Is Plasma coming to an end?! Are you buying one? (1 Viewer)

[Kevin Collins]

Back in June of this year CNN Money http://money.cnn.com/2012/06/21/technology/TV-shipments-LCD/index.htm




Quote: from HDTV Magazine

Overall, LCD-TV is the only TV technology that continues to grow, as LCD continues to take market share from both plasma and (not surprisingly) CRT. LCD-TVs will account for 88% of total TV shipments worldwide in 2012,
up from 82% in 2012, and should peak at 97% in 2015, after which OLED-TV will start to become a factor. Plasma TV shipments will fall to about 5% share in 2012, down 26% from 2011 as pricing becomes uncompetitive in some key sizes. OLED-TV sales will be insignificant in 2012.

I don't know, I hope that Panasonic doesn't give up on plasma, it will be a sad day. Being stuck with poor black levels, off-axis viewing and glossy screens send shudders through my body...

What are you going to do?

 

[Mike Frezon]

Originally Posted by Kevin Collins /t/324568/is-plasma-coming-to-an-end-are-you-buying-one#post_3990653
I don't know, I hope that Panasonic doesn't give up on plasma, it will be a sad day. Being stuck with poor black levels, off-axis viewing and glossy screens send shudders through my body...

What are you going to do?

I am going to buy a Panasonic plasma TV within the next week or so. That's what I'm going to do!

I am very excited to upgrade from my current 32" Vizio LCD to a 55" Panny ST50. Veeeeeeeeeery excited! It's much like being a kid at Christmas. In fact, this, pretty much, will be my Christmas gift for 2012. Santa's just bringing it a bit early!

I'd hate to think I'm buying a fading technology. I've been convinced that Plasma sets are the best. But, I also still have my Beta HiFi deck.

 

[FoxyMulder]

By 2016 OLED televisions will start to be mass manufactured and will be cheaper to buy and will likely take over from Plasma, so you will get great blacks by buying them.

 

[Peter McM]

I love my Mitsubishi! DLP forever!!

 

[GlennH]

Yep, I'm thinking OLED. But the latest news isn't encouraging, as the manufacturers are having trouble getting good yields of large sizes, which will serve to delay introduction to the mass market and reductions in price to reasonable levels.

 

[Gregg Loewen]

the problem with all the non plasma technologies is the lack of good viewing angles.

 

[Jason Charlton]

+1 on the viewing angles.

Our "ancient" 32" SD CRT set in our family room may (finally!!!) be starting to show signs of "end of life". I am 99% certain I will opt to replace it with a good plasma display. I have not been impressed with any of the LCD displays I've seen, and since our family room is rectangular with the display on one of the long walls, good off-angle viewing will be critical.

It's ironic for me - flash back to about 6 or 7 years ago, and I was very much anti-plasma - mostly for cost reasons (they were among the priciest option at the time) but that argument has completely disappeared and now they offer a much better quality/price ratio than LCD.

 

[Radioman970]

I have a panny 42" plasma now that I bought a few years back. I went thru a Samsung (60hz) and Vizio (120hz) LCDs and returned them both. The Samsung had a way better picture. The Vizio had lots of options but bad overall. The panny has a good natural looking TV picture. Surprisingly good sound built in when I need to use it (from PC with HTML)..better than Samsung or Vizio. The TV had great dark levels but now it's clearly dark gray. I won't be buying another plasma if I can help it. The image retention thing is completely annoying. I think I have burn in from watching 1:33.1 stuff even though I try to mix it up with different ratios and using the featuring that wipes off the retained stuff. Over time, that just doesn't cut it. Still, this TV seems to be built well. And if there is no other choice, I'd reluctantly buy another.

 

[FoxyMulder]

Originally Posted by Radioman970 /t/324568/is-plasma-coming-to-an-end-are-you-buying-one#post_3990750
I have a panny 42" plasma now that I bought a few years back. I went thru a Samsung (60hz) and Vizio (120hz) LCDs and returned them both. The Samsung had a way better picture. The Vizio had lots of options but bad overall. The panny has a good natural looking TV picture. Surprisingly good sound built in when I need to use it (from PC with HTML)..better than Samsung or Vizio. The TV had great dark levels but now it's clearly dark gray. I won't be buying another plasma if I can help it. The image retention thing is completely annoying. I think I have burn in from watching 1:33.1 stuff even though I try to mix it up with different ratios and using the featuring that wipes off the retained stuff. Over time, that just doesn't cut it. Still, this TV seems to be built well. And if there is no other choice, I'd reluctantly buy another.

