Panasonic Viera TX-32LZD81 32in Freesat HD LCD TV Review

Hopefully these comments may help someone considering purchasing this TV, I have had 4 months to play with this TV since treating myself at Christmas after reading many reviews, its worth travelling a few miles to ensure you get the 5yr warranty, the price I paid is still over £100 less than I can get locally without the 5yr warranty,
Now the TV, first bad points, well one I can think of, after it's done an overnight update it won't switch back on,just sits there with the led flashing, (this has happened 3 times in 4 months)no biggie, just turn off at the mains for a minute to reset itself,
Good points, the picture out of the box is good but not what I'd describe as excellent, but spend a little time setting it up & I'm sure it will be well worth it, I downloaded a test card & went through the TV's many settings until I was happy with them all, now I WOULD describe the picture as excellent, not even rushing to close the curtains in bright sunlight as with previous TV's,
Auto set up in freesat is great,inc BBC-HD (connected to the same quad LNB that I am using to recieve sky) but if you enter Other SAT (non freesat mode) and run a 45 minute scan for all satellites you will find many more signals than those available on freesat at the moment, in fact so many signals that it's not possible to store them all on the TV's 1000 presets, of course a lot of these are encrypted, but you should be able to pick up all "free to view channels" on astra 2A-2D & Eurobird 1, without moving the dish, I have over 500 sat channels stored including Luxe HD, enough to keep most people happy I think,
Very happy with the sound, it's possible to set up volume corrections on each mode, freesat, DVB, AV, HDMI etc so there is no more having to turn the sound up & down as you go from DVD to TV to freesat etc, my laptop linked to the TV provides an adequete picture and sound from the laptop is also available on the TV via an adapter,
One note re Carolines comments about not being able to send freesat to other TV's via the RF lead is true, but if you go into the link settings it's possible to set AV1/AV2 to TV out and then I think you should be able to scart out the channel being watched on the TV to a video sender if you wished, although I use this facility to viera link to my panasonic DVD recorder which works great on Direct TV record & Timer programming on both freesat & freeview
IN CONCLUSION, although I have probably spent a total of several days setting it up over the last 4 months, in my opinion it's the best TV we have ever owned & perfect for our family's requirements and with the ethernet socket hopefully about as future proof as is possible for any TV to be, it will be interesting to see if any new services will be provided via ethernet in the future, I have not tried the common interface up to now but I understand reading comments in various forums that it is possible to recieve pay to view, setanta etc, if I can help with any questions about this TV please contact me at at94@btinternet.com

Further to Marks comments about hooking up a video sender to AV1 or AV2 - yes this works OK but only if you have the TV switched on at the same time as the TV receiving the signal in the other room. Does anyone have a suggestion how I might watch Sky News in bed even if the TV downstairs is turned off?

Hi JLO, I don't know if this will help or not, with the LZD81 connected to a Panasonic DVD recorder, I am able to start recording SKY News in non freesat mode, then turn the TV onto standby (TV off tuner still on), the DVD recorder will continue to record Sky News OK with the TV on Standby, so if it's possible to output to a DVD recorder with the TV on standby maybe there is some way to output to a video sender with the TV on standby, I think its a case of conning the TV into thinking that its recording so that it leaves the tuner on, failing that how about a cheap FTA box for your bedroom (ie Fortec Star FS4200 from Maplins @£39.99) and taking another feed off the dish

I have just bought this TV for £639 (including a 5 year warranty) from Discount Electrical UK, the price advertised here of £569 does not include a 5 year warranty (which is £175 extra with D&G incidentally). I've yet to discover how good the TV performs, but it's in the top 4 of all LCDs and Plasmas tested by Which, which can't be bad.