FreeSat box, or TV with FreeSat?

[admin_exported]

Hi All,

After much searching of reviews (and lots of advice on this site) I've decided that the Panasonic TH-42PZ85B is the TV for me. However, it's been brought to my attention that there will be a range with an integrated FreeSat tuner in the next few weeks.

Looking on Panasonic's website, the FreeSat equipped TH-42PZ81B looks to be almost identical to the 85 model, but the specs list shows an additional feature called "Deep Colour (10bit)" for the new TV.

The web prices for the (as yet unavailable) new model look to be about the same as the 85 + a FreeSat box.

Does anyone know if this TV is essentially the same as the 85 (which would be good news from my point of view) and if there's anything I should be worried about regarding it having an internal tuner vs getting the 85 with an external FreeSat box?

Thanks,

Sploo

 

[peds]

I would hold out for the Freesat equiped version or for a review from the team for the new line up at the very least. The deep colour that is mentioned relating to the 81 is the new HDMI 1.3 profile. No expert but i hope this is a help. P.s. if it were my money i would now only be looking for a panel with Freesat. Its the future that will bring the most cost effective programing to the consumer. FREE!!

 

[Anonymous]

Just make sure your first , and most important priority is picture. Poor sound, lack of inputs, Freeview, Freesat etc. can all be worked around. A duff picture will always be a duff picture.

 

[SpiceWeasel]

I have the 42" 85 and it's excellent. The 85 has most of the features as the top of the range 800, including upgraded audio. I do have a proper surround system as well for movies, but I normally use the tv's speakers for normal tv use. So I decided the upgraded audio on the 85 was a better bet than a freesat tuner.

Yes the 81 has the freesat tuner inbuilt, but at the moment there's only 1 channel in HD. I have a normal bog standard sky box so I already get all the channels( apart from the 1hd). If freesat gets a decent amount of HD content in the near future then I might think about getting a freesat box. But at the moment sky hd is the best bet for hd content.

When/If freesat catches up with sky then I would imagine by then the price of the freesat box's to be a good deal cheaper than they are now ,and have better features and picture quality.

Obviously if you can't get Freeview in your area or you don't have sky/virgin then the freesat tuner may be of more use to you.

I wouldn't base my decision on a new tv soley on the fact that it has a freesat tuner inbuilt, picture quality and maybe sound if you don't have a proper surround system would be the deciding factor. I don't think you can go far wrong with either the 81 or 85 series Pany's though.

 

[Anonymous]

Many thanks for all the replies.

peds - thanks for the info regarding the deep colour profile. I've no idea what difference that might make to a picture, but I guess it's a feature I might as well have.

david - Yea, image quality is king. I do intend to get a HD FreeSat PVR (if/when they appear) and/or a PC with a FreeSat card. However, it would be nice if the TV had it built in to start with. I'm hoping that the 81 is essentially the same as the 85 in terms of image quality.

SpiceWeasel - glad to hear you're happy with the 85; it certainly is getting a very positive response (and I'm surprised it's not appeared in an issue of the mag yet). I have a good sound system, so as long as the sound from the TV is acceptable for normal viewing I'm happy. I'm hoping that single HD channel (BBC) will be showing F1 from next year, and I... erm... don't mind watching Gardener's World on occasion (but don't tell anyone).

I get Freeview, though on rare occasions it can be dodgy. However, there surely must be more HD channels to come on FreeSat, so I think it's a technology worth having.

Hopefully, the mag will get hold of an 81 model and let us know their thoughts on this forum soon...