How are these BUDGET PLASMAS? (1 Viewer)

[xAbre1200]

I was looking at some of COSTO's plasma TV's this week and I noticed how cheap they've become. Their price tag has greatly dropped from last yr. I have been thinking on replacing my current large screen CRT anyways since it has been performing poorly and I thought I would pick up a plasma from COSTCO since their price has dropped so much.

I am going to be soon buying the BIC Acoustech Speakers and I guess a TV upgrade would be great.

I wrote down a few TV's that were within my price range....

1. VIZIO 42" 1299.99
2. Phillips 42" 1499.99
http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11161689&search=phillips%2042&Sp=S&Mo=1&cm_re=1Top_Left_NavTop_search&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&N=0&whse=&Dx=mode+matchallpartial&Ntk=All&Dr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ne=4000000&D=phillips%2042&Ntt=phillips%2042&No=1&Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Nty=1&topnav=&s=1

3. Panasonic 42" 1699.99
http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11165578&search=panasonic&Sp=S&Mo=77&cm_re=1Top_Left_NavTop_search&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&N=0&whse=&Dx=mode+matchallpartial&Ntk=All&Dr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ne=4000000&D=panasonic&Ntt=panasonic&No=4&Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Nty=1&topnav=&s=1

4. Maxent 50" 1799.99
http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11162043&search=maxent&Sp=S&Mo=1&cm_re=1Top_Left_NavTop_search&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&N=0&whse=&Dx=mode+matchallpartial&Ntk=All&Dr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ne=4000000&D=maxent&Ntt=maxent&No=0&Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Nty=1&topnav=&s=1

I was thinking about the Maxent since it is a 50" and the price tag it preaty great, or the Panasonic..... but I really have no idea right now. I was told to stay away from VIZIO because they are cheaply made (well thats what I was told)..... if someone could steer me in the right direction, I would greatly appreciate it.

 

[Gregg Loewen]

hi
the best of the bunch is easily the Panasonic.
regards
Gregg

 

[xAbre1200]

Yes, I also like the Panasonic. But but price is only a few hundred away from the 50" Maxent. The Maxent seems like a better deal but the Panasonic looks like it has the best pictures........ Will the 50" Maxent really perform that poorly? It looked great in the store........ well all of them really did, thats why its so hard to tell which one I should buy.

 

[Arthur S]

Justin

Gregg is correct, the Panasonic is the best of that group, however, the impact of a 50 inch screen is great. A 50 inch has 41.7% more screen area than a 42 inch screen. For lots of info on the Maxent, check out AVS Forum.

 

[Larry Sutliff]

Walmart, of all places, has the Phillips 50PF7320A 50" plasma for a good price. Does anyone know whether this one is any good?

 

[Arthur S]

Larry

Please follow the suggestion I made to Justin to find out about the Phillips.

 

[Larry Sutliff]

Thanks, Arthur.

 

[Arthur S]

You are very welcome, Larry

 

[xAbre1200]

the panasonic is a little on the pricy side. is the maxent able to compare with it?

 

[Mike Romo]

I noticed this as well. I ended up getting the Samsung 42" plasma (my first set!) on Sunday but have noticed the online prices are plummeting--Amazon has it for around $1500...

I was going to get worried, but I read some really positive reviews of the set (I got the HP-S4253) from a variety of places, so I am optimistic. It arrives on Thursday, along with the HDTV DVR and on Friday the Oppo 970HD makes an appearance...we shall see...

 

[Arthur S]

Justin

If you want to know about the Maxent please follow the direction provided to you in post number 4, as Larry did with good results

 

[xAbre1200]

I did, and they will not let me post URL's nor the item price.......

 

[xAbre1200]

IM sure the quality of the maxent model cant be far from the panasonic one

 

[Gregg Loewen]

the 2 are not even close

 

[Arthur S]

Justin

The idea is that you can read about the items you are interested in, and draw your own conclusions

With all due respect, Gregg answered the product quality question, and Gregg knows of what he speaks.

That still leaves you with the question of whether the 41.7% difference in screen area with the 50 inch Maxent will have more impact on you than the better quality 42 inch Panasonic.

Maybe I can actually resolve this for you. Consumer Reports tested 50, and 42 inch plasmas in the March 2006 issue. The very similar (if not exactly the same) 50 inch Maxent MX-50X2 was the lowest rated set in the group, rated only fair in picture quality with HD, DVD, and regular TV. The 42 inch Panasonic rated excellent in HD, DVD, and regular TV.

Regards

 

[xAbre1200]

 

[xAbre1200]

do you guys think that a 50" plasma will be much more bigger than a 42"? It does seem like a preaty significant difference to me... but im not sure if I will be able to sacrifice picture quality. By the way, I am curently a use of dish network, is there any way to improve my signal quality besides getting an HD signal? I currently use cable instead of s-video or componet cables for connecting my TV to the receiver....... will standard tv cable get better results than s-video?

 

[Arthur S]

Justin

The 50 inch will give you, as I posted in post #15 of this thread, 41.7% more screen area. So almost half again as big as a 42.

I would switch to cable and get HD. You have no idea what you are missing by not adding HD, and cable is better than dish, in my personal experience.

You just can't have it both ways. You can't get top notch picture quality in a cheap 50 inch. I really think you need to save up for a couple or 3 months and get the 50 inch Panasonic plasma. Around the holidays you might get an exceptionally good deal, especially since Panasonic is introducing its 1080P plasmas, so the current TH-50PX60U might be available for less than $2,400.

 

[Eric Samonte]

I have the Panasonic 42" plasma and also Dish HD DVR. I recently installed a Panny 50" at a friend's but with Direct TV as his sat provider. Dish HD seems better compared to Direct TV and that's both looking at an HDMI connection. Sat TV is better than cable for my case as cable puts out a grainy picture on all SD programs. For HD both r at par with each other.
On another note, one should consider that a problem on a 50" would show up bigger than on a 42". Basically, u blow up a pic, u get to see more stuff. So I would aree with Arthur..get the Panny 42" now or save up for the 50".

 

[Arthur S]

There have been debates over sat vs cable and there are plenty of people who swear by sat. And there are plenty of people who swear at sat. No one seems to disagree with the fact that medium to heavy rain, very likely will cause signal disruption, though precision alignment will minimize this.

I can only speak from my personal experience which was that rain was a real problem, and that my picture, through Comcast Cable is excellent on SD on a Toshiba 65H84 CRT RPTV from 12 feet. HD adds a total of about $20/month to my bill, since I need a ~$15 digital plan, and the $5 month HD charge. For that, I get about 15 HD channels, including my local ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, PBS. Can you even get the local HD channels on sat?