 32-inch KDL-32D3000 model we’ll be reviewing it in full soon, but until then here’s some more tantalising info on this eagerly awaited television.

The highlights of this Bravia are Motionflow and the support for 24p. Motionflow, as its name suggests, is designed to aid the flow of motion on-screen. This is handy if you want to remove the judder from movies and generally reduce blur on moving objects — often a problem on LCD screens. On the other hand, 24p is almost the opposite. It’s intended to show movies from Blu-ray and HD DVD as they were originally shot on film, judder and all. We loved both features, but Motionflow is particularly impressive, and shows how far LCD technology has come in recent years.

On the negative side, one thing that struck us when the D3000 was announced is its lack of a 1080p panel. It does support 1080p
signals though, which it downconverts to show on the 720p screen. Despite the
panel resolution, there’s some serious image processing going on here
that makes for an awesome viewing experience.

As you would expect, the Bravia D3000 range has great connectivity. With Sony being at the forefront of both high-definition gaming and video, the decision to include three HDMI sockets doesn’t surprise us. One of the HDMI sockets is side-mounted though, which will suit some, but not all.

The D3000 also wins eco-points by being recommended by the Energy Saving Trust. This means it will save you money and possibly the lives of polar bears, plus it will exempt you from having to listen to pompous pop-stars and ridiculous royals telling you to save the planet while they jet around in carbon-belching aeroplanes. -Ian Morris

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