4 Top LED TVs Under $500 for Super Bowl Fans on a Budget

By Louis DeNicola, Cheapism.com

This time of year, TVs on offer tend toward the humongous: big screens with big price tags for the big game. A high-definition projector can splash the Super Bowl across an entire wall. Consumers who aren't inclined to spend thousands of dollars on such a setup can also find good deals on HDTVs this month. An LCD TV under $500 may not elicit gasps from Super Bowl party guests, but the top picks from Cheapism.com promise to shine all year round. They display high-quality, 1080p images (a.k.a. "full HD") and earn positive reviews from consumers and experts alike. Some are even so-called smart TVs that can stream content over the Internet via apps such as Netflix.

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The screens on these LCD TVs are backlit with LED lights, which use less energy than the fluorescents that used to light most LCD screens. All four recommended TVs have Energy Star certification from the government. Based on the program's estimates, they won't add more than $15 per year to a utility bill with normal usage.

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One thing to keep in mind, especially if you watch a lot of sports: A high refresh rate (the number of images shown on the screen per second) helps reduce motion blur when a TV processes fast-moving content. As CNET reports, many models that claim to have 120 Hz refresh rates, including those featured here, use "creative" ways to reach that number. Some do help reduce motion blur, but others don't. In Cheapism's analysis, the Vizio M401i-A3 received the best feedback from experts who put it to the test.

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