LCD/Plasma/CRT/DLP - questions

[andrewfee]

I would seriously avoid the Samsung for a couple of reasons, firstly the scaling on it is very poor, feed it with regular TV and it looks really soft, feed it with anything other than 360 and again it just doesn't look right at all...

The upscaling on the set is fine; 480p looked great, aside from the sharpening DNIe does. It's de-interlacing where the set is let down. (especially 1080i; it throws away half the resolution and runs in 540p)

...the other main problem is all the noise in the dark areas and the lack of blacks on screen, as soon as you get an area where there is a fair bit of dark detail the whole image looks foggy, sort of like a black hole on screen.

Noise in dark areas? It must have been the source. Drive it from VGA and send a full black image; no noise. DNIe's sharpening does exaggerate any noise from the source though.

If you enable the brighness sensor, black levels are good, but not great.

The other thing 90% of LCDs do is frame rate convert, they all convert whatever you put into the screen back to the screens internal frame buffer, most screens have an internal buffer at 60hz, however a few have funny frame rates like 56.25hz. This means any pal material, including tv, games and dvds has judder, this annoys me more than anything else. To see if it bothers you you can force your dvd player to output ntsc and play a pal disc in it.

Now, I don't watch a huge amount of 50Hz material, I mostly play games, but I did not notice any framerate conversion. Scrolling text (like you see on news channels) was smooth here. The set does not do 2:2 pulldown though, so unless your DVD player does it, then DVDs will look a little "juddery" - however that's the case with any television that doesn't do it.

With the panels you get a better picture, upgradeable inputs (add scarts, componet, hdmi etc. as and when you need them) and the 42" panel is smaller than the 37" TV because it has a much smaller surround.

Better picture? Aren't they just the same panel/processing, but you can swap out the input boards?

I would take the 480 line PW8 over any other brand plasma and definitely over any lcd out there, even with HD material it trounces the others, however if you can afford a few more quid then get the PHD8, stunning set!

Well, if you're only watching SD material (television) then a 480 line display will be fine, but 720p downscaled is pretty noticeable for games.

With the 360, games like Ridge Racer just looked like Xbox titles (imo) when they were running in 480i/p; only when viewing it in native 720p did it look next-gen.



Now, I'm not disagreeing with you; there are now displays better than the Samsung around the same price-point, but 5/6 months ago, this was not the case.

If around ?800 is your budget (price of the Sammy) then I would probably recommend going for a higher quality 26" set instead. Not only are you going up a step in quality (the Sammy 26" is around ?600 iirc) but smaller sets make response times look faster. (I guess because the trails are smaller)

[t-dog]

Better picture? Aren't they just the same panel/processing, but you can swap out the input boards?

no, afaik there are different circuits etc on the monitors (pwd/phd) and the tv versions (pv500/pe50/pa50), and appearently, since monitors lack speakers and tuner, more proccess power is being directed towards making a better picture.

Well, if you're only watching SD material (television) then a 480 line display will be fine, but 720p downscaled is pretty noticeable for games.

i think what gizze meant was that even though you feed the samsung a hd signal, and even though you get a slightly higher res, it does not weigh up on all the other bad aspects of the samsungs picture, and all considered you are better off with a panasonic pwd8, even though it's only 480.

[gIzzE]

The Samsung converts everything to 60hz, there is no getting round that, if you can't see it happening that is great, but for those that do it is a nightmare.

Compare the Xbox 360 on a samsung and then the same 720p signal on a PW8, the PW8 looks far better, then compare the same thing on a PHD8 and again it is better, but not as big a jump as going from the samsung to the PW8.
The PW8 is the best screen per ? out there, if you really must have a screen with a higher res the HD version is better, but I would take the PW8 over any other 42" or smaller screen on the market if I could not have the higher res version.

Don't get me wrong, I think Samsung has done more for flat panels than any other company, they got them down to a price where people didn't have to think too much about buying one, however, as you say there are now far better buys out there.

[andrewfee]

no, afaik there are different circuits etc on the monitors (pwd/phd) and the tv versions (pv500/pe50/pa50), and appearently, since monitors lack speakers and tuner, more proccess power is being directed towards making a better picture.

Ah, good point; I hadn't thought of that.

I think what gizze meant was that even though you feed the samsung a hd signal, and even though you get a slightly higher res, it does not weigh up on all the other bad aspects of the samsungs picture, and all considered you are better off with a panasonic pwd8, even though it's only 480.

Well, he said it was better than any other display, other than Panny's 720p ones:

I would take the 480 line PW8 over any other brand plasma and definitely over any lcd out there, even with HD material it trounces the others, however if you can afford a few more quid then get the PHD8, stunning set!
Same with the PV500, great set and beats all other plasmas and lcds, and it is only beaten by Panasonics own monitors.

