Pros: Price, colors, black levels, viewing angles, greatly resistant to IR and burn-in, anti-glare is effective.
Cons: Break-in period recommended, slightly visible cross-hatch pattern in reflections.
The Bottom Line: The PZ80U offers an excellent picture at a price afforable by the average home. It is a model line that deserves to be on virtually any short list.
tjapkesg's Full Review: Panasonic TH-50PZ80U 50 in. HDTV TV
I always thought our first HDTV would be an LCD. I just did. It has always been said that Plasmas have an edge as far as performance and picture quality, but early generations came with a couple factors that scare many consumers away. Even today. Both technologies have potential tradeoffs, and, for me, the weight shifted toward plasma.
In this review, you will find a great deal of information that formed the recipe for my decision. Read it all or glean through it. If you find any of it useful, awesome!
LCD and Plasma - What are the differences? Today, at a glance, there isn't much of a difference. Sure, the underlying technology is vastly different, but what you see on the screen doesn't differ quite as much as it did in the past. The shortfalls of either tech has also seen a dimensioning gap.
Viewing Angle For plasma panels, each pixel is glowing phosphors and the pixels themselves are the light source, much like standard CRT (i.e. "Tube") TVs. Conversely, LCDs have pixels that only change in color, and the light source is behind the pixels.
Imagine very sophisticated, microscopic mini-blinds. Depending on your orietation, and the light source, your perception of the light passing through the blinds changes. If you're off to the side, parts of the light are blocked by the blinds. Of course, technology improves, and todays LCDs have incredible mini-blinds and improved light sources. LCD viewing angles now rival Plasma, but you may still see some limitations.
In my experience, today's LCDs maintain a great picture as you walk around them, but you can see the colors or contrast shift slightly. In other words, what you see when viewing them dead/straight on is not quite the same as when you sit way off to the side. For my tastes, plasma still gets bonus points here.
ACTION! Another area where plasma usually excels is with action, whether we're talking movies or sports. Since plasma sets share similar phosphor based pixels as CRTs, they can change color and luminance very quickly. Pixels in LCDs are slower to change, thanks to those mini-blinds. You see, those blinds are made up of small crystals. To change the output of a pixel, these crystals must twist or untwist to either block or unblock light. They don't always do so as promptly as we would like. LCD has made great strides to catch up, even match plasma, but there's virtually no question with plasma.
Simply viewing various sets in the store, I couldn't give additional points to one side or the other.
Black Levels Since Plasma pixels are the light source, and are either on or off, if a pixel is "off", it is black. LCDs use a single light source, so achieving the "color" black is totally reliant on the panel's ability to block that light. Here again, technology has allowed LCD sets to catch up
The word is that the Pioneer Kuro models (plasma) have the best blacks, but they come with quite a cost premium. The 50" Kuro costs more than 2.5 times what I paid for the TH-50PZ80U, which displays black as well as, or better than, anything in this price range. Coming from a high end Sony Wega CRT, the Panasonic does not disappoint. Keep in mind that the Pioneer Kuro plasmas are touted as the best HDTV money can by. The Panasonics still offer black levels that rival most others.
Screen Glare It is often said that Plasmas have better color; more "realistic" color. On the other hand, people also say that LCDs have superior anti-glare characteristics. Thing is, the matte finish on many displays (mostly LCD, some Plasmas) seems to have an effect here. It's almost like looking through a foggy window, albeit a very nice one. Nowhere near that extreme, I do think there is something there. Glossy screens just seem to have richer colors. Some people do need anti-glare that is effective in extreme situations though. For others, the anti-reflective coatings on "glossy" screens have improved. I recommend looking at this closely, keeping in mind that there are some plasma models with an LCD-like matte finish, while there are some LCDs with glossy screens.
The anti-glare on the PZ80U fairs well, certainly better than our old Sony Wega. It does have one interesting characteristic that caught me off guard. Due to the way that it diffuses the light, it creates a faint cross hatch pattern within the reflection. How visible this is depends on the strength of the light reflecting off of it and what is displayed on the screen. If you are watching a dark scene with a bright window behind you, this pattern is more likely to be visible. For us, we have a bright white window that I would say is on the more extreme end per causing glare, but it was no longer distracting after the first few days. And this pattern is far more favorable than a mirror reflection of that window (unless you want to check the weather without turning around).
