Just made the dreaded trip to Currys to check out some LCDs and get dribbled on by the absolute spacktards that set them up (badly).
The standout performer was a 32" Sony V series (old one). They had neither the new S nor the new V in store, but if the former is as good as the set we saw (supposedly it's even better) then Sony have another winner - absolutely suberb in every respect.
They had a Samsung R73 and R51 side by side there as well. Unfortunately their freeview tuners seemed to really struggle with the signal they were getting and they were the only sets which were dropping the stream repeatedly. IQ-wise, the R7x wasn't the improvement over the R5x that I was expecting, though it was hard to tell because (with identical menu settings) the former provided very pink-biased skin tones, while the latter tended towards orange. They made each other look a bit silly to be honest, though the quality of the panels was evident - I suspect they'd come closer to the Sony with HD video.
Aesthetically, the R73 is absolutely hideous. It looks great in brochures but when you see it up close the uneven gloss black surface lets it down - it just seems tacky. I much prefer the more faceted older models.
Got to say, the most distinguishing factor in-store was the way the sets coped with a standard definition feed. The few LCDs that were hooked up to HD sources were more tricky to compare. The LGs looked good for the money, but again, the Sony won out due to deeper blacks and far more useful processing - LG's "XD" seemed less intelligent, by default raising the saturation and contrast to silly levels. There was a Panasonic unit there which looked quite good, but I didn't have time to investigate. Shame there were no Toshibas.