Lets talk Plasma
- Thread starter 1sty
- Start date
1sty said:
about 3 years now.
- :
- 2003 Subaru WRX Wagon, 2000 Miata
some of the older plasmas have issues. there's a movie theatre in Toronto that uses some NEC plasmas as "digital advertisements", so they are on pretty much 24/7. i remember going when the theatre first opened (about 5 years ago) and they were beautiful. i went just last week and the plasmas were all blurry, distorted and the colour was all faded. i will try to take a picture the next time i pass by. again, these were the earlier generation plasmas, i read somewhere that manufacturers are on the 4th or 5th generation right now.
i dont know if this means much to you craig but my old job (very popular bar) took down thier plasma's cause of this burn in/life issue. They got them fixed and put in a diffrent bar the owner had. They replaced them with two huge projection screens then standard 32inch all around the bar. This was a lil over a year ago and all the customers are much happier with the projector.
plasmas are no good for data or games because of burn in.
i personally think projection LCDs or DLP(pricey) are the way to go but not easily mounted up high.
some of those $6000 LCD screens may looks etchy up close but from a normal viewing distance they're golden, imo. who knows how long until we have 40" ones
i personally think projection LCDs or DLP(pricey) are the way to go but not easily mounted up high.
some of those $6000 LCD screens may looks etchy up close but from a normal viewing distance they're golden, imo. who knows how long until we have 40" ones
There are already 40" LCD's...
I've have a DLP projector a while now, nothing beats 720P.
LCD's IMO look like s***. They just aren't accurate enough for me.
As for plasmas, they are I believe on the 6-7th gen now. The Pioneer Elite we have was purchased in 2002. The elites are illegedly "top of line" At the time, it was, gorgeous display. After 3000+ hours however, they sing a different tune. It was re-calibrated and tuned up about 3 months ago. It looks great now..Cost 320$ to have that done. So it goes though.
I've have a DLP projector a while now, nothing beats 720P.
LCD's IMO look like s***. They just aren't accurate enough for me.
As for plasmas, they are I believe on the 6-7th gen now. The Pioneer Elite we have was purchased in 2002. The elites are illegedly "top of line" At the time, it was, gorgeous display. After 3000+ hours however, they sing a different tune. It was re-calibrated and tuned up about 3 months ago. It looks great now..Cost 320$ to have that done. So it goes though.
LCDs are where it's at until OLED is readily available. No flicker, no burn in, great viewing angle, great brightness, extremely low maintainance, and don't suck much power. Not the greatest blacks but that depends on the brand mostly. Not to mention LCDs can sometimes go up to 1080p! Beat that sucka!
girth said:
Let's be realistic here...LCD's are not amazingly accurate in terms of color. They just aren't. Viewing angle is alright. The problem with LCD's is you get what you pay for. Big time. Nice LCD's are so expensive. Also your 1080p claim? Thats the samsung.."price tag sucka" LCD's need to be recharged every now and again, and depending on what you have, can be costly. Same thing applies to plasma's..Really, your best bet is to get a realtively affordable digital projection (DLP being an option) or go projector.
SpicyMchaggis said:
Which model are you refering to?
If its the one I think it is, then its about $6500 which is where most 40" LCD monitors are.
Actualy I have access to a 40" NEC that does 1080i. Any screen that is native at 1280x768 realy shouldn't have a big problem with it, thoereticly atleast as it certainly has the lines to handle it or 720p. Retail is about $6500 for it. Compared to plasmas that can display the same image its around the same retail price. LCD just doesn't typicly have the option of being EDTV to cut cost like plasma does.
1sty, if you are looking for a good ED unit the Panasoics are great, I've sold a bunch and never had a problem with one. I think we've only had three with any problems in the last two years. Only problem you might have if you are looking at the consumer version is that they aren't available right now as the current production run has sold out and the new one is not out yet. A great alternative is the LG ED plasma, same picture minus the ATSC tuner and Cable Card slot, at about $500 less.
As for high quality HD units, my personal favortives are the Pioneer Elite for a full blown TV and the Fujistu for a straight monitor.