Image Retention and Burn-in Both of these were big concerns with early Plasma TVs. As a bit of background, both are conditions that arise from the phosphors in the screen aging differently. If you left an image with a black background and a big white circle in the middle for a few hours, you might see a ghost of that circle for several hours after that. If that circle fades as the pixels around it are aged to a similar level, then it was simply Image Retention, or IR. Leave that same picture on all day, and it could very well become permanent (Burn-in). The TV would still work, but that ghosted circle could haunt you forever.
CRTs share the same risk, and it is said (by both manufacturers and consumers) that current plasmas are very resistant to IR or burn-in. If you had no concerns with your CRT/Tube TV, then you should have nothing to worry about with a plasma. Still, that hasn't stop Panasonic from including warnings concerning the first 100 hours, as those phosphors age fastest when new. Honestly, unless you leave a stock ticker up, or play video games with a static image (e.g. score box), you likely have nothing to worry about during that break-in period, and certainly not beyond that. After nearly two months, we have yet to see even a hint of image retention.
LCDs don't suffer from this because of the single light source. The pixels never age.
Life Span A plasma will age much like a CRT and will be half as bright at around the specified half life (100,000 hours in this case, or 30 years at 11 hours per day), while an LCD will be just as bright as day one. However, once that one light goes out, it's all over. In either case, the expected life of a flat panel is relatively the same.
Power Consumption Both use more than the CRT in your average home. But these TVs are also typically much larger. In our case, we went from a 27" Sony CRT Wega to a 50".
Between the two, plasmas are rated with a peak power usage that is considerably higher than LCD, sometimes almost double. However, keep in mind that pixels on plasmas are on or off. Peak power usage would require displaying 100% white at maximum brightness settings, and how often does that happen? LCD TVs use a much more predictable amount of power, because of the single light source. It can, and generally does, change, since the light output from that source is often varied to improve either bright or dark scenes (i.e. dynamic contrast).
Other Notes Torch Mode and Calibration Manufacturers tend to ship displays with a default setting that is exceptionally bright and vivid so those displays look as good as possible in brightly lit showrooms. This is often referred to as "Torch Mode", in reference to the insanity of these settings per home use. Calibrating your TV, by way of making adjustments to the picture (e.g. Brightness, color, contrast, etc...), is always a good idea, whether you simply do it by eye, possibly with the aid of a video containing test patterns (e.g. Digital Video Essentials), or have a professional do it. Panasonic has protected consumers from defaulting to Torch Mode. Upon powering on the TV, the "PZ80U" immediately prompted me with a question regarding the environment, with options for Home or Store. The "Home" setting defaulted to a break-in friendly setting and a picture that was very suitable for home viewing. The Store option obviously would have enabled "torch mode". If you choose this option, the TV prompts you for confirmation.
Why the TH-50PZ80U And why plasma? Price and performance. I could find LCD TVs with excellent pictures, features and in the sizes I wanted. But nothing I considered came close to the price of the Panasonic plasmas (partly due to sales). Unfortunately, once you get up and over 42", you are in a realm that has been owned by plasma since the onset, and LCDs have only recently invaded.
The biggest contenders were Samsung LCDs, which looked comparable, but cost considerably more. Between shopping and research, the PZ80U series kept coming out on top.
The First Week Naturally, I can't get enough of it. I can't swap movies fast enough. It doesn't help that we also picked up a Panasonic BD-35 Blu-Ray Disc player as part of a promotional bundle deal.
Standard Def... The BD-35 does a good job at upscaling, so most of our DVD collection looks stunning. I Robot, Lord of the Rings, WALL-E, The Incredibles, etc... all DVDs and all look amazing. Well enough that it is unlikely I'll replace too many of the DVDs in our collection.
We currently have Dish Network as our TV provider and have not upgraded to an HD package yet. "SDTV" hasn't faired as well as the DVDs. It still looks "good", but it looks like standard definition video stretched out onto a big screen. And that's precisely what it is, and TV is generally far from ideal video quality on top of that. Some stations do look better than others.
