Sorry . . . Plasma vs LCD - again!

[admin_exported]

I posted a note a week or so again about my confusion, after me and my girlfriend had gone into a Curry's store and felt the 37" LG5010 was the best display in the shop, despite not getting a great review in WHFSV. Likewise we felt the 5* Panasonics and Samsungs looked pretty bad, and certainly much worse than my current 28" Loewe CRT set. Thanks to some helpful replies I could understand why this might be. So . . .

. . . today we went into an independent store where I was able to play to my heart's content with some Sonys and Panasonics and able to compare plasma directly against LCD.

I had been settling on buying the Sony KDL-W4500, due to all the reviews. They didn't have that but they did have the W4000 and I was able to compare that, like for like, with the Panasonic PZ80 - i.e. a top LCD with a top Plasma fed off the same standard def TV input. Again, as with my previous post, as much as I wanted to be impressed with the Sony (and say "Yep, one of those please"), I was disappointed with the picture - it looked like you were viewing a normal screen through a fishtank, or as though someone had smeared vaseline all over it. Surely this can't be normal I thought; how on earth would they convince anyone to pay money for it? My girlfriend, being less influenced by technical specifications - and more to the point, much less subtle - just blurted out "Well, that looks rubbish - it looks like a TV that's going wrong! I couldn't watch that for 5 mins without getting a headache!". In comparison she was much more impressed with the Panny PZ80, felt it was by far the better picture and could happily watch it all day (she even liked the 46" version - which just made me love her even more!!).

So my question is - why does anyone think about buying an LCD TV when even a 5* Sony W4000 looks awful - and not in a comparative kind of way, but a 'this is nearly unwatchable' kind of way? Sadly, even the plasma, when flicked on to ITV2, looked terrible, like an old 1970s set that hadn't been tuned in properly. So my second question is - despite all the glossy coverings and marketing, is LCD and Plasma technology still way inferior to CRT?

Sorry to sound negative and dismissive, as I don't mean to put anyone down who's bought one of these sets, but I'm really wondering whether it's worth parting with my 28" Loewe CRT which looks far better than anything else I've yet seen (albeit now about 14" too small!).

 

[Anonymous]

When you were viewing the screens today how far away from them were you standing? It's quite important with large screens that you choose the right one for your room as they tend to only look their best from a certain distance. I've heard the quality of some freeview channels like ITV2 are pretty poor, do you know if the store was using freesat, freeview or Sky?

A friend of mine has the Panny 37PX80B plasma and although it's only HD ready it is a great all rounder that even makes SD feed look good.

 

[Anonymous]

Well, true, close up the LCD looked awful and the plasma better, but even from about 2 metres away the LCD didn't look great, and I could see what my girlfriend meant about giving you a headache compared to the plasma.

Yes, they did have the 37PX80B there next to it's bigger brother and it did look the better picture. So, if I'll be sitting about 2- 2.5m away, what size should I be thinking of getting?

 

[Anonymous]

Jarnesque:

Well, true, close up the LCD looked awful and the plasma better, but even from about 2 metres away the LCD didn't look great, and I could see what my girlfriend meant about giving you a headache compared to the plasma.

Yes, they did have the 37PX80B there next to it's bigger brother and it did look the better picture. So, if I'll be sitting about 2- 2.5m away, what size should I be thinking of getting?

You were right about LCD vs. Plasma, plasmas always offer motion, colour and contrast levels that put LCDs to shame. In fact, the only reason why the Sony is more expensive is because it has 1080p capability, which is useless for TVs under 46"

With your viewing distance, a 37" set is perfect if you're watching a mixture of stanard-def, such as most TV broadcasts, and hi-def, such as Blu-ray movies, so go for the Panasonic TH-37PX80B, which you can buy for under £600. If you want even HIGHER quality, Pioneer are making a new range of LCDs including a 37" version, the Pioneer Kuro KRL-37V, which offers great CRT-quality colour and contrast, 100Hz picture proccesing for smoother motion and a few other features. It costs £1,450 though.

 

[Anonymous]

"So my question is - why does anyone think about buying an LCD TV when even a 5* Sony W4000 looks awful - and not in a comparative kind of way, but a 'this is nearly unwatchable' kind of way?"

My feelings exactly. I know some people don't agree with me, but I just can't watch SD on LCD. I think it is awful, I would much rather watch a CRT TV.

I went to see the Sony 4500 last week because everyone is raving about it. I had seen it before, and was not that impressed, so I wanted to have another look. As I walked towards it from a far it looked good. Much brighter than the other TV's. But once I got to the normal viewing distance 7-10 feet, I just cringed. The usual LCD problems; motion blur, pasty faced heads on people. Admittedly, it was better than the other Sony models, and much better than other LCD sets. There was a JVC that was frankly appalling . They wanted £500 for it. I would not have given 50p.

Of course, if you are going to be watching in HD and blue ray things improve, but I for one watch mostly normal non HD TV, and so LCD is a no, no.

 

[Messiah]

Were the TV's calibrated correctly?? Probably not in a shop. My 37" Samsung looked quite bad before being properly calibrated but since it has been I can only say the picture is stunning!! Several months on I look at it and think WOW! Seriously!

So personally I would trust the reviews and get the TV set up properly and I doubt you'll be disappointed.

 

[shado]

I have had my Full HD Lucid Clarity Definition Panasonic 37 inch for 7 months now and have had no problems with this set. Granted it is not very forgiving with poor quality Standard Def material but I did not buy it for this purpose. Having now added Sky HD and a Panasonic Blu Ray player it has raised the standards in viewing pleasure. Obviously tuning the picture with THX menu and good quality leads makes all the difference. I started my research over a year ago where I visited my local Panasonic shop and compared the Best Buy Plasma against the Best Buy LCD 37 inch TVs as this is the max for my Living Room. The Plasma was HD Ready whereas the LCD was the first Panny set to have Full HD. Both were fed the same boxing match with plenty of black background, and quite frankly the LCD had the better image and motion control with black showing more contrast. The plasma in my view looked quite dull in comparison. I queried the difference with the dealer who stated that the higher resolution was apparent and how Panasonic had now raised the bar with the LCD models. When reviewing the same model in Comet the Panny LCD stood out against the likes of Philips and Samsung with a vibrant picture quality.

 

[aliEnRIK]

Currys and comet in particular have all the extra 'gimmicks' switched on (contrast circuitry etc) and are not set up well at all (mains extensions etc)

Contrast in particular tends to be set too high so all the tvs are hard to tell apart (and look awful)

As for the sony, I would guess that everything was switched on too. Heres settings for a SonyKDL 40W400 as a sort of idea what im talking about (Should you want to have another play) ~

http://www.hdtvtest.co.uk/Sony-KDL40W4000/Settings/