LCD/Plasma/CRT/DLP - questions

[andrewfee]

I hate to double-post, but I thought I should mention that I'm going to try out that plasma.

I've been pretty wary of plasma displays, especially as a gamer, but I've now exhausted all the current LCD options for a second time, and it's almost a year since getting my LE32R41BX.

I'm still very happy with my MFM-HT75W, but it's just too small. I had considered the 20" but I'm not prepared to pay £600 for it. When I got my BRAVIA, I replaced my parents' CRT monitor with it, also giving them a TV for their bedroom, and I don't really like having taken that back from them.

At £877 for a 37" Panasonic SD plasma, I figure it's worth a shot. The reality is that I don't use as much HD content as I had expected (as with a lot of people, I got caught up in the X360, PS3, HD-DVD, BluRay, SkyHD hype - but other than the consoles it'll likely be 3-5 years before I adopt the rest, if at all) and I'd much rather Wii games looked their best than bland 360 / PS3 titles. At this price, it's very replaceable, so if I start getting a lot of HD content (BluRay, or broadcast HD) I'll be able to buy a HD set without thinking twice.

I had been considering a scaler/video processor like the Lumagen RadianceXD when it's released, but that's going to be in excess of £3000, and I was stupid to have even considered it to be honest - buying an SD display makes much more sense for me right now.

I hope I'll have it in time for the weekend, but it'll no doubt be some time next week, knowing my luck.

The only downside I can see is that it doesn't have a VGA input - not for PC use of course, but I love being able to get past any processing and overscan a display might have. (My Gamecube / 360 look stunning on my current LCD using it)

Apparently all the current Panasonic plasmas now accept pretty much every video format under the sun, including 1080p24, 50 and 60, which even the Sony X series doesn't do. (it won't do 24) Of course I'm sure most of that advantage will be lost after being downscaled, but it's nice that it'll at least be accepted and processed.

I'll be posting up my impressions once it arrives of course.

[Roost]

I thought the bravia was like...super ace?

[andrewfee]

I thought the bravia was like...super ace?

It's great, and probably the best LCD out, but it's not without problems. Forced edge enhancement, (although not much compared to most sets)
quite a bit of overscan - although those two things aren't much of an issue. However it wouldn't accept 1280x720 over VGA (essential for the 360) and I couldn't get an image I was happy with from my Powerbook.

With the supposed improved colour accuracy, I had been hoping to use it as a monitor, but it was too low resolution to do any image work, and any time I attemped to calibrate it (either by eye, or with my Spyder2PRO) things just looked awful, with super-saturated colours for anything over around 95% saturation. (of course, I'm not expecting to be using a plasma as a monitor though)

I paid £1850 for it, an extended warranty, and a DVD recorder. (intending on getting the £100 cashback, and selling the player for £100 or so, making a £60 profit on the sale) The next working day (got it on a Saturday) John Lewis were selling the same amount for £1400 or so (iirc) and within a week it had dropped to £1200. That alone was pretty offputting, and while it was good, it certainly didn't feel like a £1700 TV.

[krispyk]

I hate to double-post, but I thought I should mention that I'm going to try out that plasma.

I've been pretty wary of plasma displays, especially as a gamer, but I've now exhausted all the current LCD options for a second time, and it's almost a year since getting my LE32R41BX.

I'm still very happy with my MFM-HT75W, but it's just too small. I had considered the 20" but I'm not prepared to pay £600 for it. When I got my BRAVIA, I replaced my parents' CRT monitor with it, also giving them a TV for their bedroom, and I don't really like having taken that back from them.

At £877 for a 37" Panasonic SD plasma, I figure it's worth a shot. The reality is that I don't use as much HD content as I had expected (as with a lot of people, I got caught up in the X360, PS3, HD-DVD, BluRay, SkyHD hype - but other than the consoles it'll likely be 3-5 years before I adopt the rest, if at all) and I'd much rather Wii games looked their best than bland 360 / PS3 titles. At this price, it's very replaceable, so if I start getting a lot of HD content (BluRay, or broadcast HD) I'll be able to buy a HD set without thinking twice.