For all those talking about recharging plasma it is not possible. We are talking about sealed glass tubes with gas in them, to recharge it you would have to crack the glass open, there by destroying it. Yes they will lose light output over time, every TV does, but most current unit have 50-60,000 hour half-lifes. With most rear projection micro displays you have 4-6000 hours until the bulb burns out and then you have to replace it. At $2-500 per bulb that adds up over time. As for flat panel LCD, they just aren't there yet. If you need a larga flat panel for wall mounting and are going to be running static images on it all the time then by all means get an LCD but if you are going for picture quality go plasma. I have to look at all of these all day every day as I sell this stuff and aside from a tube TV plasma is the best picture out there, far superior to any of the rear projection sets.
If you aren't on a time commitment for your sets 1sty you might want to wait for the new Panasonic line as they are going to release then at a significantly lower price point than the current units. They are going for market share this year.
HTH
As for high quality HD units, my personal favortives are the Pioneer Elite for a full blown TV and the Fujistu for a straight monitor.
For all those talking about recharging plasma it is not possible. We are talking about sealed glass tubes with gas in them, to recharge it you would have to crack the glass open, there by destroying it. Yes they will lose light output over time, every TV does, but most current unit have 50-60,000 hour half-lifes. With most rear projection micro displays you have 4-6000 hours until the bulb burns out and then you have to replace it. At $2-500 per bulb that adds up over time. As for flat panel LCD, they just aren't there yet. If you need a larga flat panel for wall mounting and are going to be running static images on it all the time then by all means get an LCD but if you are going for picture quality go plasma. I have to look at all of these all day every day as I sell this stuff and aside from a tube TV plasma is the best picture out there, far superior to any of the rear projection sets.
If you aren't on a time commitment for your sets 1sty you might want to wait for the new Panasonic line as they are going to release then at a significantly lower price point than the current units. They are going for market share this year.
HTH
Listen to Greg S, he knows what he's talking about. The plasma recharge thing is a total myth. If you are going to be displaying anything consistently, even a logo or running bar on the bottom of the tv then plasma will have burn in. Plus look for a DVI connection for computers if you didn't take that into account.
Greg S said:
I am aware of the plasma myths out there. Some are rather funny. Recharging probably being the best.
I deal mostly in commercial series plasmas which are really just the same as the consumer stuff but don't have a built in tuner and some other typicly un-essential things here and there. I can actualy still get the commercial panasonic EDTV sets as my distributor still has them. The only difference is that the ones I can get do not have built in tuner. If you need one, let me know
For my work, there isn't a major concern with picture quality as with home video. Mostly the screens I sell will be displaying computer grpahics in board rooms or class rooms. However, we have some unusual projects, for us, on the books. ONe being a resturant that wants 2 42" displays to show basicly just TV channels. The other need they have is a 60" rear projection TV, they like sony but I went to circuit/bestbuy/ and tweeter and mitsubishi's TVs just destroy the Sony's.
In general I am in total agreement with you about the projection TV's. Be it DLP or LCD, they have no where near the brightness or clarity of either th LCD or plasmas. Not to mention they had hot spots. What I found weird was just how WEAK the home video projectors are. I sampled 3 the other day and all of them had no balls. IF someone in my idsutry even thought of selling something like it, we'd be laughed out of a job. Although we only play with 2500 ANSI lums and up.
steplat said:
DVI is still somewhat useless for my industry. That being that it can only go 5 ft. After that, its only the piggybacked analog signal that is useful. Our standard cable runs are 100+ feet to projectors. Thats why we typicly use extron interface/line drivers that covert the HD15 connections of computers to 5 single coax wires (mini high res 5 wire). This style of cable, we can run over several hundred ft. That distance problem is also why its rare that we even bother with S-Video as it just sucks over distance. Besides, composite is typicly the best video signal to run as the display device has far superior filters compared to the ones in the DVD players and other sources. The one exception being ofcoarse video cameras which only compress down to S instead of to Composite.
Sorry, off track nonsense over
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I have a 42" Gateway plasma and a 17" Gateway LCD TV. Love them both. Plasma is a little expensive, but the viewing angle is awesome for a 42". It won't burn-in if you don't leave a DVD on pause all day. When there is no signal there is a screen saver. Much more can go wrong with projection than a well-maintained plasma or LCD.
