Summary: Toshiba Delivers !!
Comment: I bought this over buying a Sylvania which was awful, as soonas I turned it on the picture was sharp and clear colors sharp, and clean. the sound is perfect, in fact I leave this TV on everynight and so far (since Xmas 2004) it has no buzzing or problems. The upper Digital channels from my IO Digital cable provider are sharper than ever!! I was going to buy a Sony, but Toshiba has always been a good product, and reliable
Here is a little trick i learned selling TV's when you purchae a new set leave it on a few days non-stop ( yes I said non-stop! )
this will surely test the set, if there are any flaws they will happen right away, then you can bring it back within your warranty with the store. They will never tell you this at a retail chain!
Anyway I highly recommend the 20AF44 Toshiba, make sure you use Monster S-Video or Componet Video Cables when hooking up DVD and Cable Box for best picture qulaity!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Met my expectations....
Comment: After looking through several choices for a tv that would work in a smaller room or bedroom I chose this one. Compared to the other tv's at this size (20") it has features that few others do. I noticed a lot of complaints about text being fuzzy or "off" and the tv having "warm" red colors. I've had the tv for several months now and i never noticed these complaints. Maybe i'am not as critical as others are, but for $160 I feel like I got a deal.
One other note I would like to mention:
I believe I ordered from a site that went through amazon.com (used and new section), I did not bother them about it but when i recieved the tv I noticed a small, almost unnoticeable dent in the top middle. I believe it was made by the shipping company but it looks like a lot of weight went into making it because the plastic is hard. Not enough for me to send it back although I wondered how i got it so cheap...
Customer Rating:
Summary: My Experience with the Toshiba 20AF44
Comment: I bought a 20AF44, excited as I was because I own a 20AF41 and a 14 inch 14AF42 (or 14AF43, I forgot the model number) and was very pleased with them. Unfortunately, when I hooked up my sample of the 20AF44, the screen image wasn't very focussed. Looking at text on the screen, there was a greenish hue on the right side of every letter, and the letters weren't focussed. I later discovered (partly from reading other reviews) that the velocity scan modulation, which is supposed to improve edge sharpness of images, does bad things to text, making them look fat and rough on the edges (even though it brightens same). You can't turn VSM off in the on-screen menus...BUT you can see what the screen image looks like without the VSM when you activate the on-screen menu and look at the image then. The VSM gets turned off when the menus are on so that the menu text looks clean, but you can then see the TV image behind the menus without the VSM on. Image text is clear and clean and normal looking without the VSM on. My 20AF41 and 14AF42 don't have aggressive VSM and the latter two show no difference whether the on-screen menu is on or off.
So I returned the 20AF44, as I was dissatisfied, and bought a 20-inch Sony (the model number was ?????VM300, I think). This sample was too dark and contrasty, even with the menu brightness turned up full, and although someone else on Amazon reported that tweaking the brightness with the service menu fixed things up, I didn't want to, as I demand that the unit perform properly out of the box). So I returned the Sony, and got another 20AF44. The greenish hue on text was gone, and I accepted the artifacts of VSM...but now there was an intermittant high-frequency squealing sound from the picture tube depending on the source material. I couldn't figure out what material triggers the squealing sound...also, if I activated the on-screen menu and scrolled to the two right-hand menus, that tended to cause squealing, and if I scrolled to the two left-hand menus (the sound and picture menus), the squealing would tend to stop). Note that this squealing is different from the normal humming sound that all picture tubes make. So I am going to return this second 20AF44 and buy something else. I'm frustrated by the whole experience and don't know what to buy now, as I NEED to have a 20 inch TV, and I remain happy with the two existing Toshiba TV's that I have.
Customer Rating:
Summary: When It Works It's Great, Toshiba Is Unresponsive
Comment: I bought this tv in January as a replacement/upgrade for my 13
Customer Rating:
Summary: Nice TV marred by flaws
Comment: After looking for a small 20" TV for my bedroom, I recently purchased this model. At this price point you probably shouldn't complain, but this set does have serious flaws you might want to consider if you're thinking of buying it.
First, like most inexpensive consumer TVs, this model's color decoder is extremely inaccurate. It's heavily biased towards red, to make it look "good" to the average buyer. You can try to correct it using Digital Essentials, but you won't get it even close to right. As Digital Essentials points out, this is usually done to compensate for a bluish white point, in order to create the illusion that the screen is brighter than competing models.
The 20AF44 also only has one memory setting, although it has 3 video inputs. If you use several different sources, such as cable TV, a DVD/VCR, and/or a game console, it's very hard to find a setting that looks correct for all, and since it only saves one setting, you'll either have to compromise or keep resetting it.
The most annoying aspect is the VSM (vertical scan modulation). Although it's touted as a positive "feature" by the literature, believe me, it's not. The effect on the picture is rather like turning the sharpness control all the way up, giving edges in the picture bright white outlines. It especially makes text (such as in video games) look awful. Unfortunately, even turning the sharpness control all the way down doesn't help matters. This set doesn't offer any way to turn VSM off (not even in the service menu). I can only imagine this was done to make the picture look "sharp" to the uneducated viewer.
Furthermore, the set is filled with consumer level gimmicks to make the screen look brighter, such as the presence of an invar shadow mask. Invar shadow masks help prevent the phosphors of the television from burning into the screen at insanely high contrast levels. It doesn't make the picture quality any better. It's no surprise then that out of the box the TV is set to maximum contrast: not good for the TV or the picture quality.
At the under $200 price point I really don't know if you can find a decent television without such problems. I hear the Sony models allow you to turn off VSM, even on the low end sets. It might be worth investigating the Sony if you're in the market for a set similar to this.