VIZIO VMB070 Portable 7″ LED/LCD NTSC/ATSC Widescreen Television w/remote control

Sugg. Retail: $249.95USD

Manufacturer: VIZIO Inc.  (977) 698-4946  www.vizio.com 

At the cottage, the only TV broadcasting is via the local Kenora CTV affiliate and a CBC repeater with the Winnipeg signal, both analog stations. At this point, I can’t predict whether the signals available next Summer will be analog or digital, so when I started looking for a small TV for the lake, I decided I needed both analog and digital tuners built in. While the Kenora station may well have converted to digital, the CBC repeater probably hasn’t because of their exemption for a year because they have so many of these transmitters; and digital transmission, being more of a line-of-sight situation, may be harder to receive in the hills and valleys of Northern Ontario. It’s no coincidence that every house, shack, or trailer from Minaki to Kenora has a satellite dish on the roof.

That’s what was in my mind as I went online looking for a small TV or tuner for my 12-volt system at the cottage. I didn’t want a bigger screen because it would just magnify the imperfections of the picture I’d get, if  I did get one at all. The 10″ Sony  Blu-ray player was there for higher-resolution sources, and I mostly watch news, anyway.

So I settled on the VIZIO, after a thorough check of new and used options, getting a price of $139.98USD including postage, from a Canadian supplier. The VMB070  is described on the Amazon site thusly: “Watch your favorite digital programs away from home! VIZIO’s 7” Edge Lit Razor LED™ LCD Portable TV features a high-resolution picture, touch controls, and built-in antenna—all in a compact package less than 1” thin. Includes remote control, carrying pouch, and adapters for connecting your DVD/Blu-Ray player or game console. VIZIO’s 7” Edge Lit Razor LED LCD Portable TV packs a lot of technology into a sleek, 1” thin frame, including a built-in fold-away antenna and Dolby Digital sound. With up to 3.5 hours of battery life, it’s perfect for…anyplace you need a brilliant, high-resolution picture. It also doubles as a digital photo frame—just connect a USB drive to share photos with family and friends.”

What it doesn’t have, I found to my minor annoyance, is an A/V output; the Sony Blu-ray has a single A/V mini-jack that serves as both input and output, but no such luck here, so what you see from this TV is what you get. That means its excellent tuner cannot be used for recording purposes, something I’d hoped to be possible at home. Oh well, that was only an anticipated ancillary function.

Another criticism of this TV, common to quite a few small portable devices, is the very poor sound quality, with a tiny pair of speakers that would have been better replaced by a single decent reproducer. One could describe the VIZIO’s sound as having about half the frequency response of a bad telephone connection. That was remedied by the addition of a pair of tiny Polk  speakers designed for personal stereos. Headphones will also serve here.

And turning to that excellent tuner, it brought in more digital stations from my outdoor antenna (the switch to all digital had already happened here in southern Ontario, so no analog signals were available) than my Zenith  off-air tuner, and the extra input also proved useful for monitoring my satellite feed when watching off air on the big screen, as well as for monitoring recordings to DVD or hard disc on my LG video recorder. So checking out the VMB070  for analog reception will have to wait until next Summer.

The credit-card remote is quite handy and simple to operate, though one can’t expect it to light up. Otherwise, it functions pretty much like a full-sized control, with buttons for INFO and GUIDE (new features of digital TV, the former re the tuned channel, and the latter for it and 2 adjacent channels), numeric selection, Menu, Mute, Volume and Channel up/down, Last, and Input, as well as Power, of course. The sparser array of buttons on the TV itself does light up when you approach them with a finger, being heat sensitive.

Picture quality is excellent, sharp and detailed, offering vivid, accurate colours, with a rated 800 x 400 pixel resolution, plenty for this screen size, a 60 Hz refresh rate, and 500:1 contrast ratio. Out of the small box, it looked overly contrasty, but the Menu offers all the necessary adjustments to customize the picture to taste and ambient light conditions. The picture quality is so good that I’ve taken to watching the VIZIO for the late news, instead of turning on the Anthem  projector’s 92″ screen if I haven’t already been watching it. The little TV  is set up quite close to the watching couch, so it’s convenient, and the Anthem has just passed 2000 hours on its bulb, so it is time to conserve my light when possible.

Getting back to basics, the VMB070  comes with a handy soft pouch, the AC power and RF-coax adapters, and a composite A/V cable, as well as the remote control, of course. Its 3.5-hour internal battery can be recharged with the power wall wart. That power supply is for 12-volt DC, so I’ll be able to plug the VIZIO  directly into my solar system at the lake (that cord not supplied). An excellent Quick Start Guide is provided with clear illustrated instructions for setup and operation. Except for its lack of a way to output its excellent video signal, and poor speaker sound, the VIZIO VMB070  7″ TV is a remarkably good value even for its list price, and a helluva a bargain for what I see it being advertised to sell at online.

Andrew Marshall