Hitachi UT32MH70 32in LCD TV
Only 39mm thick? You'd better believe it
Review When you’re watching TV you want to be directly in front of it, right? So why should a manufacturer make a fuss about a TV's sides, specifically how thin they are?
Even more puzzling is the fact that greater thinness actually does make a difference, as this sleek TV from Hitachi proves.
Hitachi's UT32MH70: only 39mm at its thickest point
If you’re sitting almost anywhere except straight in front of Hitachi’s UT - for "ultra-thin" - TV, the frame’s lack of depth is pleasingly noticeable. So pleasing, in fact, that you might be tempted to angle the screen slightly so that when it’s not switched on, visitors can’t fail but notice your size-zero model.
It’s 39mm at its thickest point, which is about a third of the thickness of a typical LCD TV. We know there are even more anorexic models on the way from manufacturers, like one at 9.9mm from Sony, but for now 39mm is still impressive, especially when mundane elements such as the power supply have had to be starved to fit them in.
Other items, such as the digital and analogue tuners, have been left out, supplied in a separate box, and that keeps the screen slim, too. It also has a happy knock-on effect in terms of weight – the Hitachi is under 11kg. And that means that if you want to hang your TV on the wall, you may not need to get the brickwork re-enforced first.
COMMENTS
Why RS232?
As another poster said, it's for servicing.
But it's got a USB port -- why not just that?
Who were the early adopters of flatscreens? Airports with 486 Windows 95 or NT 3 displays -- pre-USB. Replacement screens for this sort of legacy systems are still a potential market, so there will always be a need for RS232 in some models. As most units from a particular manufacturer use the same base PCBs, RS232 support is integrated. The only option is whether to put a socket on it or not. This socket costs pennies to the manufacturer, and saves the hassle of multi-versioning their boards: retooling the assembly lines and managing parallel stocking. For this, their commercial customers can buy any model they like with minimal hassle. If it's hard to find a suitable model in your line, they'll go elsewhere. The cost of the RS232 is perfectly justifiable when you consider how many screens there are in your average airport, and how many airports there are in the world....
RS232...
...many LCD and plasma TVs (and set-top boxes) have RS232 ports. It's often a service port for programming, disagnostics and updating firmware.
Why?
The shift from a TV 3 foot deep to one 6 inches deep, served a practical purpose. This is hardly a revolution. I really don't see the point unless you've got more money than sense.
The market will eventually shift this way anyway and then all TVs will progressively get thinner, so don't waste your money paying a premium for this. (unless you so some reason need to stand a TV on your mantle piece.
