New life for plasma TVs?

I spent some time at ABT Appliance the other day and they had the 60″ Pioneer Kuro Plasma, the 58″ Panasonic Plasma, and the 52: Sharp Aquos LCD right next to each other all playing the same signal. There was a dark shadowy part of the scene and what sold me on the plasma also makes for a good analogy:

With the Sharp there was nothing at all in the dark shadows. But with both the Panasonic and the Pioneer, you could clearly see what was in the shadows. For those of you who think plasma is dead or LCD is somehow better, you really don’t know what you are missing. Why buy a HD TV to get the great detail if it is not able to show you anything in the shadows?

I own a 46″ Panasonic Plasma - couldn’t be happier. And I’m in the market for a 55″ Flat-panel right now. On screen-sizes below 50″ - prices are equal and its a toss-up. But on screens-sizes above 50″ - PLASMA! Why? It’s cheaper, and hands-down the better picture. Why pay more for a lesser picture. Read any review of a large-screen LCD and they’ll always talk about how it’s almost as good as a plasma….

Just my 2 cents for what its worth. Bought a 55 inch Fujitsu plasma in April 2003 use it almost everyday. I still look at the new plasmas and LCD’s at the stores just to see what’s new. Guess what, I still have not come across anything that compares in picture quality and reliability this set has to offer. Just like going to the movie theatre…

I have a 25″ that I got when a hotel upgraded TV’s. It pretty much sucks but it didn’t cost me much

this article fail’s to list the problems with plasma’s that turn off most costumers. the gases in the screen are finicky with heat sources like sunlight. The fact that plasma’s are also(this may have been resolved by now)notorious for burned images. And let us not forget, the gases inside the screen will have to be refilled. how safe is that for the family gerbil when you leak some fighting with a 105″ screen?

I’ll put my panasonic 58″ plasma up against any LCD. I’ve seen my TV side by side at electronic stores against all the other LCDs, and the picture was the best, and the price was 50% cheaper for a large TV.

I bought my TV for my main uses… sports, and movies. LCD is nice but the black levels, contrast ratios, and colors aren’t as stunning. I don’t care about using my TV as a monitor. My computer monitor does a better job than any LCD TV could.

I’m not against LCDs, it’s just that I think they aren’t as cheap in large formats, and their brightness comes as a trade off to worse black levels, and slower for motion.

The Pioneer “Elite” Kuro plasma televisions offer a contrast ratio which is measured to be twice that of the next best flat screen (including other plasmas and LCDs) due to it’s incredible black levels which cannot be mimiced by LCD.

Today Plasma offers the technology advantage for the best quality picture - but good ones are expensive. The 60″ Pioneer Elite KURO PRO-150FD retails for $7,500 - but there’s nothing out there like it.

If you look at everything that’s been said about LCD and Plasma, you’ll notice the lack of complete information to the general public. LCDs’ maybe more power efficient than Plasma (eventhough that difference is shrinking)and that they’re less expensive to build,of course if you look at the prices of a Plasma TV anyone, and look at a comperable LCD, you’ll notice the price difference is minimal. As far a burn in, all you people out there need to know that all you need to do to avoid that is to not have the brightness and contrast turned all the way up like they have in the stores. And to not leave a static image on the screen all day. If for some reason you see an image on the screen after the tv has been turned off, you can clean it up by either putting on something that is white or just leave the tv on without any image and just have a black screen on. Also believe it or not, cartoons act like an eraser for that. Because of all the colors and motion moving all the time. Burn in is very easy avoid if you just use your head. And if it’s going to happen it’ll happen in the first 100 hours or so of usage. LCDs’ have too many issues with them at this time. To get one with the best black levels and minimal amount of motion blur you need to jump up to one that costs as much as a plasma tv, or to be more exact somewhere around $2500.00 or so. LCD manufacturers are making strides in those areas and someday they’ll all be pretty much the same, but keep in mind that they are ALL trying to make their tv’s as good as the old CRTs’.