Why DVDs are different... Most DVDs are anamorphic, which means they contain a 16:9 widescreen image within the 4:3 frame. When viewed on a 4:3 TV, your player scales the image, effectively throwing a considerable number of lines of resolution away, and adds the black bars seen at the top and bottom. HDTVs can use that extra information, so the result is that DVD, as a standard definition video source, is better than standard definition television.
Feeling Blu... We have about a dozen Blu-Ray discs now, and have rented several from Netflix over the past month. The picture is breath taking. I thought upscaled DVD looked great, but 1080p Blu-Ray movies are amazing. The difference can appear subtle. Besides a crisper picture, free of scaling artifacts, the colors simply "pop". The more Blu you get, the more you notice the difference when watching DVD.
My Break-in Playing it safe, I opted to adhere to Panasonic's break-in recommendations (albeit a bit loosely). That means, the picture settings were kept "out-of-the-box" and not calibrated for nearly 100 hours (several weeks). Even so, the colors were terrific. Contrast was great. Black levels excellent, particularly given the price.
I tried to minimize the amount of viewing with either letter boxes or pilar boxes (black bars top and bottom or left and right), but I don't care for distorted pictures (i.e. stretched). Zooming chops off part of the movie; a big compromise for me, and it does effect picture quality a bit. Because of this, I have taken some "risks" and watched several movies with letterboxes. I have not noticed even a hint of Image Retention though. That's with a roughly estimated 30% of the first 30 hours being such movies.
Over time, we became more lax about it, but still haven't seen any image retention. We're now running with normal (brighter) settings and still continue with no problem. If I thought it looked great before, it looks simply amazing now.
Features Remote The remote is simple. It should be adequate for the average user, and likely even preferred by those users over anything overly complicated. It covers everything you would do from day-to-day. It feels fairly solid, and the buttons have a nice tactile feel. They're easy to find and easy to operate. One possible thing to watch out for: our son mashed the power button down crooked, and it stuck down. For a couple minutes, I couldn't figure out why the TV kept turning on and off. It took nothing but a quick touch to free the button and I imagine it was more of a fluke than anything.
For advanced users hoping to teach their tricked-out learning univeral remote all the tricks will have to look for some help. There's no discrete codes in the stock remote, but this is most often the case. If you're lucky, you already have the tools you need, such as a PC programmable remote.
I have a Home Theather Master MX-500, which is an extraordinary remote, but it is not updateable or PC programmable. It does, however, tout one of the largest and most comprehensive code databases found in remote controls. Buried in a Panasonic code set, I found discrete codes for: On, Off, Video1, Component1. It works flawlessly, so I can say that the PZ80U does support discrete commands. Fortunately, thanks to Vierra Link, the TV automatically goes to HDMI1 for the BD-35 Blu-Ray player, as I never found an "HDMI1" command.
Note about Discrete Codes: For those who don't know, macro enabled remotes can make TV-life a breeze; one touch of a button, and a macro fires off a sequence of commands that turn on your TV, receiver and DVD player, while also switching everything to the appropriate inputs. A discrete code for "on" and a discrete code for "HDMI Input #1" makes macros much more usable. Otherwise, if things get out of sequence, the remote might turn on the A/V receiver, but turn off your TV. Hit the button again, and the TV turns on, but the receiver turns back off.
Speakers - Sound Quality They're TV speakers, so there is only so much you can expect to get out of them. These are certainly adequate for normal TV viewing, but they do fall short of the sound output from our old Sony Wega. However, the Wega was exceptional by TV standards. After a few days, my ears adjusted and I have no real complaints.
Tuners - NTSC, ATSC and QAM NTSC is the analog broadcasts we all know is going dark in 2009. ATSC is the new digital standard. That's not to be confused with HDTV, as HD is merely a subset of the ATSC standard, but rest assured that this TV does pick up HD signals. QAM is the free and clear digital channels found embedded in cable TV feeds. Most often, this is limited to HD locals, so, even without an HD subscription, you should get HD versions of ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, etc...