I'll have around ?3000 I can spend on a new display soon, and was leaning towards getting one of the 37" Philips LCDs with Aptura, when they're released. (technologies like ambilight, and having 1920x1080 pixels are really pushing me towards it)

But the 50" Panny is around ?3500 (I refuse to buy a display with less than 1280x720 pixels) so I could go for that at a push. I'll certainly have to look into it. I have never been impressed with any plasma I have seen on display, however, and am put off by image retention and "rainbows" (not the same as DLP, but you get blue/yellow flashes with fast movement on high-contrast screnes, or big contrast changes)

I don't like having a big glass panel either; I hate reflections, and it's one of the things I love about LCD.

[Salsa Party Animal]

Toshiba WLT58 37" LCD TV is available for 1,499 pounds in some places. You can get 2 HDMI with it, but I never seen it in action.

[gIzzE]

If you are anywhere near Norfolk, or can be bothered with a drive over, you are more than welcome to come and view a plasma that is set up well.

I left the singstar menu on from 1am till 11am the next morning a couple of days after getting the 50" PHD8 and there was zero retention, let alone screen burn. This particular model is pretty bomb proof.

Problem with all these flat panels is you only get that 3D effect when you have decent blacks, and most of them don't, that would rule out any LCD for me as my main set.

I did say that I would take the Panasonic SD monitor over any other 42" flat panel or smaller available (other than the HD version). The reason I said that is I would have a Fuji 40 series if the 42" version was a progressive panel like the 50" and not that ALiS ****!!
That also includes the panny PV500, personally I prefer the PW8 to it even though it is a higher res. But resolution is only good if everything else is done right.

[andrewfee]

Thanks for the offer; I'd love to come and see it, but wouldn't be able to. (I'm in Glasgow for a start)

That's impressive about leaving the menus on though. I have a habit of leaving the X360 dash up so I can see who is signing in etc if I'm in the room, and of course you have crosshairs / HUDs to worry about.

Blacks are important, but most displays I've seen, be they CRT, Plasma etc don't have totally black blacks unless you're swallowing up shadow details. LCD blacks (on higher-end models) don't really concern me, and technology like ambilight should help improve them. (bias lighting can make quite a difference)

[shane3107]

Hi, I would like some help please...

I am after purchasing a smallish LCD screen for the spare room to play games on (obviously).

I have a budget of around ?500.00 and it would be used for the following:-

Xbox360 (PAL), PS2 (PAL), GC (NTSC), Xbox (NTSC) & PC. I would want to run them all at the highest res - if at all possible and it would effectively be my one "gaming" screen for all of the above consoles & PC.

I found a set which seems to meet my requirements but thought it wise to run it by you guys first to see what you think. The set is question is the SAMSUNG LE23T51BX.

http://www.hiwayhifi.com/site/product.asp?section=2&cat=37&sub=148&prod=25651

I would want the screen to be future proofed for the PS3 as well so any guidance on this would be great please.

If you think this Samsung screen is **** but can reccomend another at a similar price, than please do so.


Thanks in advance.

[HaHaUK]

I would want the screen to be future proofed for the PS3 as well so any guidance on this would be great please.

That set does not have HDMI input which will be the input of choice for HD PS3 gaming.

[gIzzE]

I would have a look at the Panny lx52 26" for around ?700 ish, it does everything you want and only a little over budget!!

[Kron]

I would have a look at the Panny lx52 26" for around ?700 ish, it does everything you want and only a little over budget!!

It doesn't have a native PC input.

[gIzzE]

Good point!

However do you ever use you TV as a PC monitor?

I bought my HD plasma mainly so I could use my PC on it, abd after I had hooked it up once I never used it on there again. I would make sure it does everything else well first.

[gIzzE]

does anyone know if the LX52 will accept 1366x768 over hdmi? If is does you can plug your PC into that port.

[Kron]

However do you ever use you TV as a PC monitor?

I haven't yet but its great to have the option and its also useful having a VGA port for the DC and/or 360.

[andrewfee]

does anyone know if the LX52 will accept 1366x768 over hdmi? If is does you can plug your PC into that port.

Unfortunately not. It seems HDMI is for video only, not computer use. This is why it always seems to have overscan (generally 16px, iirc) and will only accept 480i/p, 720p and 1080i.

For a current set, DVI-I (with HDCP) might be worth looking out for instead; it'll accept both digital and analogue signals, but should also accept native resolution. The only downside is that it's and 8-bit RGB connection, whereas HDMI is 10-bit.