You get what you pay for: A cautionary tale

Back in March, I decided that I wanted a Wii and an HDTV to go with it. I'd never owned a TV before, and didn't want to spend every last dime to get one, so I settle on Vizio. They seemed to be a middle of the road sort of brand, with above average reviews for their price bracket.

I purchased their 720p 42'' model at Sams because of the awesome return policy, although I obviously hoped I would never have to use it. Wrong. The backlight started bleeding so bad that you could even notice while bright colors were being displayed. Major issue, especially for gaming. Took it back after 3 months and swapped with another unit of the same model.

The new unit worked beautifully until a month ago, when all of a sudden I would get audio dropouts while playing the XBOX. Not a huge deal in most games, but I had just picked up Rock Band 2, so obviously, this issue wasn't going to fly. I hauled the unit back to Sams, just as the first, and with much hesitation they took it back.

Deciding that it was most like just a lemony model, I told them I'd pay the difference to step up to the 1080p 120Hz model. That was 30 days ago.



I got my first lock up this morning.

Maybe I should have just gotten a Samsung instead.