plasma TVS...

[MrDudeMan]

i am just looking for some general opinions on plasma TVS...

say whatever comes to mind, but please dont be an idiot

if you know a little something about them, please list some good and bad points about the technology. how often do they break or have problems? expensive to fix? etc. etc...

the information anyone provides will be much appreciated!

thanks :beer:

 

[Nebor]

Flat.

 

[Dunbar]

I think they are a good alternative to RPTV's in 42" and larger sizes. If you sit more than about 10' from the TV than a tube television (still arguably the best picture quality) is too small. If you watch a lot of standard definition telivision most people say plasma is better than projection. They are also getting cheaper, a 50" can be had now for under $5k and a 42" ED model can be had for $2500.

 

[HappyPuppy]

Don't buy one from Gateway, they use the cheapest components money can buy in their plasmas.

 

[PCTweaker5]

I think that goes for all of Gateways stuff. I actually heard somewhere that companies like Gateway use refurbished parts in their computers. It feels pretty good knowing that each computer I will own for the rest of my life will be built by me.

 

[biostud]

Expensive and loose colors due to slowly leaking gas in a period of 5 years

 

[0roo0roo]

contrast not as good as a good crt. dot pitch isn't as good either, esp with newer sony tubes that are superfine. they do hav ethe kewl factor. many of the cheaper ones aren't truely hd, they don't have enough pixels.

 

[Isshinryu]

I would much rather have a flat screen HDTV...I never really liked plasmas, though I can't pinpoint the exact reason.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Originally posted by: biostud666
Expensive and loose colors due to slowly leaking gas in a period of 5 years

According to Sound & Vision mag that one is an urban legend.

I keep reading that even the best models have problems showing shades of black properly (both handling fine shading without obvious steps, and showing really deep 0,0,0 black) so I'm keeping my old 32" JVC CRT another year while I wait for improvements.

 

[MustISO]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons

Originally posted by: biostud666
Expensive and loose colors due to slowly leaking gas in a period of 5 years

According to Sound & Vision mag that one is an urban legend.

The gas leaking is definitely not true. Plasmas will lose their brightness over time but no one really knows what the half-life is. They can be VERY expensive to fix, depending on what's wrong with them. Like DLP's and LCD's they cannot match the black levels of CRT displays. I have a CRT based RPTV and I love it. It's not the money, it's that the technology is fairly new and it will get much better and much cheaper.

I'd spend a lot of time on some of the Home Theater sites if you're really interested in learning about the displays.

 

[KK]

We have about 8 or so plasmas at work for alarms and such. One thing I noticed on a few of them is that they do get burn in if kept on something stable for awhile.

KK

 

[ManSnake]

Operating life of ~20k hours.

 

[MustISO]

Originally posted by: KK
We have about 8 or so plasmas at work for alarms and such. One thing I noticed on a few of them is that they do get burn in if kept on something stable for awhile.

KK

Yep, that's one benefit of LCD and DLP. Some Plasmas have an image shift feature that will shift the image at a certain interval to help avoid burn in. As with CRT's, turning down the picture/contrast setting will help to avoid any image burn.

 

[PlatinumGold]

one of my clients bought a Plasma TV, tho when he asked me, i recommended (and i told him i wasn't an expert) that he get a DLP screen.

it's been 4 months now, i've been to his house at least 12 different times to help him with various aspects of his system (Tivo, Dish, Comcast Digital, port out to his laptop, Bose (again not my recommendation) HTS).

he's not entirely happy with it, the only time he gets full satisfaction from his system is when he's viewing DVD's.

i still think he should have gone with a DLP system.

 

[Koing]

Originally posted by: MustISO

Originally posted by: KK
We have about 8 or so plasmas at work for alarms and such. One thing I noticed on a few of them is that they do get burn in if kept on something stable for awhile.

KK

Yep, that's one benefit of LCD and DLP. Some Plasmas have an image shift feature that will shift the image at a certain interval to help avoid burn in. As with CRT's, turning down the picture/contrast setting will help to avoid any image burn.

Yup but at home how often is the image so static for a long period? A while isn't any sort of time frame.

Well my dad is going to buy one at the end of the year around xmas time.

Read here:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?s=4a94cf6ab17e923dfac4aa4719b3120c&forumid=40

Great info.

Get a Panasonic 42" 6series and you will be happy. If you want the tv model the 42PA20 that is good or the newer 42PE30 model. Both are more like 'standard' tv's and have all the controls and such in them. THEIR picture quality is astounding. The blacks ARE black.

I have seen cheap and expensive displays. Go with the Panasonic 6" series models you will be happy. If your going to spend £2k spend the extra £500 and get the 6series. The cheaper displays DO NOT SHOW WHAT A GOOD Plasma screen can do.

REMEMBER that store setups are generally bad and the contrast set well well above normal viewing settings to attract CUSTOMERS. Kind of like people getting a P&S digital camera and then going WOW great image. Then having a photographer look at it and th ink wow the colours are out of WHACK.

But pick whatever technology you like best. Me I don't like RPTV at all. I like Plasma and of course the projector in a darken room for movie viewing is the ultimate but that is impractical for tv viewing.

Koing

 

[Koing]

Originally posted by: PlatinumGold
one of my clients bought a Plasma TV, tho when he asked me, i recommended (and i told him i wasn't an expert) that he get a DLP screen.

it's been 4 months now, i've been to his house at least 12 different times to help him with various aspects of his system (Tivo, Dish, Comcast Digital, port out to his laptop, Bose (again not my recommendation) HTS).

he's not entirely happy with it, the only time he gets full satisfaction from his system is when he's viewing DVD's.

i still think he should have gone with a DLP system.

I'm not really suprised. Plasma screens are not great with bad quality feeds like off the air feeds or sky feeds that are not decent digital ones. Even on the higher compressed digital channels they will look poor. But a DVD will be great.

What plasma did he get?

Bad in bad out.

Koing