I had been considering a scaler/video processor like the Lumagen RadianceXD when it's released, but that's going to be in excess of £3000, and I was stupid to have even considered it to be honest - buying an SD display makes much more sense for me right now.

I hope I'll have it in time for the weekend, but it'll no doubt be some time next week, knowing my luck.

The only downside I can see is that it doesn't have a VGA input - not for PC use of course, but I love being able to get past any processing and overscan a display might have. (My Gamecube / 360 look stunning on my current LCD using it)

Apparently all the current Panasonic plasmas now accept pretty much every video format under the sun, including 1080p24, 50 and 60, which even the Sony X series doesn't do. (it won't do 24) Of course I'm sure most of that advantage will be lost after being downscaled, but it's nice that it'll at least be accepted and processed.

I'll be posting up my impressions once it arrives of course.

Andrew, I have a 37 inch PX60 and I have to be honest and say that as a regular TV it is amazing! I have only used my 360 and Cube but have been impressed with the image they offer.

I am moving out next month (hopefully) and am in a similar position to you.
Front room TV duties will be fullfilled by a 42PX60. I havent been too impressed with the image quality of LCD's so far although I am considering a 26inch Sony.
I think I'll probably be in the same club as you and am seriously considering getting a 37 inch PD60 and a decent component switcher which should come in at less than grand which is going to go in my games room along with my trusty 21inch Philips for all my retro consoles, despite having objections from my parents and girlfriend. I pay the mortgage, I'll have as many bloody tv's as I want

[Lyris]

It's great, and probably the best LCD out, but it's not without problems. Forced edge enhancement, (although not much compared to most sets)
quite a bit of overscan - although those two things aren't much of an issue. However it wouldn't accept 1280x720 over VGA (essential for the 360) and I couldn't get an image I was happy with from my Powerbook.

Andrew, I hate to say it, but you're expecting far too much from consumer TV sets. The edge enhancement issue's annoying for sure, but at the end for my ?1450, I'm happy. I'm all for returning things you're not happy with - but seriously demo any Plasma before you put cash down.

Good on you for pushing high standards as well, but personally when I look for TVs I compare them to other TVs that are available - because the best I can get (for a reasonable amount of cash) and what my dream TV are two very different things.

In all honesty, you're probably best looking at a dedicated monitor and a video scaler.

[andrewfee]

Andrew, I have a 37 inch PX60 and I have to be honest and say that as a regular TV it is amazing! I have only used my 360 and Cube but have been impressed with the image they offer.

I am moving out next month (hopefully) and am in a similar position to you.
Front room TV duties will be fullfilled by a 42PX60. I havent been too impressed with the image quality of LCD's so far although I am considering a 26inch Sony.
I think I'll probably be in the same club as you and am seriously considering getting a 37 inch PD60 and a decent component switcher which should come in at less than grand which is going to go in my games room along with my trusty 21inch Philips for all my retro consoles, despite having objections from my parents and girlfriend. I pay the mortgage, I'll have as many bloody tv's as I want

I'll be interested to hear what you think of the PD60 compared to the PX60 if you get one - apparently, despite the fact that the specs are the same, the ED panels are brighter and have better contrast than the HD ones. (due to the pixels being larger)

That reminds me though, I'll have to get another component switcher if I go with the Panasonic. I've currently got a 3 > 1 Farmer box from Play-Asia, which is ok for the xbox/ps2, but the gamecube / 360 will have to use it too, as there's no VGA input. (and then there'll be Wii later this year)

Why would it go along with your Philips TV and not replace it though? I thought Plasmas were considered to be as good as CRTs?


It's looking like it won't be turning up until the beginning of next week though, unfortunately, unless I can get a Saturday delivery.

EDIT: Lyris, I have considered the Panel/Monitor & Scaler option, but you're talking ?2500-3500 or so for the scaler alone (there's nothing below that capable of doing a great job with HD and SD - it's typically one or the other) And that's before the display!

