lets talk plasma shall we?

[thecavemankevin]

Well, the wife and i have decieded a nice plasma is in our future (next month or so) and we are going to be buying from circuit city. We are looking in the 2500 range and we will be installing it ourselves (so we will need a wall mount too).

I am curious what some of yalls experiences are with high end TV's and would like to hear your input.

I am currently leaning toward the Panasonic TH-42PX60U It is the new model of last years PX50U which was the third best selling plasma last year. Panosonic also held the #1 spot last year with a very similar model, but it was in many ways more of a monitor (speakers were optional) w/built in TV capabilities.

this peerless mount is the wall mount i am thinking off...but i have done very little looking into the mount dept.

also, what are some of the "other things" that go along with this kind of installation/setup? We have a panasonic home theatre in a box/5 disc DVD changer that we will be mateing this with.

so what do you all think?

[sean33]

sony XBR

[RapidTransit]

I say wait untill Cable/Verizon/Sattelite and BluPoo/HD-DVD do with HDMI otherwise you bought yourself a big paper weight.

On a side note THANK GOD Fios TV got approved in my Town (Second in the State of MA) Good Bye Comcrap pausing and stutering.

[magman007]

what ever you do, buy their agreement on it. It is stupid not to on a big screen/plasma/lcd. As you may know, the plasma halflife is only 4000 hours. that isnt much, especually compared to the lcd with 60,000, also at sears we have had 2 plasmas go down in 7 months. just be smart, and buy the agreement on a plasma. serriously.

[Steelrat]

For a primary display, that you will use often, I would recommend an LCD or rear-projection over a plasma. Plasmas are too prone to fading and burn-in. For a home-theater room used by responsible adults, it would work fine.

[rkjunior303]

I can't stand the picture on an LCD -- the pixelation on it, especially on non-HD channels is out of control. Even with HD channels, I've noticed on my buddies Sony LCD-HD (60'') if the camera moves fast or if there is alot of "action" - the screen quality goes to crap. Pixelates, gets blocky, etc.

[skriptal]

I can't stand the picture on an LCD -- the pixelation on it, especially on non-HD channels is out of control. Even with HD channels, I've noticed on my buddies Sony LCD-HD (60'') if the camera moves fast or if there is alot of "action" - the screen quality goes to crap. Pixelates, gets blocky, etc.

pixelation on a LCD is usually due to a poor digital input, or not at the Native resolution of the LCD. I perfer DLPs though, Although I can see the rainbow on some sets. Gt a Nice LCD DLP you will never look back.

[Kevmaster]

be VERY wary of burn-in with plazmas. We have 6 of them in the office, and 4 have had images burned in them, to varying degrees. They're great TVs, but they do have their limitations. I highly recommend them for use by responsible people...just all the people I work around arn't exactly responsible.

[RRfireblade]

what ever you do, buy their agreement on it. It is stupid not to on a big screen/plasma/lcd. As you may know, the plasma halflife is only 4000 hours. that isnt much, especually compared to the lcd with 60,000, also at sears we have had 2 plasmas go down in 7 months. just be smart, and buy the agreement on a plasma. serriously.

That's news to me. we have had Pioneer Plasmas in service for around 15 years in commercial applications where they NEVER get shut down. I have also sold a number of other commercal units to NASCAR (2 of which are currently in the Daytona USA attraction for over 5 years now) and 2 others that reside somewhere in the world aboard a couple of US nuclear Subs.

Personally I would take a high end Plasma over LCD any day. And DLP is basically just a projected LCD for all practical purposes.

[ThePixelGuru]

I can't stand the picture on an LCD -- the pixelation on it, especially on non-HD channels is out of control. Even with HD channels, I've noticed on my buddies Sony LCD-HD (60'') if the camera moves fast or if there is alot of "action" - the screen quality goes to crap. Pixelates, gets blocky, etc.

That's because the signals at a different resoultion than the TV. Get something that matches and you won't have all the nasty artifacts and quality problems. It's tough to do though, since LCD and plasma screens only have one resoultion, unlike CRTs.

EDIT: RRfireblade, what don't you sell, man?

[magman007]

That's news to me. we have had Pioneer Plasmas in service for around 15 years in commercial applications where they NEVER get shut down. I have also sold a number of other commercal units to NASCAR (2 of which are currently in the Daytona USA attraction for over 5 years now) and 2 others that reside somewhere in the world aboard a couple of US nuclear Subs.

Personally I would take a high end Plasma over LCD any day. And DLP is basically just a projected LCD for all practical purposes.

well, thats what they tell us at sears, and what consumer reports suggests.

[Hexis]

And DLP is basically just a projected LCD for all practical purposes.

DLP is very different from LCD (rear-projection). Both display types are a fixed-pixel design. Beyond that, there is not much that is similar. DLP has a much better color space and black level than LCD. LCD does not cause the "rainbow effect" that some people can see and find distracting.

DLP is a micro mirror device. Light is bounced of a chip that has a small mirror for each pixel (or a mirror for a pair of pixels in some designs). The mirror each pixel is rapidly flashed on and off to tunr the pixel on and off. The light then passes through a color wheel to present a color image.

A LCD display works by projecting light through a LCD panel. The LCD can turn off each pixel, but not quite all the way (black is really dark grey).

[fire1811]

I personally would get a LCD over the plasma's. For the reason's stated above.

[Vex]

be VERY wary of burn-in with plazmas. We have 6 of them in the office, and 4 have had images burned in them, to varying degrees. They're great TVs, but they do have their limitations. I highly recommend them for use by responsible people...just all the people I work around arn't exactly responsible.

Actually, with Next-Gen plasmas (which Panasonic makes), there is no burn in. Also, they've got true blacks AND their life span has been increased to 60,000 hours (that's a lot of damn TV watching!)

[datapimp69]

ok first you have to ask your self if you are looking for size or quality.

first rule of thumb LCD is better for smaller screens 32 and below, you dont want to go above 32" in lcd.
if you want bigger then plasma is the way to go. i can explain this in more detail if you want, but trust me.

once you choose the size you need to look at native res. a good 32" lcd will have a native of 1366x768. then look at the refresh rate of the unit. it should be at 12ms or less, if you stay under 12 you will never see any artifacts watching TV. i have a 12ms 32"lcd and i play bf2 on it and dont see artifacts.

you also want to look at contrast ratio anything over 1000:1 is where you want to be.

caveman hit me up on xfire if you want to talk.

if i was to buy something 32 or under right now i would get this deal
right price for the unit and spec's

or this if you are looking around 50"

but notice that the 32 and the 50 are both the same rez. so how do you think the screen got bigger? the pixcels had to get bigger

and yes i do own one, i have a 30" lcd and a 102" projection in the house.