Insignia or Samsung?

[zzbusch2]

I'm thinking of buying the Insignia 51" NS-51P680A12 from BestBuy or the Samsung PN51D530A3. From what I've read, these are the same TV. The Insignia is just a rebrand for Bestbuy.
Does anyone have any experience with either of these TV's? The Insignia is $150 less then the Samsung. If everything is the same, I'll go with the Insignia.

Thanks.

 

[Pardus]

Samsung will have better picture, features, lousy sound
Insignia will have an ok picture, better sound, better warranty

Go with the Insignia and use that $150 to invest in a long term warranty.

 

[NutBucket]

Truth. 3 year squaretrade warranty is about $150

 

[sivart]

From what a Best Buy manager told me is that Insignia's are made by Samsung. It is basically their QC reject panels, so they may have a worse contrast ratio or some other spec.

Along with different features and firmware.

 

[Modelworks]

Insignia is made by whoever they can get to make the product for the lowest cost at the time Best Buy wants the model made. You might buy one model and have it be samsung and the next one might be funai and there is no way to tell without opening the products and looking at the boards.
If brand is important to you then stay away from brands like vizio and insignia .

Insignia can be much harder to locate replacement parts for because the production runs are shorter and done on demand. So when the factories produces the run they do not have a lot of extra stock or replacement parts left . Insignia also means that you are going to have to rely on Best Buy to get repairs because most shops are reluctant to work on the brand.

 

[ericlp]

does costco still offer 3 year warranties after you buy with your amex card? Tho, you I don't think costco sells insignia that's a best buy brand right?

To me that is worth the price of the TV not only that but 90 day money back is great too.

 

[wirednuts]

i would do more research. if they truly are the same tv, then yeah whatever. but samsung doesnt put much price premium on their products as it is, so i would bet that insignia has cut some costs somewhere by removing something...

plus, samsung has excellent RMA service should you not want to go through the retailer. insignia of course is all done through worst buy