Sharp is a popular brand among LCD TV buyers, and in recent months they have released a new Aquos range that are capable of fully accepting and displaying 1080 signals. As a full-time reviewer, I have had the pleasure of testing the Sharp LC-46 XD1E LCD TV, and will give a rundown on its good and not-so-good points in this article.

Good Points

* Very detailed and sharp picture when fed with high definition source. A native resolution of 1920 x 1080 is not hype... it allows the Sharp to fully display incoming 1080 signals on the screen. As a result you see less pixels and the image takes on a more realistic hue as if you're looking at an object in real-life without any blocks to break up the lines.
* Very deep black level. LCDs generally are taken to have an inferior black level because of their constantly-on backlight, but this Sharp exhibits one of the deepest black I have seen coming from an LCD TV thanks to its proprietary Super View Black panel. This deep black allows the image to become more energetic and 3-dimensional rather than washed out, therefore enhancing your viewing experience.
* Minimal motion blurring. Again, motion rendering is meant to be one of LCD TV's biggest flaw due to "sample-and-hold" effect, so you may see quite a lot of blurring or ghosting during fast action scenes. Sharp's scanning backlight appears to reduce this problem quite significantly: fast moving objects are handled with fluidity and this is the first LCD TV that I could confidently say that I wouldn't mind watching sports on.
* Price. This is the cheapest 46-inch full HD 1080p from a branded manufacturer available on the market right now.

Bad Points

* Red push. Sharp implemented a 4-wave backlight (red, green, blue, crimson red) system to provide more convincing skin tones to the picture, but unfortunately they only managed to introduce red push where the colour of red is too prominent in scenes containing red. You can use the "Colour" control to desaturate all the colours to reduce red push, but this will also make other colours look dull.
* Uneven screen. The larger the screen, the harder it is to maintain a uniform screen, so it is hardly surprising that this 46-inch LCD TV displays vertical and horizontal banding across the screen especially against a mid-grey background. Of course most people wouldn't look at a grey background all day, but it's worth bearing in mind that these bands will be noticeable when the camera pans across a light uniform colour such as blue sky.
* Electronic buzz and humming. Various owners have complained about this, and unfortunately these problem affected my review sample as well. At certain backlight levels, there would be a reasonably loud buzzing and a different character of humming ala French horn. These unwanted noises are present even in standby, so the only way to silence the LCD TV would be to turn the power off totally.