LG 42LK450 Review – Best Budget 42 Inch LCD TV

If you're looking for the best HDTV for your basic setup when watching your favorite movies when spending your leisure time, the LG 42LK450 will perfectly satisfy your needs. This 42 inch LCD TV is ideal in any living room and also great for your big room.

What Do We Expect From This 42 inch LCD TV?

Basic setup means no 3D and internet apps but an excellent Blu-ray companion as well as for your widescreen PC monitor. With this applications, it gives a healthy number of inputs of 3 x HDMI, 1 x VGA, 1 x USB including component and composite for traditional analog.

The LG 42LK450 HDTV has a good looking design in all black color, it has a physical dimension of 40.1 inch wide by 24.8 inch tall and 3 inch thick, not that slim but it is solidly durable. With its bulky size, it is surprisingly lightweight for only 33 pounds including the TV stand. 

You can get the highest resolution of full HD 1080p for a well detailed display, this is perfect if love playing games on big screen or use it as your PC monitor. At 60Hz refresh rate shows a smooth motion in fast action scene but indicates some blurring at times. A very good value of contrast ratio at 100000:1 gives a deeper blacks and whites for a rich color definition. If we try to compare it with other brands with 1M:1, you can't barely see the difference, this is how good the LG 42LK450.

Right off the box you can expect a plug and play operation without any complications. Of course, you can always adjust to your own preferred settings using a user friendly remote. With the ISF picture modes this further improves the picture display for either a daytime or night time viewing.

In addition to that is the LG's Intelligent Sensor that automatically adjusts the display image according to its room conditions for more enjoyable viewing. This also includes the Easy Picture Wizard II for the most convenient picture calibration, less the pain for spending hours for the right picture adjustment. 

If you love to watch your picture collections on wide screen, you can enjoy it here because it fully supports the JPEG file format. You can also play your favorite MP3 music as well as movies in MPEG, WMV and MP4 format, all of these makes it possible with the provided USB port connector.

To complete your viewing pleasure, the LG 42LK450 is equipped with great sound quality. A surround sound system that drives the two powerful speakers for a total of 20W, with five different sound modes to choose from and lets you adjust the bass, treble balance control.  

This also features a Smart Energy Saving, when turn it you can save more energy and speaking of energy saving, this TV is an Energy Star Qualified that saves you for another 30 percent more. This will help you cut your electric bill without wasting power and money.   

Final Thoughts and Analysis

The LG 2LK450 has an above average picture quality, with a 1080p resolution you can be sure to its clear detailed picture but, at 60Hz refresh rate is fairly smooth that shows an evident of blurring in fast scene. The contrast ratios are somewhat above average at 100000:1, you can't expect a monster value from a CCFL LCD compare with LED backlight TV's. Despite of its value, it produces a descent amount of display that can be seen in a wide angle anywhere you sit in the room. The backlight is so adequate without any glaring on either side.

It features a soft touch power button that almost a touch sensitive that turns on effortless, once pressed it takes few seconds to turn on. The tuner is very powerful, it can get all the local station using only an indoor antenna. Changing channel from different TV stations is fast compare to other brands. 

An average features with a descent amount of inputs that you can't have any shortage, the support for JPEG, MP3's and MPEG format makes it stand from the rest. A nice sounding output with a wide range of audio control but you can't expect a huge sounding subwoofer in it.

Overall, the LG 2LK450 is a solid performer with an entry level HDTV from LG, this is for those who are budget conscious viewers who wants a basic setup for their living room entertainment system. If that's what you're looking for the best 42 inch LCD TV, this is definitely for you.   

Read the full LG 42LK450 Review and discover more of the Best 42 inch LCD TV of today. 

About the Author

Discover the Best HDTV for 2011 as we give you more reviews to help you decide before making the final decision of your purchase.