Toshiba 32WLT66 review

The next key inclusion is the latest version of Toshiba's proprietary Active Vision LCD picture-processing system. Active Vision LCD is an umbrella term that incorporates a host of different image-processing elements designed to improve colours, contrast, motion and sharpness.

Another trick tucked away in the Toshiba's menus is a colour-management system that handily lets you tweak the saturation, brightness and hue levels for no less than six of the picture's colour components: magenta, cyan, yellow, red, green and blue.

There's even more colour flexibility via a so-called 3D Colour Management option that shifts the emphasis of the TV's colour and white-balance settings towards PC use for those wanting to double the TV up as a computer monitor. The 32WLT66 can also optimise its pictures for DVD movie rather than TV broadcast material, thanks to a Cinema Mode that alters the TV's progressive-scan settings.

On the sound front, the 32WLT66 is distinguished by a 'WOW' processing system that spreads the soundstage further afield, and a highly unusual but certainly welcome facility for adding an optional subwoofer (available from Toshiba for around £150) to boost bass levels.

Performance
The 32WLT66's pictures excel. Colours, for instance, are exemplary, combining almost brutal intensity with impressive tonal subtlety. Good colours are usually accompanied by a decent contrast range, and so it proves with the 32WLT66, as peak whites are pristine but controlled, while deep blacks appear impressively profound and largely free of LCD's common 'greying-over' problem.

The benefits of Toshiba's Active Vision processing system, meanwhile, are evident in the 32WLT66's fine detailing. What's more, this exceptional sharpness is achieved without throwing up any significant negative side effects. The set is thus a superb performer with high-definition sources -- though it proves unusually good with standard-definition digital broadcasts and DVDs too.

There are only two small picture downers to report. Firstly, dark scenes are subtly affected by an unwanted blue undertone. Second, while skin generally looks natural in colour, faces can look marginally flat and waxy thanks to a lack of shading finesse.

Sonically, the 32WLT66 is perfectly respectable. Voices remain clear and authentic even during rowdy action scenes, trebles avoid harshness and the speakers get good and loud before even a trace of distortion sets in. In an ideal world, more bass wouldn't have gone amiss -- but this can be said of nearly all other LCD TVs. At least the 32WLT66 provides the option of upping the bass quotient by adding an optional subwoofer.

Overall, the 32WLT66 is a tantalising proposition. Its standards and the flexibility of its features and connections are all far higher than you've any right to expect for under £1,000. If this set is indicative of the sort of quality we can expect from the glut of LCD TVs heading our way in time for the World Cup this summer, we truly are going to be spoilt for choice.

Edited by Mary Lojkine
Additional editing by Nick Hide