
I represent the Lollipop Guild, the Lollipop Guild... no, no, WAIT... take that back... just funnin'.
I'm the mechanic in our shop who was most aware of the impending doom of the 5 inch B&W, antenna-feed TV we had in our break room. Searched out portable, digital TV's and found my way to Amazon and this thread. Printed out the Amazon pictures, tech features and many reviews and presented to my buddies. All voted yes, Go for It, except a couple of stodgies and the collection plate was passed... the purchase from Amazon then made.
We couldn't be happier! Few things you should be aware of though:
1) The single rabbit ear antenna that comes with this great little TV might be perfect if you live in the Great Plains or some other gorgeous flat land of America, but if you live where there are mountains, molehills or tall buildings between the TV station transmitters and your new TV, you are going to have to, I said "have to", upgrade the antenna.
We realized this, given our geographical location, and agreed we'd wait to see what the included antenna could receive before spending for an upgraded antenna. The included antenna worked in our area no better than the misshaped coat hanger that was serving as the antenna for our old black and white - fuzzy picture and most distressing... no color at all on our new color TV. We pulled in no more stations than what the old junker was pulling in.
Quick trip to our local electronics store (Frye's Electronics here in San Diego) and I purchased a GE Omni TV antenna for $35.00. Made all the difference in the world.
Re-scan of available stations by the TV picked up 14 of 15 channels available locally over our air, nailed the HD or digital stations and all of a sudden we had crystal clear, color picture and sound.
With this little dynamo, antenna is everything. It can do the job, but it has to have a good input if you're trying to catch signal over-the-air and that means an upgraded antenna. Cable input to the TV will give you every channel you get in your house on the large sets you own.
2) Sound. This is a mini-TV with mini-mini stereo speakers in each lower corner of the set. These are perfect if you are in a quiet room with the TV on your desk a foot from your face. Max output by the TV is not enough to clearly fill a room, however, if you've set this little wonder up on a shelf in, let's say like we did, a break room of 10x12 feet.
The headphone output of the Haier TV can also be used to transmit TV sound to a small set of external, AC adapter powered computer sound speakers. We paid $15.00 for a magnetically shielded 2.1 "surround sound" computer speaker system with two speakers and a mini-woofer for the deep bass. When first hooked up, we turned the TV sound down to zero and the speakers own sound control up to max and then used the TV sound control to bring up the sound. At a quarter of TV max, our sound system will now blow you out of a 10x12 room. Magnetically shielded speakers are essential as non-shielded speaker magnets will interfere with antenna reception.
3) Please note: Our new system has three individually A/C adapter components. We bought a power strip to plug them all into. One plug in the wall... three plugs in the power strip. One plug for antenna power, one plug for TV power, one plug for speaker power. You have to remember that the TV is not a computer willing to share its own power with other components as computers often do through USB ports. You want separately powered amplification components that plug into your separately powered little color TV.
4) If you don't know this about common table-top antennas: The rabbit ears catch the VHF (Very High Frequency) signals and the circular Loop thingy catches the UHF (Ultra High Frequency) signals. For us, in our locale, all the major stations, save one, broadcast via the UHF range.
The lone hold-out, our CBS affiliate, has chosen to broadcast both analog and digital in the VHF range. We can't pick them up yet, no matter how much we now tinker with the rabbit ears, but their local website claims it will be a probable pick-up once they go full-power VHF digital signal on Feb. 18. Why they chose to go VHF when they admit every other minor and major broadcaster is transmitting (and we're now easily receiving) UHF is beyond us, but so go broadcasting and investment decisions at our local CBS affiliate.
5) This personal TV comes with a built-in fold-out stand like you might find on the back of a photograph frame or plate display. Leans the TV back about 35 degrees. Okay if you are using it on a table-top about a foot from your face, but unacceptable if you want to view it from a farther distance. The TV does have, however, a built in common-thread screw hole squarely centered on its bottom for mounting on a camera tripod or simple, weighted mount like we made to hold the TV upright.
6) Lastly, yes, we'd recommend this TV for the limited purpose it was designed. Excellent picture with the correct antenna, blow out sound with a small additional investment. Great buy at the Amazon price. Again, we couldn't be happier.
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Haier HLT71 7-Inch Handheld LCD TV.