After a lot of research, CNET reviews and personal comparisons I concluded that Plasma hands down beat LCDs. To tell all of you honestly, SONY LCDs including XBR4 looked trashy compared to the Pioneer Kuro and Pioneer Elite series. SONY is about 5 years behind Pioneer in duplicating HD & digital performance particularly in the areas of color saturation and motion blur.

I have a 50 inch LG Plasma. Seems good to me.

The heat it puts off actually works out nice, it truly warms my room. Keeps it nice and toasty in the winter. In the summer, the room is cool, and I barely watch in the summer, so I don’t anticipate it being an issue. Also, if you play games on it, take a break after an hour or so and flip to a tv channel. The Burn in tends to disappear. I agree the burn in is the worst part, but I guess thats what we have to deal with on Plasmas. Sometimes I switch to the channel that’s “Snowy” and leave it there while I go do something, it tends to help out…

Plasma is dead… PERIOD

If I wasn’t a gamer I would go Plasma. Yes plasmas still have burn in problems, even the new ones. My brother in-law has a new Pioneer KURO (with in a year) with “anti-burn technology” and he has a big fat Wii logo burned into the bottom left corner of the screen. Which blows because Plasmas have better scan rates then LCD. However as a gamer rear projection is still the best solution but the brightness is a bummer on those sets. Worse then plasma.

As someone else said plasmas are great for sports and fast movement but in few years OLED will replace it.

RE: Laptop connection to plasma:

Yes, you can. I have a laptop connected to my plasma tv. I use it (along with a wireless keyboard) for playing Netflix Watch Now movies. Looks great!

My 50″ Pioneer Elite plasma had the best picture of any set I saw in my two-month search for a HD set. It blows the LCDs away. It cost more than the other sets I saw, but when it came to buying a set I expect to own for many years, the additional cost was worth it. I have had it for a year and am still amazed at the picture. Sports on a plasma is much better than LCD.

Heat and Plasma… James in GA. I’ve had a 50 inch plasma on top of a mantle with a more than 80,000 btu per hour wood stove underneath it with a surface temperature of between 400 and 600 degrees that runs almost non-stop for 3 months out of the year. The plasma is as good now as the day I bought it 3 years ago. It has no fans and has never failed nor has the operating temperature ever exceeded the 110 degree maximum. I don’t know what you’re talking about.

I have a 42″ Plasma in the family room which is surrounded by windows and the picture is alway clear at any angle and with lots of light.

I was undecided until I saw fast moving scenes on two monitors side by side - one Plasma and one LCD. Plasma delivers much better picture quality for fast moving / action scenes. So I bought a 42″ Panasonic plasma and never regreted the decision.

At the larger sizes (>50)the plasma’s are definately the way to go. I bought a 58″ Panasonic 1080p this summer, for a basement w/no light issues. When the lights are out, you can’t distinguish the black areas on the screen from the darkness in the room. With HD-DVD playing, it looks like you are looking out of a window, its so clear and crisp. Amazing

They set the LCD’s in the store way to bright.

IMHO though the technology that seems to be on a short life span is the DLP, other than for budget shoppers.

I have a Panasonic 37″ Plasma monitor needed the smallest plasma to fit in entertainment unit)with a PC card and HDMI slot card in it and a Samsung 32″ LCD with all the hookups. THE PANASONIC PLASMA crispness and picture quality are far SUPERIOR to my LCD. I have Verizon FiOS and had Comcast. Fios is superior. Go to CNet dot com and get unbiased reviews.

I am in the high end electroics business selling realy expensive high quality systems. Apples to apples, if you can choose plasma choose plasma.

To answer the PC question below, you can connect a plasma to a PC safely. If you are looking to use it as a constant computer monitor, the LCD is a better choice as plasmas can “burn in”. This will only happen if the plasma sits on one image, like just the desktop, sits for long periods of time.

The PC answer? If its mostly a TV pick plasma, if its mostly a PC LCD is a better choice.

OK, Is it that important. I have a 36″ Toshiba CRT I purchased in 1998. Works great, good picture. A real big clunk’n piece of plastic and glass.
I am using the $2K I saved not buying a LCD or PLASMA for a golf trip in VEGAS. Enjoy sitting home getting fat and watching your LCD or PLASMA. I’ll let you know how green the courses are in person.

