Daiwa L55FVC5N 55" FullHD Smart LED TV Review

Having a big TV has been a thing of pride for quite some time now. While everyone wants one, not everyone has the money to buy one. In recent years a lot of brands have come up with smart looking TVs with big panels at an affordable rate but many a times there has been a tradeoff in terms of the quality of the product. The Daiwa L55FVC5N FullHD Smart LED TV is a 55-inch TV that comes at a rather affordable price of Rs 41,990. Does this TV also come at the cost of mediocre picture quality? We find out!

Looking at the TV, it definitely looks very modern. The bezel area is respectably thin and will not be causing any distractions while watching content on the TV. Moving to the side of the TV, it has a slim frame that gets a brushed type of finish. The back houses all the input ports and connectors on a vertical and a horizontal panel. The connector list is pretty standard and you get all the necessary inputs such as 2 HDMI, VGA, 2 USB 2.0, RJ45 port for internet connection and more. The TV also has built-in Wi-FI and there is a screen capture and a screen mirroring option as well. The right side of the back also has a few controls in case you cannot get your hands on the remote.

The Daiwa L55FV5CN is great when it comes to picture quality and there is no doubt about that. The A+ Grade  panel gets a something called  as HRDP which enhances the clarity and colours that are produced by the screen.  In my viewing experience I did not feel that any colour was too dominant compared to others and the brightness levels were adequate. Part of me only wished that the TV had a bigger resolution instead of the 1080p resolution as it is a huge TV. The viewing angles are also great and I noticed very minimal colour and contrast degradation when viewing from extreme angles. The 20W  speakers are pretty loud and that is great as this 55-inch TV would most likely be kept at a distance. The bass output is lesser than what I like and if listening to music is something that you do regularly then I would suggest hooking it up with a dedicated sound system. For all other intents and purposes the speakers suffice.

Since this is a smart TV you get all that you would come to expect of smart TVs such as the convenience of streaming YouTube, Netflix and other streaming services, browsing the web, managing your E-mail etc. In fact the remote, which Diawa calls it as 'Daiwa Web Flirt Remote', has dedicated buttons for YouTube, Netflix and Hotstar. These buttons will quickly become your friends if you frequently use any of these services. There is 8GB of ROM for you to store any apps, audio or video files. The CPU on-board is a Cotex A7 1.3GHz dual core and is coupled  with Mali-400MP2 GPU and 1GB DDR3 RAM. The OS that you get is Android KitKat 4.4.4. While you can browse through the various menus with relative ease, the hardware does struggle at times and there are occasional lags that you will experience. Coming back to the remote, it has 2 IR lenses on top of the remote that give it a very appreciable range of operation. There is a button for viewing the TV in Eco mode as well and there are three levels of it. Each level reduces the brightness and intensity of the screen. A mouse button has also been provided, which on pressing brings up a pointer hand on the screen. The disappointing thing, however, is that when you are in the mouse pointer mode then the mouse does not follow the motion of the remote. Instead you have to use the four arrow keys provided on the remote, in order to navigate through the various screens. Typing in the pointer mode will probably be the most boring thing that you will do all day and there is also no QWERTY keyboard at the back of the remote either. I was a little surprised to see this as some of the more affordable TVs also have remotes with a floating mouse feature. If you have an extra keyboard or mouse or both then you are going to have no problem because they are compatible with the TV. While you cannot play any games on the TV, you can cast your smartphone or tablet screen on the TV and enjoy viewing those game graphics on a big screen.

The Daiwa L55FV5CN is no doubt a capable TV at an affordable price that does not compromise on the picture quality. In fact it impressed me the most on that front. The looks are also very appealing and this TV will find home in almost any room that you put it in. The Smart TV capabilities are also carried well and the only real issue I had with the TV was the mouse. If you can overlook that then this TV is a great buy for a large room.