Plasma really worth it? (1 Viewer)

[Brent M]

Well said, DaveGTP.

 

[Max Leung]

Plasma weaknesses:

- expensive
- low resolution. 848x480...anything higher and the price goes up...way up! Not very good for HTPC use, especially for high-end gaming.
- dithering-like artifacts similar to DLP. I see what looks like mosquito noise on neutral colored areas of the image.

Movies on my aging TW40X81 CRT RPTV look filmlike and smooth. When I look at a plasma, it screams "LOOK AT ME! YOU ARE WATCHING A VIDEO!" - it's great eye candy, like looking at pictures of playboy centerfolds. There is a level of hyper-realism when looking at a plasma in torch mode. I think a plasma would be perfect for watching anime or playboy videos - it would complete the unreal experience. :p)

With that said, a properly calibrated plasma can look very good. Comparing a Samsung 61 inch DLP RPTV and a Panasonic 50 inch plasma, and it was very close when comparing color fidelity and punch. However, the Samsung has 1280x720, double the resolution of the Panny and is a few grand cheaper to boot.

One thing nice about the plasmas: Women seem to drool all over them (based on anecdotal evidence and watching couples in the stores). Who cares about PQ when WAF is on the line?

 

[DaveGTP]

Actually, the only plasmas with that low of a resolution are the 42" ED units. The 50 incher Pannys are like 1366x768, with the Pioneer being 1280x768. A little more resolution And the DLP has inferior black levels and black detail to the Panny plasma units (and this coming from a DLP FP owner).

I still hold that Pannys have better PQ, if you want to use a generic term like Picture Quality. I personally don't like CRT RPTVS - the narrow viewing angles and limited light conditions would drive me bonkers.

 

[Max Leung]

Has anybody tried hooking up a PC to these supposedly high-res plasmas? How good does it look, provided you can get 1:1 pixel mapping? Are all 50 inch panasonic plasmas at 1366x768?

It's too bad most of the plasmas I've seen look terrible. I even see screendoor on some of them (must be the low-res plasmas). Although, the Panasonic 50 inch I did see at Best Buy looked pretty good. I should have looked closer to check out its resolution.

 

[Jonathan Dagmar]

Panasonic produces plasma panels with a 4000:1 contrast ratio, if you can have blacks with that then......

And further feature exclusive to panny's is that the panels are assymetricaly. The blue is wider than the green which is wider that the red. It is well known that blue is the darkest colour, and therefore is usually overdriven in both CRTS and plasma panels to make it as bright as the green and red. not necessary with pannys, which is why they not only are rated to last much longer than other plasma panels, (60,000 hours!) they have better colour accuracy, better gret scale, better BLACKS, and so on. But yeah, they still cost a hecj of a lot, so unless being able to hang it on your wall, you are much better off buying an LCD or DLP projo.