I had considered a panel, but the Panasonic ED 37" looked to be around ?400 more than the PD60, and there doesn't seem to be a Gen 9 (iirc) one out yet. That's without input boards too, and it looks like it'll only take three. That's one Component, one SCART, and then I have to choose between VGA, DVI, or HDMI - VGA will take native res at both 50Hz and 60Hz, DVI will do it at 60Hz only, and I believe HDMI will do 50Hz and 60Hz, but not at the native resolution. Only DVI and HDMI have HDCP though of course.

If I had a scaler with it, I'd have to use VGA, which would mean buying a DAC and HDCP stripping box to go on the output.

While I have the money, I just don't think it's worth spending ?4k+ on that.

EDIT2: Just realised, with a scaler, it'd only need one input on the panel, as everything would be going through it, but that's not the point - I just can't see it being worth that much to be honest.

[Lyris]

I'd have to agree. Don't you find though that with that as the only option at getting closer to perfection, that finding a consumer TV you can tolerate the shortcomings of is a better option?

[Synthesthesia]

I'd have to agree with Lyris, you're not going to find something that's going to be what you want unless you're prepared to pay for the quality. It's just not going to happen with a consumer LCD television. How many TVs have you had and sent back trying to find the right one for you? I mean sorting through all these TVs is not going to be cheap considering shipping prices. I've got the old Sony KDLV32A12U, and i'm really happy with that. Just go with the scaler if perfection is what you want.

[krispyk]

Why would it go along with your Philips TV and not replace it though? I thought Plasmas were considered to be as good as CRTs?

I dont like the idea of playing 4.3 games on a widescreen monitor. For some reason my 21inch gives pretty good results for my Saturn, PS2 and Dreamcast so Ill definitely be keeping it for a while.
I havent really used my PX60 long term for games playing and tend to watch regular TV and DVD's on it (which look ace!).

Considering I am going to be sitting about 8 feet from it when I get it an SD plasma should be fine for my needs (hopefully). Im not too worried about burn in either. I discovered the other day that my 4 nephews and nieces had been watching CBBC and CBEEBIES over the weekend with the contrast on MAX. I was not impressed but thankfully there was no burn in or retention. I think if your settings are sensible to start off with and you dont play the same game for a massive length of time ( and I am talking 12 hour sessions ) then a PD60 is a good choice and thats why I am considering one.

[andrewfee]

I'd have to agree. Don't you find though that with that as the only option at getting closer to perfection, that finding a consumer TV you can tolerate the shortcomings of is a better option?

I don't expect perfection, but I also don't expect manufacturers to do stupid things like forcing processing on you that screws up the image.

If you could disable DNIe and Dynamic Contrast (on all inputs) on the Samsung LCDs, for example, then they would be a much better TV.

Sony force Edge Enhancement on all their LCDs, and only have the option to disable it on their high end sets. (X series)

You would think something like an on/off toggle wouldn't be hard to implement.

Same goes for the way Sony handles VGA - they basically block any signal other than the ones listed in the manuals. Most TVs will accept what you throw at them, or show up an error if it can't be displayed, regardless of what's in the manual. (other resolutions just aren't officially supported)

There's no reason why Sony should block out 1280x720 over VGA... but they do.

My current display isn't perfect by any means - the deinterlacing isn't awful, but it could certainly be a lot better. (although its size certainly hides most of it at 4-6ft) It also forces quite a lot of Edge Enhancement - but I put up with these flaws, as the image overall still looks fantastic, but more importantly - at the price it was, I can forgive these faults.

When you've spent £1700 on a TV (+ warranty) it's hard to forgive stupid things like disabling 1280x720 over VGA, which renders the 360 VGA lead useless, and forces you to use (in my opinion) a lesser input.

At £845 I'm not expecting perfection (hell, it's an ED panel and doesn't even have VGA - although that matters less at lower resolutions) but considering the size for the price, and inputs / signals it supports, it looks to be great value, and unless it's got some glaring issue (there's a couple of plasma things I'm worried about) I'll be able to overlook them.