I chose a plasma because of the viewing angles.

I chose an LCD over plasma because typically, LCDs use less energy.

I also disagree with Plasma losing a side-by-side comparison with LCD. When I was shopping for a big screen TV I was open to either LCD or Plasma and the Plasma clearly had the superior picture, especially when displaying fast motion. In bigger screens, the difference in the display of motion appeared more pronounced. Watching a football game on a 50″ LCD vs. a 50″ Plasma showed how smooth the Plasma display is and how rough the LCD can be. The LCD would even slightly pixelate at times of sudden movement.

I bought a 50″ Samsung Plasma and am constantly amazed at the crisp picture and vibrant colors. Mine sits in a bright living room with several windows and the anti-glare screen makes reflections a non-issue. I had a burn in from one of those cursed channel logos and the anti-burn utilities cleared it up nicely.

I’m with Gigi of New London, CT on the logo issue. It’s not enough that there are more commercials on some channels per hour of program than ever before. No, now they have to flash pop up promo banners across the bottom of the screen during the actual program as well. It’s ridiculous and annoying as hell. And the burn in issue of station logos is one I hadn’t thought of. Personally, I’ll stick with our 32″ CRT until it dies (we’re on cable, so we don’t care about broadcast going digital). LCD vs Plasma? Who cares? The programming is so crappy it’s not worth spending $1000s for these new sets.

The reason I bought an HDTV was for better picture quality. Plasma has a better quality picture. Questions?

As for the side by side comparison, that is what drove me to buy a plasma. I spent a litle over a month sopping for an HD TV, and I ended up with a 42″ 720p Plasma (can’t think of the model number!), because it honestly has the best picture. My father has a 42″ 1080i Sony LCD, and the first thing he said when he saw mine was “Wow, this picture is MUCH better than mine!” I’ll stick with the plasma!

I’m in the market for an LCD/Plasma…still undecided. Side by side viewing viewing is always a challenge. Can anyone comment on the quality of the incoming signal to the TV, or the ability of the salesmen on the showroom floor to configure the set optimally? In some stores, just taking a view of many screens at a reasonble angle shows variation in brightness and color. Of course, I expect some dependence on the performance of each set, but the I think the setup is important. The environment plays a role as well, AR is the way to go. Still, I’m liking the truer black and better contrast of the plasma.

ought two large LCD’s because I could hook up my laptops directly to them…you can’t do that with Plasma’s…can you?

Both Panasonic and Pioneer Plasma TV’s have PC input so you can hook your PC up to a plasma. The better question is should you do that? I can’t answer that with any authority but the manufacturer would probably not have that input option available if hooking up a computer was a bad idea.

I’m in the market for a new TV. Recently the Wall Street Journal did an article on LCD and plasma TVs. It stated that plasma uses a third more to twice as much energy to operate than an LCD. I’m concerned about the environmental costs as well. Any information would be helpful.

I have a 19 inch Magnavox I bought in 1987 and its still going strong. What a deal!

I bought two large LCD’s because I could hook up my laptops directly to them…you can’t do that with Plasma’s…can you?

Well, maybe in the consumer world LCD is gaining but in the out of home advertising market integrators on our digita signage forum are buying plasma displays because they are more economical.

Re John Fortt’s response - a casual search for LCD vs Plasma will get you oodles of layman explanations for why LCDs look brighter - the retailers at big boxes set them at ‘torch mode’ i.e. Brighteness/Contrast at maximum (presumably because they sell at higher margins??), while the plasmas are set at dimmer settings.

What is the lifespan of a Plasma set vs. an LCD set?

I agree with an earlier view that OLED’s will probably be the next hot thing.

I have a 23″ LCD in my sleeping room and a 42″ PLASMA in my living room. And to be honest the Plasma rocks!!!!
It’s a NEC 42PX VR5A and this is a low resolution model. I have seen so many 1080 LCDs and still the low resolution NEC Plasma beats them all! I had somebody over watching Training Day and the picture is so crisp when you see the raindrops on the car, that you can’t believe thats only low resolution. After almost 2 years no sign of burn in. Just turn on the sleep timer if you fall asleep easy on dvd’s. NEC rules!

