JVC calls their LCOS (Liquid Crystal on Silicon) technology D-ILA, just like Sony called theirs SXRD. But it’s all just variations on a theme. And what’s that theme? Light is reflected off the liquid crystals instead of shone through them. And this makes a big difference. The Sony SXRD sets are all stellar performers. Anyone with such a set should be proud to own the bleeding edge of quality digital projection. JVC is aiming for a slice of the same HD goodness pie with their 70″ rear-projection D-ILA HDTV. Sound & Vision Magazine got to take a look, and I will forwith summarize for you.

The good:

The set has a resolution of a full 1920 x 1080p, which is a good thing, of course. It has two HDMI inputs and a CableCARD slot. Unfortunately, it cannot accept 1080p signals on any input.

But what about the picture? One of the things Sony’s SXRD sets does really well is the blacks. S&V found that the JVC set did blacks really well too. This is not true of JVC’s previous D-ILA offerings.

The bad:

The remote didn’t seem that well thought out. To me, it doesn’t matter. I’d use my programmable remote anyway. But switching between the inputs was slow. Also, the texture of the rear projection screen itself became visible during some movie scenes. This happens sometimes with rear projectors, but the reviewer thought that it was more obvious than it should be with this set. Also, colour uniformity across the picture could be better.

The ugly:

The menu system. Blocky, unrefined. Just yuck.

Conclusion:

It’s hard to sweat the small stuff when an HDTV performs as well as the JVC HD-70FH96. This giant HDTV manages to combine the high resolution of 1080p with most of the other characteristics that make a great-looking image. Its biggest shortcomings — a clunky user interface and the couple of missing features noted above — shouldn’t deter anybody who values picture quality above all else.

Sound And Vision Magazine: JVC 70-inch D-ILA HDTV