All very clever, but as if this wasn't stylish enough in itself, the TV also boasts a strident scarlet-coloured back panel (that sticks out a mere 80mm), and lights the edges of the cut-out circle in red when the TV's in standby. Cute.

Good value, a fantastic all-round design, great connectivity, bright and colourful images

Lack of detail in dark areas, some processing problems

As part of Toshiba's 'Picture Frame' range, its trick is that it shrinks its bezel down to an almost unfeasible size; just 23mm across. This means that your picture almost looks like it's floating in mid air - an effect that's not as showy as our ...

A design so subtle it's startling, takes up less space than any other 40in TV, decent HD pictures, fair price

Strange flickering effect to pictures, standard definition performance isn't the best

The set's most immediately obvious trick is Ambilight, whereby pools of coloured light sympathetic to the content of the picture spill from the TV's sides. As well as giving the 47PFL9632D a striking after-dinner talking point, Ambilight genuinely ...

Superb picture quality, features galore, Ambilight design

Care needs to be taken with picture settings, occasional processing glitches

It gets off on the right foot, at least, by looking rather lovely thanks to the way a smoked glass cover has been placed over the normal black bezel. It's well connected too, with three HDMIs, a PC port and a digital audio output among the highlights.

Impressive HD performer, much improved 100Hz, great looker, good connectivity

Numerous standard def problems

Thanks to its innovative 'Picture Frame' design, the bezel around the 46XF355's screen is just 23mm across, helping the TV look sublime, and meaning the 46in set occupies barely any more space on a wall than a typical 42in TV.

Superb space-saving design, great colours, good HD performance

Average standard definition performance, poor viewing angle

Including three HDMIs and two component video inputs among its connections, meanwhile, ensures that the 46W3000 provides plenty of terminals for our favourite HD sources.

Excellent colour response, loads of features, great build quality

Motion blur, black level issues

Its rear end disappoints too, by only including two HDMIs when every other TV we've featured today manages three. Ah well; at least these HDMIs can handle 1080p/24 feeds from Blu-ray players.

Superb colours, good price, good contrast

Troubling amounts of motion blur, only two HDMIs

Other great news finds the LE40A656 boasting a full HD resolution, four v1.3 HDMI sockets, 1080p/24 compatibility, a USB 2.0 port for digital photo and MP3 playback, a massive claimed contrast ratio of 50,000:1 (delivered via the inevitable dynamic ...

Gorgeous design, huge feature and connection count, great picture quality

Not cheap, some picture options can mess pictures up

The 42PX80 is also the only TV in this group not to carry a full HD resolution (something plasma finds hard to achieve on relatively small screens). But happily that appears to be the only area where the 42PX80 falls short of its rivals in cold ...

Great value, excellent picture quality, good feature count

Red colours can look a touch orange, HDMIs can't handle Deep Color

In case you're thinking that flat TVs are already pretty thin, then consider this: while most 'flat' TVs are around 100mm deep, the majority of the 42in LT-42DS9's rear end sticks out just 34mm (though this does increase to around 74mm in places). The ...

Surprisingly cheap, stunning slender design, good connectivity, decent pictures in many ways

Motion can smear, parts of the rear stick out over 70mm