The contention that plasmas lose to LCDs in a side-by-side compairson is either misinformed or….let’s just call it misinformed. LCDs lose when it comes to black levels and accurate color reproduction. Not to mention it fails in motion test (performing dismally when compared not just to plasmas, but also to LCoS displays).

I don’t know Mr. Fortt’s credentials, but I suppose there’s a reason he works for CNN and not a serious audio/videophile publication. He’s clearly not qualified to write an article on this topic.

From Jon Fortt: Perhaps you should take this up with Panasonic’s Chief Technology Officer, Paul Liao. He’s one of the biggest plasma boosters out there (since Panasonic is heavily invested in the technology), and the side-by-side comparison statement came from Liao himself. He says (and the story notes) that plasma’s comparison struggle has everything to do with brightness at retail.

Plasma is dead. OLED will be the leader of the high end market in 3 to 5 years with LCDs being the cheap alternative.

In next-gen models, yes. Panasonic’s CTO tells me that 2008 plasma models will be about 25 percent more efficient than last year’s, basically matching LCD’s power use. He says 2009 models will be 50 percent more efficient than last year’s.

Can anyone speak to the power consumption issue with Plasmas. When I bought my TV a year ago, I was amazed at how much power a Plasma consumes as opposed to a LCD model. has this been addressed in current or next gen models?

I agree that pricing has led America to an inferior product (LCD). I’ve got both, plasma in main room, LCD in bedroom. Plasma picture (both SD and HD) is clear crisp. LCD picture is inferior on SD programming, less than great on HD. Plasma is clearly a superior product but a lot of old issues (burn-in, etc) have led people to LCD. Plus, LCD’s are generally cheaper but, in my opinion, you’re getting less quality for the lesser price.

You can’t compare the rated lifespan of a plasma to an LCD. A plasma lifespan is rated for when it goes to half the original brightness, an LCD lifespan is more to when the backlight dies than loses brightness. Refresh rate has nothing to do with how a display shows motion, it’s the response time in milliseconds that determines how well it shows motion (4 msec will show motion much better than 8 or 12). An LCD is backlit, it will never look like an emissive display; as plasma’s, regular old TVs and OLED are. Emissive displays can turn pixels off (like turning a light off), that’s why they can show black better (contrast ratio). An LCD is darkening a crystal to block the backlight (like holding a grey filter in front of a light instead of turning the light off), the crystals aren’t truly black so some light gets through and there is bleed-over from surrounding light. Eventually, when every LCD pixel gets it’s own individual backlight that can be turned off (an OLED backlight for instance) they will have much better contrast ratios but that is a few years off. Burn-in will always be an issue with a plasma, it is being moderated on newer sets by control schemes, not by making the plasma pixels more resistant. I am particulary upset with the new habit of all channels displaying a constant logo now while we are all switching to displays that have burn-in issues, I wish someone would sue them to get this crap off the screen. As it is, I don’t watch some channels now because they have a giant logo that is solid white as well as constant advertising of some other show. We should all get together and cancel our cable subscriptions until the logo’s go away.

The major problem I have seen with Plasma TVs is the screen reflectivity compared to that with LCDs. The plasma sets tend to reflect everything while the LCDs have almost no noticeable reflection visible.

James, I own a Panasonic plasma that uses the same anti-reflective coating you see on LCD’s. It’s located in a bright room with many windows, and yet I can watch it without difficulty.

Just as LCD technology has improved through the addition of higher refresh rates and wider viewing angles, plasma technology has improved through the use of anti-burnin systems and reflection cutting screens.

In my opinion, LCD does still have three advantages over plasma though. LCD is lighter, LCD uses less electricity, and LCD generates less heat (though I’ve never seen one with a fan). When I weighed those LCD pro’s against the superior picture quality of the plasma, I simply decided that those LCD advantages weren’t strong enough to justify the inferior picture quality. I have never regretted that decision.

