I have been a long admirer of the Onida brand of products. Being just best by technology is not what makes their products better; they also have the most stunning designs. But this time around I find that some bit of user-centered thoughts have not been applied that well. That’ll come later, but let me get straight to the review.
I exchanged my faithful 1-1/2 yr. old <a href=’’https://mouthshut.com/product-reviews/Onida_21_Black_FGL-925045289.html’’ target=’’_new’’>Onida 21 Black</a> for their Onida 29 Poison 2000. The list price (MRP) on the website was same as what my dealer in Bangalore offered, Rs27, 490.00. The exchange price given to me was Rs19, 490.00, which is a fairly good deal. Just that I feel the actual selling price is always lower then the MRP for these kind of goods, I probably could have looked around for someone offering me even better bargain. But, the good part here is that I was also given a WorldSpace Satellite Radio with a three month subscription free with this unit. The radio is BPL make but has been pasted with stickers to hide the label, lol.
Onto the TV (I bought it without the stand), the design is minimal and very simple. I like the slight curves around the base and the matt grey finish. The buttons are exposed on the front but the steel finish makes them look like little jewels on the pannel. Two LED’s (one Red/Green for Standby/In-use and the other Red for Alarm) appear with two glass-like buttons for the IR and Eco (Digital-Eye) sensors. The front A/V connector is protected by a rather tiny cover which comes ’off’ the TV. This probably could have had a rubberized dongle-like connection (prevalent in mobile phone connectors)
Installing the KY-Bass fixture was a breeze and setting up the TV is child’s play. The picture quality is really good. The DVMC feature is built in (i.e. users cant turn that Off.) Sound is just as good (2000 Watts is way too much actually) though I think the booming effect of the Bass is slightly high and does not sustain/fade for long. One can obviously control the volume of the Bass alone and set the 5-band equalizer for better acoustics. I keep the volume to about 5 ~ 12 at best, while the max is 50! (Tried out for this review:-)
The On-Screen Display could have been better (having a user control to turn on a ’translucent’ background for better readability.) The menu is quite long/detailed and needs a bit of understanding to use it properly. Channel sorting is tedious but channel-scan is pretty fast. Only ascending order of scan is available as against bi-directional (available on LG.)
Three A/V connectors (1 in the front and 2 in the back) are mapped to three dedicated video channels. One of the rear connector is for Component-in. There’s a Headphone jack in the front and the unit comes with a comfortable headphone set with about 3 meter cord.
Coming to the Remote, its an LCD one but is no great shakes. Its a waste to have an LCD if I can’t see the channel number or volume level then to press buttons and see it on the TV screen. Ergonomics is average. You have to set Time and Date on the remote and then again on the TV. There’s no button that can synchronize the time on remote to that of the TV (each power cycle erases the TV time settings.) The only plus is setting up five different profile settings with 10 channels per profile. Also, you needn’t point the remote towards the TV to operate it. That’s good.
Now, for some oddities.
There’s no SWAP feature!!!
The Half-mute feature is missing.
The Zap! feature is missing.
The channel entry (---) starts at one digit (-). Onida could have kept the max. itself!
No dedicated Video key, you instead press ’Shift’ + ’TV/FAV’!
Each time you switch On the TV, it gives a loud pop-like sound. Picture comes after about 5 seconds.
The 4-Way keys aren’t mapped to the Menu as shortcuts.
All these above points were there in my previous Onida 21 Black. The manual is not that helpful either. Yet, coming back home to watch a big TV having great picture and sound is just great. The other 29’’ model with integrated speakers on the stand could have been ultimate but this TV does get the basics right.