I bought this TV (SAMSUNG CS-29Q1PW) a few days ago and am reasonably impressed by the picture and sound quality.
The picture is crisp and clear, colours are vivid and natural. Low signal noise reducing amplifier (LNA - for amplifying weak signals) works great as it boosts those weak channels and makes them VIEWABLE, improves picture quality on regular channels too. I compared the picture quality with superflats from SAMSUNG and SONY, and although SONY 29 (even a plain WEGA) seemed to be reasonably better, SAMSUNG 29 Plano was only marginally better in terms of picture quality. I’d still give it 8 out of 10 for picture quality - considering that it does not have a digital comb filter, it’s not a flat tube and it’s soooo cheaply priced!
The sound is great for a TV! I own a 2600W Sony Home theatre system, and thought I would never get impressed by anything else in terms of sound quality - at least a TV, that too a SAMSUNG. But I was pleasantly surprised as this one gives full and satisfying experience (particularly at low-to-medium volume.) The woofer makes a hell a difference. Overall I’d give it 9 out of 10 for sound!
The menus are a pain in the beginning but then you get used to it in a few days. The picture and sound modes are handy but not much use if you like to adjust the settings yourself. There is only one custom memory each for picture and sound settings where you can adjust things like colour, brightness etc. It’s great to have a sound equalizer setting. The menus are a bit complicated for non-techies and could be improved. They should also be made more easily readable. The Indian languages setting makes the menus even more difficult to navigate. Menus get only 4 out of 10.
PIP feature is good and useful. other features are Games :
The Games zone is really handy for those times when there is absolute junk being shown on all the channels in the world. And the games are neat - They are all 15 different games - most of them are good - a few even manage to be interesting and challenging. The TV has 2 sets of input jacks and one areal socket. Scart socket, monitor in and s-video in are missing (these come only with more expensive models anyway). The remote is well designed and a pleasure to operate and even caters for games very well. Overall a generous 7 out of 10 for features!
So summing it up - It is a good quality large screen (29) TV with a good bunch of features for those on a budget. I gave back my 15 yr old BPL-INDIA 21 WR and got this one for 21 grand. That’s the sort of price you pay for a 21 inch box, man!