Part of the reason I'm going for the ED panel is because it'll avoid pretty much all upscaling, and downscaling is generally handled perfectly, with progressive inputs at least. (and I believe Panasonics are rather good at deinterlacing and handle 1080i "properly")

I dont like the idea of playing 4.3 games on a widescreen monitor. For some reason my 21inch gives pretty good results for my Saturn, PS2 and Dreamcast so Ill definitely be keeping it for a while.
I havent really used my PX60 long term for games playing and tend to watch regular TV and DVD's on it (which look ace!).

Fair enough. It makes sense I guess, as those games are generally interlaced, and you still have the issue of how well the set handles deinterlacing the image, whereas a CRT is unaffected. If it's an older CRT, an RGB input should bypass most/all processing (if any) and get sent straight to the guns, giving you a great image. 37" must give you a pretty good 4:3 size though, considering a 32" screen gives you a 26" 4:3 image. (same as a 28" CRT)

I'll need to get an RGB lead for my Saturn somewhere though, as I've currently only got a JRGB one to go into my XRGB2+ (which I can't use due to no VGA - if anyone is interested in buying, send me a PM)

Considering I am going to be sitting about 8 feet from it when I get it an SD plasma should be fine for my needs (hopefully). Im not too worried about burn in either. I discovered the other day that my 4 nephews and nieces had been watching CBBC and CBEEBIES over the weekend with the contrast on MAX. I was not impressed but thankfully there was no burn in or retention. I think if your settings are sensible to start off with and you dont play the same game for a massive length of time ( and I am talking 12 hour sessions ) then a PD60 is a good choice and thats why I am considering one.

That's good to know about retention / burn-in. I'm getting less and less concerned about it now, especially as I've had it pointed out that Plasma phosphors now age about half the speed of CRT ones (most CRTs are quoted at 30,000 hours, compared to plasma's 60,000) although I suspect that plasma ones can be driven harder (brighter) which means they could still be succeptible if it's too high. (I'll be setting it between 100 and 200cd/m2 though, depending on lighting conditions)

These days, I don't often play the same game for that length of time anyway - it's not that I don't have the time, but I tend to get bored spending more than a couple of hours playing one game now.

I have to say, something that concerns me more than gaming now is probably DOGs - I noticed on Sky Three (I use Freeview) the other day that they had a full-white "Battlestar Galactica starts ____) below the logo which was there for the full length of whatever was on. (I can't even remember what it was now) They seem to be everywhere now. (the good news is that I've got MHEG disabled on my PVR, so no "press red" etc)

[ince]

im looking to get a hdtv. i will mainly be using it for xbox 360, GC and dvds and some tv watching.

anyone got any thoughts on this set and is there anything better for around ?1500 - ?2000?

[Lyris]

Sony force Edge Enhancement on all their LCDs, and only have the option to disable it on their high end sets. (X series)

Actually, it's not that simple. The haloing that I reported to them is a bug. The X-Series has an option to disable and enable "Edge Enhancement" but this is a separate thing. People using the X-Series are reporting haloing with or without this option on - even on HD material! It sounds like a problem with Sony's scaling algorithm.

Sony themselves admitted to me that it's not intentional. That means that it's negligence on their part and their ignoring the warnings I sent to them months ahead of the manufacture of these new TVs. Sony UK's engineers have classified this as an error.

Same goes for the way Sony handles VGA - they basically block any signal other than the ones listed in the manuals. Most TVs will accept what you throw at them, or show up an error if it can't be displayed, regardless of what's in the manual. (other resolutions just aren't officially supported)

There's no reason why Sony should block out 1280x720 over VGA... but they do.

Again, I don't see why it would be that simple, I'm not sure why you'd think they would specifically block a resolution from being displayed. What possible reason would they have for doing that?

More than likely, the image processing chip in the TVs been developed to only handle common PC resolutions to cut down on R&D time and money.

I currently have a JVC LCD TV in for review which only officially supports 640x480 over its PC input, but I've managed to get it to sort-of work showing resolutions with x768 lines - the same number of lines as the TV's panel. That doesn't sound like companies intentionally limiting their products to me.

Ince - look at the Sony V2000 series (KDL-32V2000 and -40V2000). They do have a slight bug with haloing but they are excellent TVs.