Image retention is often confused with image burn in, retention goes away but it can be very annoying, i'm sure you know all this though and i'm looking at a Samsung 60inch E6500 because it has good black levels, better motion at 50hz than the Panasonic models and has far less image retention than the Panasonic models.

 

[schan1269]

OLED works exactly like plasma does...in a sense.
The "market confusion" will be LCD(cause you know with Samsung marketing...) killed off plasma when OLED came along(cause Samsung will probably correlate LCD->LED->OLED)...
Nope.
OLED will replace plasma as a better method(and lighter/energy efficient) of producing a picture in exactly the same way...(ie, each pixel creates its own color and backlight)
OLED will kill LCD as being overall superior.
By the way...
I've been predicting the death of LCD before plasma...
When OLED first arrives, the cost is going to be exorbitant. Plasma can still get cheaper(and bigger). I do foresee 50" being the "small" plasma in another year. With 70" and 80" on the horizon...squeezing out LCD.

 

[Radioman970]

Image retention is often confused with image burn in, retention goes away but it can be very annoying, i'm sure you know all this though and i'm looking at a Samsung 60inch E6500 because it has good black levels, better motion at 50hz than the Panasonic models and has far less image retention than the Panasonic models.

I used to get that mixed up. My panny has this thing I call "The Sweeper". Black screen, white bar that goes across to help with the retention. I use that often to wipe the screen. But now I think I have some thick dark lines along the areas where 1:33.1 lines are and the ratio that leaves bars at the top and bottom. The sweeper doesn't get that anymore. I keep hoping it's in my head. Could be...
Cool TV. My next will be 3D, whatever I get.

 

[Steve Tannehill]

I love my Mitsubishi! DLP forever!!

+1

 

[FoxyMulder]

Originally Posted by schan1269 /t/324568/is-plasma-coming-to-an-end-are-you-buying-one#post_3990798
OLED works exactly like plasma does...in a sense.
The "market confusion" will be LCD(cause you know with Samsung marketing...) killed off plasma when OLED came along(cause Samsung will probably correlate LCD->LED->OLED)...
Nope.
OLED will replace plasma as a better method(and lighter/energy efficient) of producing a picture in exactly the same way...(ie, each pixel creates its own color and backlight)
OLED will kill LCD as being overall superior.
By the way...
I've been predicting the death of LCD before plasma...
When OLED first arrives, the cost is going to be exorbitant. Plasma can still get cheaper(and bigger). I do foresee 50" being the "small" plasma in another year. With 70" and 80" on the horizon...squeezing out LCD.

OLED has arrived and the cost is very high but then so was plasma when first launched, as far as what is type of television sells, well here in the UK and i believe the rest of the world, LCD is outselling plasma by substantial amounts, this is mostly due to LCD's superior brightness, in shop displays an LCD can look stunning while the plasma can look dim under heavy shop lighting, i also think most people are sold on LCD's which are displayed in torch mode in shops, i don't think people know that LCD marketed as full HD 1080p actually produces around 300-400 lines in motion, you need to turn on the interpolation modes to get 1080p, plasma does around 800-900 lines naturally, LCD does have some advantages if you like 3D since it can go brighter, no television is perfect though, each technology has issues, even OLED will have issues.

Home cinema fans will buy plasma, the average person will not, LCD outsells plasma by a good margin, i think i read it was 80% or 90% for LCD.

