Celestial LT4268TA LCD television

A budget big-screen television with 100Hz motion smoothing

Good Gear Guide

The Celestial LT4268TA is a 42in LCD television with 100Hz image smoothing and multimedia features. Its 1080p (Full HD) display has reasonable but unspectacular image quality.

Pros

  • Reasonable image quality, cheap(ish)

Cons

  • Visible motion blur, high power consumption

Bottom Line

For a casual viewer or anyone on a budget, the Celestial LT4268TA LCD television is a reasonable purchase with acceptable image quality. Several aspects of this television are inferior even to TVs from other budget brands, but as a cheap LCD panel it is still worth considering.

Would you buy this?

  • Price

    $ 1,499.00 (AUD)

The Celestial LT4268TA has a unobtrusive design similar to the Changhong LT2643A. A squarish black bezel extends at the base to house the television's 8W stereo speakers. The TV comes with a functional if ugly remote control, with all the buttons on the television itself hidden on the right side of the bezel.

All the connections you're likely to need can be found on the back of the Celestial LT4268TA. Three HDMI ports makes connecting multiple digital devices easy, while older analog VCRs and camcorders can be attached using the two composite, two component, two S-Video or single D-Sub VGA port. For our testing, we connected a Dell Inspiron Mini 9 netbook via VGA and a Sony PlayStation 3 games console via HDMI.

During our video tests the Celestial LT4268TA performed acceptably but not brilliantly. We played a few DVD-quality video files through the netbook, and the TV delivered reasonable image quality but not a great deal of visible detail. Playing high-definition games and Blu-ray movies through the PlayStation 3 netted better results, with a decent amount of fine image detail in our Terminator: Salvation and Angels and Demons Blu-ray movies.

One sticking point is the Celestial LT4268TA's low static contrast ratio. At 1200:1 you'll miss out on a lot of dark and bright image detail in movies such as Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, and since there's no dynamic backlight adjustment you'll be forced to set the backlight to a medium setting and hope for the best.

The Celestial LT4268TA has a 100Hz frame smoothing mode, supposedly removing judder and image stuttering from regular 50Hz video content. It does an acceptable job of this but also introduces visible motion blur, sometimes stealing detail and clarity from fast panning shots.

We were particularly disappointed by the Celestial LT4268TA's power consumption. Measured at an average of 268 Watts during regular use, this is almost double what competing LCD televisions from better-known brands consume. It's even more than a power-hungry television such as the Panasonic TH-P42S10A plasma.

The Celestial LT4268TA LCD television will suit those looking for reasonable image quality at a low price. It has obvious flaws, though, including astronomical power consumption.

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Read more on these topics: Celestial, home entertainment, lcd tvs,

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