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Samsung clearly doesn’t believe less is more: this year it has launched 17 new televisions. Of these, two are whacking great plasmas and the other 15 are LCDs. Crave suspects Samsung doesn’t get out much. There are three ranges: the entry-level S86, the mid-level R87 and fully featured M87.
The S86 range offers screen sizes of 26, 32, 37, 40 and 46 inches. All of them are 720p-compatible with a resolution of 1,366×768 pixels. They all have response times of 8ms, offer two HDMI sockets at the rear as well as component in, so your hi-def requirements are taken care of. There are the usual range of analogue inputs, including composite, S-Video and Scart. There’s also a gaming mode, which will be popular with console owners.
The R87 range consists of five screens, with sizes of 23, 26, 32, 37 and 40 inches. Like the S86 range, they’re all 720p screens, with a resolution of 1,366×768 pixels and a response time of 8ms. The good news is that these televisions all feature three HDMI sockets — something we love to see. One of these sockets is even side-mounted, which makes it ideal for hooking up a PlayStation 3 without messing around behind the TV and risking some painful muscle strains, not to mention wire-spaghetti hell.
And finally, the jewel in the crown is the M87 range, which is 1080p ready, so you can get the most out of HD DVD or Blu-ray. There are five different sizes available~: 32, 37, 40, 46 and 52 inches. The only problem we can see with this range is that the 32-inch model doesn’t actually have a 1,900×1,080-pixel screen, it’s a 720p one, with a resolution of 1,366×768 pixels. While we think it’s a tiny bit sneaky for Samsung to include this screen in a supposedly ‘Full HD’ range, we’re pleased to see all of the M87 screens supporting HDMI 1.3 for extra-vivid colours and Dolby TrueHD sound. Expect full reviews in two shakes. -IM