Here is some news on the issues OLED is having.

http://www.hdtvtest.co.uk/news/oled-tvs-delayed-201210192300.htm

Here is the article about plasma's market share, it is very low.

http://www.hdtvtest.co.uk/news/plasma-market-share-low-201208132099.htm

 

[schan1269]

Ok, lets compare "apples to apples" here...
The smallest plasma are 42".
Last year(I worked for the primary wholesaler of LG so I knew, and still know, LG's sales Y2Y)...
42" and bigger only...
Plasma accounted for 57% of LG sales. Even if you factor in the 40" LCD...plasma still had 54" of LG sales. If you add in 32" LCD, plasma still had 49% of sales. Even MORE IMPRESSIVE? How many more LCD are in LG's lineup over the plasma models?
The single largest selling LG TV?
50" 720P plasma. (which that TV, by itself, outsold ALL of LG's 50" and bigger LCD)
In their top 10....7 were plasma.
From friends that deal with Samsung, the overall market penetration was about the same.

 

[Mike Frezon]

Officially, LG are keeping schtum about their OLED plans, insisting that the new TVs will be available ‘soon’

"schtum?"

 

[schan1269]

Shed a little info here...
Aarons(the RTO place) was one of my clients(well they had a "team", spread out over 7 offices...)...
Their 3 biggest buys?
73" DLP.
50" 720P LG
60" 1080P (bare bones) LG
Those 3 sets made up 80% of their TV purchases.
Aarons made up less than 15% of company wide DLP.
Aarons made up less than 8% of LG plasma.

 

[FoxyMulder]

Originally Posted by Mike Frezon /t/324568/is-plasma-coming-to-an-end-are-you-buying-one#post_3990864

From the article:


"schtum?"

They also said that all employees must drink schweppes, that's the cue to start thinking up words beginning sch, Sam, above my post already has.

 

[Steve Schaffer]

Ok, lets compare "apples to apples" here...
The smallest plasma are 42".
Last year(I worked for the primary wholesaler of LG so I knew, and still know, LG's sales Y2Y)...
42" and bigger only...
Plasma accounted for 57% of LG sales. Even if you factor in the 40" LCD...plasma still had 54" of LG sales. If you add in 32" LCD, plasma still had 49% of sales. Even MORE IMPRESSIVE? How many more LCD are in LG's lineup over the plasma models?
The single largest selling LG TV?
50" 720P plasma. (which that TV, by itself, outsold ALL of LG's 50" and bigger LCD)
In their top 10....7 were plasma.
From friends that deal with Samsung, the overall market penetration was about the same.

I sell tvs at a large national retailer (the one that also sells DieHard batteries) located in a relatively depressed part of town. Nevertheless ours is the "Mother Ship" store between Bakersfield and Sacramento.
We sell a huge number of 50" 720p plasmas because they're the biggest sets less-than-affluent people can buy for 500ish and imho those are the sets keeping plasma alive. 99% of shoppers just want the brightest, thinnest set they can afford and couldn't care less about picture accuracy. They'll pick some god-awful edge-lit Samsung over an ST-GT-VT Panny almost every time.
I did buy a new tv last week. I wanted passive 3D as my eyes/brain have a hard time not seeing flicker and ghosting on active models. Ended up with a 47LM6400 LG. It doesn't have the inky blacks and infinite viewing angles of a Panny ST50 but I don't watch in a totally dark room and my seating positions are well within the IPS panel's sweet spot. I was fully ready to return it and get the more expensive ST50 if I saw too much of the edge bleed, clouding, or banding that plagues most edge-lit led/lcd sets. So far the screen uniformity has been excellent and I'm very happy with it.
As for the potential future disappearance of plasma sets I think a large factor is going to be power consumption limitations on tvs imposed by governmental agencies. This is already set to happen in California.

 

[Mike Frezon]

Originally Posted by FoxyMulder /t/324568/is-plasma-coming-to-an-end-are-you-buying-one#post_3990871

They also said that all employees must drink schweppes, that's the cue to start thinking up words beginning sch.

That would be limiting. I'm sure they also offered up a supply of schpepsi.

 

[FoxyMulder]

Originally Posted by Mike Frezon /t/324568/is-plasma-coming-to-an-end-are-you-buying-one#post_3990874

That would be limiting. I'm sure they also offered up a supply of schpepsi.

I heard on the schapevine that Arnold Schwarzenneger was their favourite movie star.