Haier HLT71 7-Inch Handheld LCD TV

First I did my homework, read both the excellent and rotten reviews but after finding that I should have excellent to moderate reception (see: [...] )I took a chance. Indoor or out I get nothing. I know these small portables will work in this area, the one I see at Radio Shack works great. This one goes back to Amazon tomorrow!

I bought this tv to play one player rpg's while on vacation. For that purpose, it is superb. I am very happy with my purchase. It is also nice for watching DVDs on, as long as you are not looking for perfect sound. This is a good product and I will definately recommend it to my friends.

Not sure if I got a bad unit but when I plugged the TV and autoscanned for channels, it found none using antenna that came in the box. We live just outside of NYC and I expect to find at least 10 channels - (my other TVs find 40+ channels). But this TV found none - no matter how I oriented the TV - even when outside the building. So back it went to Amazon. I found dozens of reviews with the same issues so either this TV is very flaky or there is a batch that don't work correctly. Amazon customer service is great.

I brought this TV about 2 months ago twice! The first one that I brought would not even come on...it would charge but not turn on. I took that 1 back and got another one. The 2nd 1 worked fine as it picked up all of the local over-the-air stations in my area. I brought the TV to use at work but because of the area that i'm in at my job I don't get good reception. I stopped bringing it to work and haven't used it in a few weeks.
Well I pulled it out recently to use it and now I can't get any stations other than analog. I took it different places and scanned it and still...only analalog!! I even tried to hook it up to 1 of my TV antennas at home and still...only analog stations. I'm really upset that I paid my money for something that I can't use because it will not work properly. I'm looking at getting another one sometime soon and I can tell ya that it definitely will not be HAIER!!!!

While I don't have this model I do have applicable experience on portable TV's. First, if you like your TV and expect to keep it a long time go ahead and buy another battery ($31 at Amazon). Why, you ask. Haier is not a big name brand and really doesn't have a great reputation for service. As such I would not depend on them to have batteries available 2 years from now at any price. There might be some third party batteries available but so far my experience with them is 100% negative - if the do work they don't last. Lastly, if you want your original battery to last unplug it. I know that is a lithium/ion battery and that it should tolerate a constant trickle charge. Go tell that to the millions of laptop owners who work at a desk always hooked up to 110v and then they take their laptop away from the office and get only 30 minutes of power even with power saving measures turned up to the max. People who constantly in and out of the office get pretty good performance from li-ion batteries. Those that leave their devices (including TV's) plugged in for months and think that they should have 100% of expected performance available will likely be disappointed. Why does this happen? I expect that the more intelligent chargers which charge, test, and cycle the batteries are beyond the budget of these devices although I don't let HP off the hook for this reason. I know this suggestion conflicts with the reason many buy such a TV especially those looking for emergency service. It comes with a car adapter that will run and charge at the same time. You weren't going to get but a couple of hours of service anyway so you were likely going to exercise this option as it is.

Perhaps when Sony and Panasonic enter this market we will have answers for both issues. My second gen Panasonic DVD player (circa 1998) had batteries which didn't deteriorate unexpectedly and were still available in 2008 although at a price almost as much as a new Panasonic DVD player.