Overscan - HDSize1 and HDSize2 This TV supports displaying video with no overscan, using the HD Size 2 option. Traditionally, TVs would overscan the picture, with portions of the picture "running off" the edges of the screen. This came about because of CRT/Tube Televisions, particulary in the early days of TV, that don't always frame, or center, a picture in the same position. Since the placement of the edges on various TVs was unknown, some "fudge factor" was built in around the edges. If you have ever had to adjust a computer CRT screen, it was for a similar reason.
Modern displays, particularly flat panels, are fixed pixel displays where the picture placement is absolute, and thus have "perfect" picture placement. This means you can potentially view a picture with no overscan, seeing those hidden edges. However, some video, most often broadcasts, includes extraneous data or artifacts on the extreme edges, often seen as a vertical line on the left edge. For such instances, you can use overscan to hide the edges. On this model, HD Size 1 is the overscan option that slightly zooms in on the picture and shows 97% of the image.
Unfortunately, there isn't a button to toggle this on and off (i.e. menu only), so I imagine many owners will opt to simply leave HD Size 1 on and never worry about it again.
Screen Modes: Full, H-Fill, Just, Zoom, 4:3... Since video comes in various sizes, these modes give you some flexibility in how that video is fit within your screen. These are fairly standard for any make and model, and Panasonic has done a pretty good job in their manual of describing and illustrating each. This is also a tool for protecting your set from image retention or burn-in during the break-in period by allowing you to always fill the screen, leaving no blanks areas.
Vierra Link - HDMI CEC Panasonic has an implimentation of HDMI CEC (Consumer Electronics Control) called Vierra link. I'm not aware of the interoperability of this feature with other brands, but we have a Panasonic BD-35 Blu-Ray player connected to our set. This link allows the two devices to communicate and coordinate. For example, the TV automatically switches to HDMI 1 when you press Menu or Play for the BD-35. Similarly, when you turn off the TV, the BD-35 powers off.
Noises It seems most TVs make some kind of ambient nose, be it a whir, whine, hiss, etc... This TV has a number of cooling fans in it, but they are fairly quiet. They're considerably quieter than your typical desktop computer, but somewhat louder than a notebook computer. I have only noticed the fans when the room is absolutely dead quiet. With either sound from the TV or A/V receiver filling the room, or simply the furnance running, I can't hear them.
Otherwise, it does not whine or hiss like our CRT based Sony Wega did. It also doesn't go "BONK" when you power it on (again, like the Wega). You here a click, and it comes on. When turning it off, there's a delay after the screen goes blank, followed by the same click. So far, I have not noticed any cabinet creaks or pops coming from the TV, but it is still new. Such noises are outlined in the manual as a possibility.
Inputs If these are important to you, be sure to check the list. But this set includes a fairly standard variety and quantity that includes HDMI, Component, S-Video, Composite and etc... The one thing worth noting is that this particular version does not have VGA for PC input. However, many modern computers have DVI output (digital version VGA being analog), which can be adapted to an HDMI input with a simple DVI-HDMI dongle or adapter.
Conclusion This TV deserves to be on just about anybody's short list. The PZ80U series is simply a great value. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend them to anybody, with the possible exception of heavy gamers and those with extremely bright rooms (sunlight).
Many video games have a lot of static images, generally score boxes, that may lead to image retention or burn-in. The risk is fairly low, at least from what I have read and experienced, but it is a risk you have to weigh for yourself. And since the screen is glossy, extreme glare can be an issue. However, my manager has the same TV facing a large number of windows. She reports that glare does appear on the screen, but it does not effect actual visibility of the picture and it only occurs in the morning. Whether it is acceptable will depend on your tolarance for glare.
1920 x 1080 Resolution 1000000:1 Dynamic Contrast Ratio for the Brightest whites and darkest blacks 4096 Shades of Gradation for spectacular Color Rep...More at Amazon Marketplace
>b>1080p Pixel Resolution>/b> - See the detail you've been missing with the highest pixel resolution available. >b>Tru2way Technology>/b> - Receive fu...More at Sears
Epinions.com periodically updates pricing and product information from third-party sources, so some information may be slightly out-of-date. You should confirm all information before relying on it.
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2010 Shopping.com, Inc.