[andrewfee]

I currently have a JVC LCD TV in for review which only officially supports 640x480 over its PC input, but I've managed to get it to sort-of work showing resolutions with x768 lines - the same number of lines as the TV's panel. That doesn't sound like companies intentionally limiting their products to me.

That's what I'm saying though - the majority will usually only say they support X resolutions officially, but they'll often accept most things you throw at them, if the refresh rate is ok.

Sony sets basically block anything other than the ones specifically mentioned in the manual, even if they would have probably worked. (I see no reason why 1280x720 wouldn't have, for example)

[H-Man]

A long moan about my quest for a HD gaming set:

Over the last 3 months i've bought various lcd and plasma screens and have returned them all.

The initial budget was ?450 for one of the new Samsung HD CRTs, but reports of blurry corners, poor geometry, and buzzing put me off. Another ?300 was added to the budget and I bought a Toshiba 32wlt66, which, according to reviews, is one of the better lcd screens around at the mo. Games in HD looked great when still, but in motion became a smeary mess. SD looked piss poor compared to my old crt and movies varied from ok to pretty decent. Next came the newest Samsung lcd, which was pretty much the same. That went too.

A friend of mine recently bought a new Pioneer plasma and I popped over with the 360. Immediately it was obvious that SD is far better on a plasma screen, but still not as good as a crt. Movies look better too. Games lacked the vivid colours and detail that made still shots on the lcds look so breathtaking, but motion was considerably superior. However, when moving the camera about textures still became a smear. I also noticed a brand new problem - green flashes, or 'fringing'.

Apparently all plasma screens suffer from this to some extent (it has something to do with the retention of phosphers) and is noticeable when panning past areas where light and dark meet (I don't know the technical terms to describe it). Imagine you're playing a fps and are in a dark building looking out of a window on a bright day. Strafe left to right and the dark of the window frame blurs out in a green (on some sets it's yellow) tinge where it meets the sky. CoD2 on snow levels was particularly bad, as were areas in Oblivion. Infact every game we tried had some green tinge, even the ball in Table Tennis.

Still, having ruled out lcd, another ?650 was added to the budget, bringing it to a whopping ?1500. I couldn't afford the Pio plasma with this (tbh I didn't want it after the demo) so I went for a Pannasonic (42PX60) - which has received many decent reviews. The same problems showed up. Textures smearing with motion and green flashes. These flashes are also apparent with movies and general tv viewing - black and white movies suffering the most (Sin City was bad) - just not as often.

Some reports suggest that only certain people can see these flashes. I happen to believe that's bollox. More likely that they're rarely obvious in movies and SD viewing, especially if you haven't seen them before, and people don't realise they're seeing them. In games they appear far more often, and are very noticeable. I've shown 15+ people (incl. friends, family, and shop assistants) certain maps in CoD2 and all have seen them instantly. It doesn't do much for the immersion of a game when you spin around and see a green fringe on every barrel, lampost, and on the edges of every building. Even if this issue didn't exist, the smearing with motion was enough to put me off a plasma screen for gaming (i'd consider one for movies and SD, though)

So, now i'm back at the start and am pissed off. Maybe my standards are too high, but the fact is I wouldn't put up with these issues if these televisions only cost ?100. What is the point in superb picture quality if it changes when you move the camera? Kameo switches from a perfect fairy tale snapshot into a mess of blurred colours everytime you look around. The game may not look as impressive on my 50hz Sony when still, but it feels solid, more convincing, and looks better in motion - which is most of them time.

The End!

[gIzzE]

Buy a Panasonic commercial screen, no speakers and not tuner but it has better internal components and less processing trying to tidy up poor freeview feeds and there fore virtually no smearing at all.
One thing you have to remember is a plasma takes around 800 hours to settle down, the white levels calm down a bit after this time to normal levels and the sort of rainbow effects you describe almost disappear. I still see it very ocasionally, but it is very occasionally.

There is a massive jump between the consumer and the commercial screens and the main thing is it gets rid of all the things you are describing above. Well worth checking them out.