Home > Consumer Reviews > ViewSonic N1630w 16-Inch 720p LCD HDTV

I read the reviews, but was hoping this was a time they were wrong. Its hard to find a small TV. Don't do it, don't buy this one. The picture is great as long as you are sitting squarely in front of it exactly at eye level. But if you are buying this for your kitchen or a small room and doing what most people would be doing ... moving around, this is horrible. The slightest off angle viewing creates a washed out picture.

And the sound is worse. Tinny barely describes it and I haven't found a way to make it really acceptable.

Oh, and all this only after waiting through a VERY long start up time where we get to view the three birds!

Unless you have one of those very specific stationary uses where the users thought it was ok, move on. This TV is not suited for use in kitchens and most home applications that folks are normally buying a small TV for.

Please, Sharp, please bring back your small Aquos!

I've had this television for over 2 weeks and I love it; it was the only one that I could find that met my criteria; a QAM tuner, AND it had to sit on my desk and fit under an overhead cabinet in my home office (it made it by 1/16", whew!)

The picture quality is very good, but as other reviewers have said, the viewing angle could be better. I watch it at eye level, straight on, about 3-4 feet away and it is super. If I stand up and walk around, the upper vertical angle lightens the pic, but still looks OK to me. I checked the lower angle and it darkens the display. Of course I wouldn't watch it that way, but if you were to have it on a high shelf, that could be a problem. If you are close to the TV, the Horizontal angle at eye level makes the picture have a negative type appearance when you stray too far to either side. This is similar to a 22" Vizio we have in the kitchen. Again, it works for me in my situation, but could be a distraction in other environments.

Lastly, the sound! Yes, it is not really great; kinda reminds me of a Transistor radio I had in the 50's. I tried to live with it for awhile, but it got on my nerves (I'm rather picky). I did not want to return the TV, so I purchased a pair of inexpensive Logitec 120 speakers, hooked them up to the headphone jack, and I am now very pleased with the sound output. If you demand more, you could spring for more elaborate extension speakers.

All in all, I would recommend this with the caveats mentioned above. I'm very happy with it and was well worth the cost! It gets 4 Stars only because of the sound quality!

I bought a big screen with a PIP that would not show my DirectTV. I use the ViewSonic as a PUP (Picture Under Picture) so it's just used a few minutes each day. It does OK. I do not have HD.
My only gripe is the menu that takes up 75% of the picture while you are trying to adjust the picture. You can adjust transparency but the purple fog never goes away. How can I adjust the tint to get proper flesh tones when the menu obscures the faces behind a purple screen? Answer-Guess at it, turn the menu off and repeat. Next time just put a little slider adjustment across the bottom, get rid of the huge screen blocker.

For starters, I've got no complaints about this TV. The picture is great, the tuner is great (I don't use a Decoder box so this is key), it's got a HDMI input (I do use an Apple TV so this is key).

I used a OmniMount PRO 12" ceiling mount to place the TV over my fridge in the kitchen, so the standard VESA mounts on the back were also something I needed. The stand can be removed easily enough with a small screwdriver (I expected ViewSonic to provide a small snap on cover for the hole left behind on the bottom after removing the stand but there wasn't one (at least not in the box I received - this might bother some people.

The setup menu's easy enough to deal with, I set it up to skip the duplicate analog channels so when I channel up and down I see the HD channel if it's available. I tried labeling the channels but can't seem to get the labels to "stick".

If sound quality is very important to you, I do recommend you purchase a supplementary set of speakers for it. Like any small TV I've seen it sounds a bit "tinny" on it's own. Thankfully there are plenty of computer speakers available which fit the bill, for example I used an Insignia NS-3006 setup that I picked up for under $50 and am delighted with the setup. The TV helps out by muting it's own speakers when you use the headphones jack.

Hope this helps.

This TV is well priced and very versatile to connect. The speaker inadequacies can easily be worked around by connecting to a good computer sound system. The viewing angle is a bit restrictive at closer viewing distances but is not a serious drawback. Overall, I am very well pleased with my purchase. I especially like the size. It sits beside my 22" comp. monitor so I can multi-task.