The Sony KDL-40 V 5810 TV is a 40-inch Full HD LCD TV with a universal tuner. Available since November 2009, the device is listed at 799 GBP on Sony’s website. Elsewhere online, it’s available for 750 GBP.

Reviewed by Florian Friedrich on February 8, 2010

High contrast ratio.
Neutral colours.
Accurate 24p reproduction.
Universal tuner (including CI+).

Poor motion clarity with standard signals.
Lacks full set of aspect-ratio settings.

The Sony KDL-40 V 5810 scores plenty of plus points: With its excellent features, contrast-rich images, and consistent colours, it seems on first glance to rival bigger, costlier Sony models. Still, the low motion clarity can be irritating — especially during sports broadcasts.

Most important connections:

4x  1x

Multimedia

The USB and network connections provide excellent photo-playback quality, and the 40-inch Sony can even display camera metadata wherever these are present — it’ll even show you where the photo was taken on a map if the camera has provided GPS data.

Other Features

All the connections an AV fan could ask for — but the labelling could be a bit more legible.

The Sony’s satellite tuner provides support for DiSEqC 1.0, allowing the user to control up to four low-noise block converters (LNBs). With CI+ support, the DVB-C tuner also meets the latest standards. If you like to tweak your TV’s picture, you’ll love the choice of seven gamma curves and a fine-tunable colour-temperature setting. And although picture-cropping (overscan) is active for HD channels in the factory setup, it’s easy enough to switch off.

Operation

We have almost no complaints about the remote control — but the picture-format button is awkwardly positioned at the top of the handset.

For digital cable and satellite reception, we loved the well-sorted channel lists — for HDTV channels, the Sony even shows the resolution and frame rate. But we disliked the way that the radio stations simply tag onto the end of the list. And another thing: There’s no back button. There are also no suitable aspect-ratio settings for up-scaled 4:3 material, so you’ll need a set-top box that offers settings like “Centred 4:3” and “Zoom”.

Picture Quality of Standard-Definition Signals

With the help of the “Scene” button, you can try out various presets. We chose “Cinema” mode because it gave us the most natural colours. Unfortunately, the analogue tuner picture is a bit rough-and-ready — details blur even in slow camera pans, and even with the noise filters switched off. With the digital tuner, however, things look a lot better: Cable and satellite pictures impress with accurate scaling and a high degree of detail.

If you select a darker gamma setting (change from “Standard” to “-2”), the picture gains depth, and compression artefacts look less pronounced. Finance tickers resolve crisply, but fast-moving pictures — in sports broadcasts, for example — show obvious blur. Here it becomes obvious that the TV lacks 100- or 200-hertz technology, which Sony has omitted for cost reasons. 576i signals look better if input via HDMI: Camera pans suffer no line-flicker, and you can keep the overscan to a minimum in the Sony’s menu.

Picture Quality of High-Definition Signals

The Sony scores highly for its correct EBU colour gamut and constant colour temperature of 6,600 Kelvin.

The picture quality is outstanding with both Blu-ray signals and HDTV signals via the satellite tuner — the sharpness and scaling are beyond reproach. If you turn down the backlight to about half when viewing in a dark environment, you’ll get two benefits: Firstly, the power consumption drops to around 115 watts. Secondly, the TV produces superb black for this price class. With an in-picture contrast of almost 3,000:1, the picture offers impressive depth, so long as you view it straight on. When viewed side-on, the picture lightens significantly, and the colours lose accuracy.

There’s barely anything to criticise about the TV’s colours: Greens look natural, and the colour temperature varies only slightly across the brightness scale (6,100 to 6,800 Kelvin). But when compared with our reference TV, Pioneer’s KRP-500 plasma, minimal colour deviations become apparent. In “Casino Royale”, for example, Daniel Craig’s complexion shows a slight pink tint, and the azure-blue sky in Chapter 4 looks a bit too turquoise. Bear in mind, however, that these are only slight criticisms.

Sound Quality

The speakers don’t point directly towards the viewers, but speech comes across clearly nevertheless. Music, on the other hand, sounds too shrill and lacks bass.

Scene: Cinema

Contrast: 85

Brightness: 51

Colour: 55

Colour Temperature: Warm 2

Sharpness: 1

Noise Reduction: Off

MPEG Noise Reduction: Off

Black Corrector: Off

Adv. Contrast Enhancer: Low

Gamma: -1

Auto Light Limiter: Off

Clear White: Off

Live Colour: Off

Screen Format: Wide

Display Area: Full Pixel

These settings apply to realistic playback of HDTV/Blu-ray material through the HDMI interface in a darkened environment. Manufacturing and HDMI playback device deviations may necessitate slight adjustment.