Be careful... Review on Sony KV-AZ212M83

Till date I had gr8 trust for Sony products and I chose Wega over Panasonic TV... perhaps I was wrong in my decision!

Ihad bought KV-AZ212M83 from Sony World, Marthahalli on 22nd Oct 2006and since then I have been on the receiving end of both poor quality TVand equally poor quality, if not worse, service.

Here is the excerpt from the mail I had sent to Sony customer care(?) for with I never got any response till date...

Here are the problems I am having with the TV :-

1)The picture is tilted horizontally downwards to right corner. Almost 1inch vertical picture is lost on the right corner. This problem getsworse on news channels. I would rather call this as "SLANT" than "TILT"due <br/>

to its magnitude!

2)There is a horizontal black line running over the screen in bottom halfwhich is clearly visible in "Vivid" mode even from 6 feet when thereare non dark patches on the TV screen. In case of plain screen ( e.g.,wallpaper from PC connected to S-Video), this line is visible even inlowest brightness mode.

Both of these problems are veryirritating and I am sure, there is some problem with my TV set, but youservice guys keep telling me "These are Normal with ALL Sony Wega TVs".

Again, I got the call today from yourself (Mr Dilipan)repeating the same things! I wonder if you are so confident that theconsumers are fools?

But I got another confirmation from oneof my friends who has Sony WEGA 25 Inch TV, that "His TV doesn’t havethe black horizontal line problem". Perhaps your service guys are aredefaming Sony products then? Your competitors must be feeling safe!

Further,I hope your service guy does his duty and fixes BOTH the problems.Again, as I said earlier, the tilt may be natural if it is ’small’ andis observed only in certain positions, not all the positions. Till thenI cannot say the problem is fixed. Also, as we discussed, I want awritten statement from the authority from Sony that these problems (TV,not the service) "Are normal and can be seen in ALL Sony Wega 21 InchFLAT TV models including KV-AZ212M83". I would prefer, if thisstatement is provided to me, duly signed, on Sony letterhead.

Ialso hope that you atleast convince me these problems are common byshowing some Sony TVs in the showroom as you assured me over the phone.

Examples of poor service I have received from Sony till date :-

1)I had registered with the "tilt" problem, on 2nd Nov. On Saturday yourguy comes up to my home and when I show him the problem, he says "I hadcome only for Demo... I can’t fix this problem". Then he asks me tocall your customer care(?) again for a "new" complaint! He goes on tosay it may take next week for the problem to be actually attended.Already lost my Saturday time, I call the center again for the newrequest.

2) I got a call within 2 days alright and I informedabout my availability after 6:15 pm on weekdays. Then again I don’t getany contact till Thursday so I called again ’requesting’ the person tocome on Saturday (11th).

3) Your person comes home and floods mewith jargon like "Geomagnetic field" etc and says the tilt is a"normal" thing. An internet search already has given me enoughknowledge that the tilt problem is rare (looks like only Sony has thatproblem) but acceptable if it is within limits like below halfcentimeter. But I show your guy that my TV has 1 INCH tilt (it is"SLANT" rather than "TILT"). This guy still takes it lightly and justrotate my TV in 90 degrees (can you imagine... towards the wall!) andsays "Look! the ’tilt’ is reduced!!". I am surprised at suchshamelessness when the ’tilt’ is still around 1 1/2 Centimeters. Here,I must agree that a small ’tilt’ is bearable and the geomagnetic stuffis applicable, when the tilt is zeroed at list in one position when theTV is rotated in 360 degrees. This was not the case with my TV and whenI pointed the same to your service guy, he kept on saying (ratherarrogantly) "It is Normal".

4) Then this guy goes ahead to servicemenu and uses "vertical compression" so that "I could see newsscrollers"... such a shame!

5) Then I had to tell me about thepossibility of misaligned yoke on which he finally agrees and agrees tomy requirement that "In atleast one position the tilt should beremoved" - this too as if he was talking to a novice and as if he wasdoing a great favour on me!

6) I got the same treatment when Ishown him the black line running horizontally on the screen. At firsthe rejected my claim, even insulting my comments... then I connectedS-Video to show him the plain wallpaper with atleast 1 mm blackhorizontal line.

7) Then this guy agrees and says (same shamefulmanner...) "This is Normal... a few TVs can have this problem and itsnot really visible". When I say him I don’t want to be the one with oneof those ’few’ TVs.. he says "This is Normal and ALL Sony WEGA TVs havethis ’feature’".

8) Then I ask him to get me these "Normal Sony TVfeatures" in written, he says he will take the TV and confirm withother Sony TVs at service center, rejecting my observation thatpreviously I had a 14 inch flat tv without any of these 2 problems!

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14Nov061920hrs - Small update :- Just now the same arrogant Sony service agenthad come and when I told him that "my friend’s 25 inch Wegadoesn’t have black line on screen" he said - "25 inch tv won’t haveblack line due to different flicker rate". He also informed me that hecan even show many black lines on my friend’s TV using the ’advanced’instruments in his toolkit.