Ohki 42" LED TV

Ohki 42" review: This cheap LED TV doesn’t have any fancy features, but its picture quality is passable

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The Ohki 42" LED TV is a 42in LED television with a 1080p LCD screen that has a 1400:1 contrast ratio. It doesn't have the advanced features that you get with television sets from big brands like Sharp, LG, Sony and Samsung. If you're watching Blu-ray and DVD movies through a Blu-ray player like the Sony BDP-S470, the Ohki 42" LED TV can display a good picture. It can also display good video if you're viewing digital television through a high quality PVR like the Panasonic DMR-XW480, but we found the television's internal tuner to be inferior to other TVs.

Pros

  • Decent quality video from Blu-ray discs and DVDs

Cons

  • Digital TV is overly smooth, 100Hz mode is jumpy and unnatural

Bottom Line

The Ohki 42" LED TV is acceptable if you're mainly going to be watching Blu-ray and DVD movies, or viewing television through a PVR set-top box. The internal television tuner isn't great, we don't like the 100Hz motion processing mode and the styling isn't exactly inspirational. But as a budget LED TV competing with models from Kogan, it's not a bad choice.

Would you buy this?

  • Price

    $ 999.00 (AUD)

Looking for a cheap television? Check out our roundup of Kogan TV reviews.

Here's a list of the cheapest televisions we've reviewed recently.

Not sure what kind of television to buy? Have a look at our LCD vs LED vs Plasma television buying guide.

Ohki 42" LED TV: Design and connectivity

The Ohki 42" LED TV has a very simple design. The television has thick bezels surrounding the LCD screen, but at around 40mm deep the chassis is quite thin. The plastic and glass bezel and base connect to the television with a dozen screws, but the setup process is easy and only takes a few minutes.

Buying a cheap LCD television often means you'll only get two HDMI ports, but the Ohki 42" LED TV’s three ports mean you can connect a Blu-ray player, set-top box and another device simultaneously. Older A/V devices are also supported thanks to the inclusion of component, composite, S-Video and VGA analog connectors.

The Ohki 42" LED TV also has a USB port that can be used to play back photo, audio and video files. We tested it with MP3s, JPGs and BMPs and found that all these loaded quickly. Video support was a mixed bag — we tried a range of downloaded files in MOV, AVI, MKV and MP4 formats and found that the high-definition MKV files would not play. The USB port also functions as a PVR, recording broadcast television to a USB memory stick.

Ohki 42" LED TV: Picture quality and motion control

The 1080P 42in LED edge-lit LCD panel of the Ohki 42" LED TV is produced by LG and has a 1400:1 native contrast ratio. It's on par with the Kogan ELITE LED32 and other budget LED televisions, with good picture quality when presented with a high resolution source like a Blu-ray movie. Similarly, DVD video looks clear. The Ohki 42" LED TV exhibits loss of detail in especially bright and dark areas of the screen — this is an area it's solidly outclassed by more expensive models from bigger brands. We also found the internal TV tuner to be slow at switching channels, and found that the picture it displayed was lacking detail.

The Ohki 42" LED TV has a 100Hz refresh rate which effectively doubles the frame rate of the content being viewed, theoretically smoothing fast on-screen motion. In practice we found the Ohki 42" LED TV’s 100Hz mode made video look unrealistic and too smooth, without removing the jumpiness of fast panning or on-screen movement. It can be disabled, thankfully.

Ohki 42" LED TV: Conclusion

The Ohki 42" LED TV will satisfy those looking for a cheap and thin LCD television. It doesn't have excellent picture quality but can display good detail from Full HD content.

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Read more on these topics: Ohki, lcd tvs, LED TV, home entertainment, led tvs, LCD tv

Matthew

1

I saw one come up for $699, delivered, comes with HDMI cable, 16GB usb. reckon I shou8ld get it? http://www.stardeals.com.au/deals/national-deal?nlp=&CID=AU_CRM_222_0_0_0&utm_source=Deal_general_newsletter&utm_medium=All_Cities&utm_content=Initial_Version&utm_campaign=Varies

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