1sty,
I have this Zenith LCD Projection TV for a while now.
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...21925&productCategoryId=cat03006&type=product
LCDs are great for HIGH resolution images, otherwise as most of us know, LCDs are fixed resolution and will stretch pixels to fill the screen.
But, i watch daily TV on it from about a distance of 8-10 feet and its great, sure its not HDTV, but its acceptable for regular TV.
Now hookup my Progressive Scan DVD player or XBox and its gorgeous to look at. No compliants at all. Sharp, clear, and best of all the least glare screen.
All tvs get glare the plus on LCDs it its kinda washed out, dull brighter spots are a lot less annoying than bright clear reflections of most other TVs.
Another note I can hookup my DVI enabled PC and with the newest Nvidia drivers you can output in HDTV formats. Playing HL2 is amazing on this screen.
But if pure picture quality on regular TV reception, i'd go with any ANALOG, but if you can sacrifice a little loss with that and have amazing quality for high end i'd go LCD anyday.
LCD and Plasmas do burn out, Plasma runs on Gas and will run out eventually. LCD have about $250 dollar bulbs that are easily replaced.
I have this Zenith LCD Projection TV for a while now.
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...21925&productCategoryId=cat03006&type=product
LCDs are great for HIGH resolution images, otherwise as most of us know, LCDs are fixed resolution and will stretch pixels to fill the screen.
But, i watch daily TV on it from about a distance of 8-10 feet and its great, sure its not HDTV, but its acceptable for regular TV.
Now hookup my Progressive Scan DVD player or XBox and its gorgeous to look at. No compliants at all. Sharp, clear, and best of all the least glare screen.
All tvs get glare the plus on LCDs it its kinda washed out, dull brighter spots are a lot less annoying than bright clear reflections of most other TVs.
Another note I can hookup my DVI enabled PC and with the newest Nvidia drivers you can output in HDTV formats. Playing HL2 is amazing on this screen.
But if pure picture quality on regular TV reception, i'd go with any ANALOG, but if you can sacrifice a little loss with that and have amazing quality for high end i'd go LCD anyday.
LCD and Plasmas do burn out, Plasma runs on Gas and will run out eventually. LCD have about $250 dollar bulbs that are easily replaced.
1sty said:I am aware of the plasma myths out there. Some are rather funny. Recharging probably being the best.
I deal mostly in commercial series plasmas which are really just the same as the consumer stuff but don't have a built in tuner and some other typicly un-essential things here and there. I can actualy still get the commercial panasonic EDTV sets as my distributor still has them. The only difference is that the ones I can get do not have built in tuner. If you need one, let me know
For my work, there isn't a major concern with picture quality as with home video. Mostly the screens I sell will be displaying computer grpahics in board rooms or class rooms. However, we have some unusual projects, for us, on the books. ONe being a resturant that wants 2 42" displays to show basicly just TV channels. The other need they have is a 60" rear projection TV, they like sony but I went to circuit/bestbuy/ and tweeter and mitsubishi's TVs just destroy the Sony's.
In general I am in total agreement with you about the projection TV's. Be it DLP or LCD, they have no where near the brightness or clarity of either th LCD or plasmas. Not to mention they had hot spots. What I found weird was just how WEAK the home video projectors are. I sampled 3 the other day and all of them had no balls. IF someone in my idsutry even thought of selling something like it, we'd be laughed out of a job. Although we only play with 2500 ANSI lums and up.
Since you are mostly using the commercial units, yea go with Panasonic, you can always ad the tuner pack in one of the swap out modules in the back. I appreciate the offer but the class A rated electronics play havoc with IR systems and I've got a lot of IR controlled equipment, not to mention that i can get most of this stuff at cost.(rofl2)
If you want a great unit for the rear-pros check out the Mitsubishi WD-62327. It's the 325 series stripped of the ATSC tuner, Cable Card adn some other stuff. Basically it is a DLP monitor, has allthe clarity of the normal line Mitsubishi's but without the frills, probably great for the restaurant.
And your right quality home projectors have very low ANSI lumen outputs on them, but the contrast ratios are fabulous, like the Sharp we have on display 900 lumen but 5500:1 contrast ratio. Black the room out and it looks gorgeous.
