Eliab Calibration review

[btbowen1]

First I would like to thank Rick Neff for all of his work setting up the Eliab tour here in Milwaukee.
Eliab, he's a nice guy and a perfectionist. He worked on my Toshiba 50H81 for 6 hours none stop, you should have seen him perfecting the screen convergence and geometry alone. He used a screen template and I couldn't believe how perfect it was when he was finished. All the rave reviews that he recieve on the hometheater spot forum are well deserved. I've done a lot of tweeks to my tv such as electrical focus and 56 point convergence and he told me that I did a good job on the user menu but my job was no comparison to his. My color temp. was off the chart before he started over 15,000 but was at 6500 when he was done. I also had to much blue displayed in the greyscale that he had to reduce. I thought HD looked good before but now its excellent. The color in DVD and HD just looks more vibrant and realistic. Theres more detail in the shadows and the black area is really black. I would recommend everyone get their bigscreen calibrated. Eliab is here until Sunday and he mentioned that he will not be touring the entire country too much longer because its too much for him and his partner Dave Abrams.

Work done on my set (from avical website):

Pre-calibration consultation on ambient lighting and viewing environment.
Pre-calibration analysis of video imagery.
Pre-calibration documentation of grayscale and display device user menu settings.
Proper set-up of DVD player parameters (0 IRE/7.5 IRE, etc.).
Centering of user menu adjustments (where applicable).
Protective (glare) screen removal.
Duvedrape and unused mirror parameter blanking with Duvetape.
Optics cleaning.
Electrostatic and mechanical focus.
Electronic or mechanical SVM disablement.
Neutralization of any auto features (auto-color, noise reduction, iris, etc.).
Color decoder correction
Choice of advanced geometry correction for one viewing mode or 1080i or 720p input calibration.
Convergence adjustment for one viewing mode.
Grayscale calibration to the correct D6500 Kelvin color temperature reference standard for one input type excluding HD.
Optimization of brightness, contrast, color, tint and sharpness controls to newly corrected grayscale.
Centering of image within the raster.
Overscan adjustment to exhibit the proper amount of picture content.
Pre and post calibration report(s) given for the customer's records.
Post-calibration consultation on video imagery as it pertains to the display device and viewing environment in question.  
 
        Brian B.

[bigcheeshead]

I wanted to have GraigM do the calibration on my Mitsubishi but unfortunatelly that felt through. If Elliah does good job at Mits calibration I would still be interested. Please email me removed for times and pricing info. Thx.

[btbowen1]

RickNeff will know more regarding Eliab's schedule but I believe Sat. 6/21/03 is his last day calibrating in town, then he's on to Chicago and upper Illinois area. Eliab did tell me that he does calibrate every brand, but his specialty is Toshiba. The coordinator for his Chicago tour actually lives on the Illinois/ Wisconsin border. Eliab also told me that after he is done here, the Chicago coordinator is going to drive up here and drive him to the Illinois area. I don't know if that tour is full already but I'm sure if you live near the border he would calibrate your set in that tour if theres room. He's already had a Chicago tour this year and another in September.

[btbowen1]

goto //www.avical.com for Eliab pricing

[bigcheeshead]

Yep just called him. His last day is today June 21st.

[davezen2]

Eliab worked on my set also, and all I can say is that I cannot believe how much better the picture looks!  Colors look much more true to life, picture is crisper, DVDs look better, and HDTV is nothing short of amazing!

Eliab is definitely a perfectionist.  After spending close to seven hours here on Monday, he had to get going to his next job but said he wasn't completely satisfied with my set's convergence.  Since he didn't have any jobs Wednesday evening he actually came all the way back here and spent a few more hours "getting it just right", as well as giving me a lesson on getting into my set's service menu and touching up the convergence myself for future tweaking.
Also, Eliab is truly an all around nice guy and a pleasure just to hang out with.

Thanks again to Rick for arranging the tour!:D

[RickNeff]

To jump in here with my 2 cents.  I've posted my review at the Home Theater Spot! in the Toshiba section.  Eliab certainly is a perfectionist and it certainly shows!  And he is quite the interesting coversationalist.  I probably learned more in the time I spent with him that I could have anywhere else.

I'm glad to hear that every else had the same fine experience I had with Eliab's calibration.  Also, thanks for the kind words about the coordination of the tour, but it was my pleasure.  Especially since there were previous attempts at Eliab tours here that failed due to lack of interest.

My wife and I have certainly seen the dramatic differences between the pre- and post-calibrated set.  It really does look like a new TV.

[btbowen1]

My wife was totally against me purchasing OUR Toshiba 50H81 two years ago and didn't want me to get it calibrated. but after sitting down and viewing scenes from the superbit Fifth Element and the PBS HD feed on cable, she thanked Eliab for his wonderful work. Speaking of cable, Eliab wasn't impressed at all with the TW HD channel quality here, at one point while watching the PBS feed he said "is that supposed to be HD?". Maybe I'll be switching to Directv afterall.

[RickNeff]

Brian,

Fortunately, my wife was interested in a "big screen TV" all along.  While she certainly isn't interested in all the details of how the TV works, she's technology-aware enough to understand the idea of calibration.  She's also good about understanding the different inputs for the DVD & HD feeds.

I think now that the set has been calibrated, the differences in the HD sources of TWC vs. Dish or DirectTV may be something to consider now.  But, I'm still waiting on the final word what additional offerings each is going to have by the end of the year.

[btbowen1]

To be fair to TW cable, the PBS show that was on wasn't the best that they usually offer such as the European tour shows while Eliab was viewing the tv. The tour shows simply looks amazing now. My jaw just dropped while watching that latest Star Wars movie on HD HBO a few nights ago. My wife invited her friends over to watch the season premiere of Sex in the city Sunday night and was showing off the newly calibrated set proudly. Believe me, thats the ultimate thumbs up for Eliab