Digital Trends

Samsung HLN617W March 25th, 2004 | by Brandon King

Viewing and Testing

The Samsung HLN line of DLPs feature DNIe technology (Digital Natural Image Engine), used to enhance detail, contrast, white balance, color, and allow for 3D motion noise reduction. The set also features a Faroujda chip, considered one of the best in the industry. The DCDi technology implemented by the Faroujda chip contributes to the absolutely beautiful picture.

Essentially, the Samsung DLP delivers a one-two punch of the latest and newly affordable image enhancement technologies. If that isn't enough, there's also standard digital noise reduction, which in our viewing tests did not produce a noticeable change in image quality. The setup menu also allows you to choose from a variety of color tones, as well as the expected brightness, contrast, color, and sharpness controls.

We tested the set with a Playstation 2 (480i/p input), Xbox (480p/720p/1080i input), Motorola DCT-5100 HD Cable box (DVI), and a home-theater PC (PC VGA input) based on an ATI Radeon All-In-Wonder 9800 Pro. We used high-quality Monster Cables for all of our connections. We won't discuss much about the audio quality beyond the observation that it is very good. The Dolby Virtual option does a nice job of expanding the soundstage, and we were pleased with the quality. The BBE sound enhancement attempts to create the surround sound experience with only two speakers. The effect is nice, but will not compete with a physical 5.1 channel setup. The audio that comes out of the pass-through is set to a constant level, so changing the volume on the TV set had no effect on the device it is passed to. The remote is a simple universal design capable on controlling the TV, VCR, cable box, and DVD player.

The image quality literally blew us away when playing Lord of the Rings through the HTPC with PowerDVD. Watching CSI in full high definition glory was a whole new experience. Colors were all vibrant, with very little tearing or artifacts, and featured excellent black levels. As with all rear projection TVs, the amount of ambient light influences the quality of the black levels and color saturation. The setup menus offer the option of Dynamic color/brightness/contrast calibration which attempts to compensate for ambient light. We found this option best for daytime viewing. We also accessed the super secret service menu to adjust the gamma levels, since our set came calibrated to display light green grass as an almost neon bright green.

One letdown was the Playstation 2 experience. Because the Samsung DLP has such an excellent, accurate, and high resolution picture, the Playstation 2 felt like we were playing an old Nintendo, with the amount of pixilation. However, DVDs looked excellent, as we were using a v9 Playstation 2 with progressive scan. The Xbox did noticeably better, especially in 720p formatted games like True Crimes: Streets of LA. In the end, though, the Home Theater PC blew them all out of the water with Unreal Tournament 2003 and Need for Speed Underground.

It is worth noting that we used Powerstrip to create custom drivers in order to achieve 1:1 pixel mapping with the HTPC. The zoom options for the PC input either resulted in a black border, or overscan, rendering the start menu out of the visible area. This was done by following several guides and threads at http://www.avsforum.com.  Image quality was noticeably sharper, and contained less flicker when using the DVI input, versus the PC input. In all, once correctly mapped, the Samsung DLP makes a stunning computer monitor. At 15 feet from the screen, no font size changes needed to be made and text was crisp and clear.  One unexpected setting we had to make was turning the sharpness down.  This dramatically reduced jaggies and pixelation.