I have a plasma; trade in an LCD that actually had a slightly sharper image, but the plasma is cheaper, producing better contrast and color; and if you still watch some SD content with your HD service it can handle it alot better than an LCD or DLP. The heat and burn-in issues are old news - this was years ago. The only down-side of the current affordable plasmas is weight, which is something that is being taken care of as apparent in the CES exposure and energy use - but it would take longer than the life of the plasma or LCD to cost as much as the LCD of comparable features over the same period.

It’s unfortunate that so many of our choices as consumers are driving us to inferior products. Wish I could say this was a new phenomenon, but it’s been this way for decades. Plasma has always been a superior alternative to LCD, and will continue to be for quite some time. You will never be able to achieve satisfactory contrast ratio when your method of viewing involves shining a backlight through the entire panel.

Plasmas are available in larger sizes than LCD!

Many people are unaware that plasmas are rated for the same life span as lcds…60,000 hours. Burn in is also an issue of the past. If you plan to mount the tv, a plasma will provide a better viewing angle.

I’ve been selling tvs for nearly five years now. All I can say is that it is tragic that plasmas receive such bad press (usually) online. Nearly all of my customers come in asking specifically for lcds due to poor information. It is always an uphill battle to sell them a superior set. (plasma) If you watch sports or movies, you will indefinitely have a better experience with a plasma set. I own a 2 yr. old Hitachi that I am extremely happy with. Check out the Samsung and LG plasmas as well.

I have both. A 50″ plasma Pioneer 5080HD (720P) and a 46″ 1080P Samsung LCD that just came out. (blanking on the model number) Although I really like the LCD, it didn’t take long to realize that the plasma produces a better picture in my viewing environments. I found the plasma to produce more accurate color, much deeper blacks, and a sharper image, even though its a 720P model vs. the 1080P LCD. Also noticed significantly less motion blur on the plasma even though the Samsung set has 120hz refresh rate. Now, price is usually a big factor for most people and Pioneer was very expensive compared to the LCD. But Pioneer charges a premium for its plasmas that I no problem paying for. The only other picture out there that is better than the Pioneer 5080HD (Cnet will back this), is the Pioneer 1080P Elite version of the same TV. Either way. HDTV rules.

The life of the plasma TV compared to the LCD is what sold me on the LCD. I have several friends that purchased plasma’s when they first came out and they have since had to replace them due to issues with plasma degredation.

This is no longer the case. New plasma TVs use automatic pixel-shifting and also have higher quality screen technology.

As for reflectivity, plasmas can be purchased with anti-glare screens. I didn’t do this because I did not need to for my viewing area, but I did purchase a plasma two months ago for several reasons over LCD –much better black levels, warmer colors, and better viewing angle. Pioneer, Panasonic, and Samsung make some excellent plasmas, and they just keep getting better

I am surprised neither the article nor the comments so far have mentioned the difference between viewing plasma and LCD at an angle. That bright, crisp LCD image you see standing straight in front, quickly becomes grainy when you step just a little bit to either side. Unless your viewing room is linear so that everyone will be virtually centered in front of the set, you won’t like the view.

The life of the plasma TV compared to the LCD is what sold me on the LCD. I have several friends that purchased plasma’s when they first came out and they have since had to replace them due to issues with plasma degredation.

The major problem I have seen with Plasma TVs is the screen reflectivity compared to that with LCDs. The plasma sets tend to reflect everything while the LCDs have almost no noticeable reflection visible.

Couple that with the plasmas’ tendency to generate enough heat on the larger screen models to require cooling fans and what could be a beautiful picture begins to be brought into perspective with a realistic consideration of rooms with windows and the sounds of fans interfering with the experience.

I disagree with the sentence: “Plasma’s problem has always been the side-by-side comparison with LCD on the showroom floor.”

Quite to the contrary, what sold me on a Pioneer Plasma WAS the side-by-side comparison. Where LCDs were almost hazy, Plasma’s were crisp and sharp. The Pioneer Plasma looked several orders of magnitude better, even when showing HD content.