Plamsa run/burn in slides???

[camdxr]

There is a view that the first 150-200 hours of use of your "new" plasma panel are the most critical and that if fed a diet of still image slides of various colours over this period it will prolong the life of your panel.

Now I do not necessarily subscribe to this, at the moment I have no opinion as this is the first I have heard of this.

Do any of the venerable members of this forum or WHF staff have a view on this? Is this snake oil or does this have any basis in scientific fact?

Your views, as always, appreciated.

 

[camdxr]

Plamsa???? Doh.....Plasma.

 

[Oldboy]

That's the first i've heard of any such theory. When i done my research before getting my GT30 plasma common consensous was that the panel required anywhere between 200-500 hours of run in time with normal full screen tv or dvd/blu ray content with reduced contrast and brightness levels after calibration.

The most important factors are to avoid any dynamic mode on the tv like the plague and to not put any still images onto the screen during the run in (photos, video game HUDs etc), by doing this and using reduced contrast and brightness levels the panel will run in nicely. As a guide 4-5 steps down for contrast and brightness seems to be the norm but of course this will impact on picture quality but it's better to do this temporarily than to have potential issues with the panel such as image retention and burn later on.

 

[camdxr]

I'm assuming that the thought process is that by displaying a set colour for 30secs at a time will ensure an even burn in???

 

[Andrew Everard]

Plamsa???? Doh.....Plasma.

S'OK, we all knew you meant La Spam!

Use of coloured slides a new one on me, too – sounds more like something used in the factory test/set-up procedure, where different colours are used to ensure all the pixels are 'firing' as they should.

I'd echo the advice above – keep the brightness and contrast modest for the first couple of hundred hours of viewing, and avoid static images on the screen.

Then enjoy, and don't worry about prolonging the life of the screen: most modern plasmas have a 'half life' – ie the time it will take them to fall to 50% of original brightness – equivalent to several decades of even quite heavy use.

 

[Oldboy]

I was consistantly told that moving images were the best way to run the panel in so the theory of coloured slides seems counter intuitive to me and a real pain in the behind, does this theory state that you are to just show these slides and nothing else for the first 200 hours then?

That would seem ridiculous to me and how many consumers in the real world would be happy to do this, you buy a tv to watch tv, movies and perhaps play some video games....showing a series of coloured frames for 200 hours and not being able to use the tv for its primary use would mean retailers wouldn't sell many plasma tvs eh.

 

[camdxr]

Thanks for the replies. I was dubious at best myself. As you say the thought of having a brand new toy and not being able to use properly for a week seemed strange. I've always been an advocate of asking if you don't know, no matter what the risk of embaressment!