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Re: Plasma vs. Rear Projection...some perspective..

66.185.85.81

Posted by Rich H on December 26, 2001 at 20:54:11

In Reply to: Re: Plasma vs. Rear Projection posted by Rich on December 26, 2001 at 19:28:34:

---"Why would I want to? Plasma is a terrible value and HDTV is a non-factor for the forseeable future."---

Interesting, Rich. Your views on plasma sound similar to most people's views of high-end audio. "Why on earth are you paying that money for those speakers. I got mine for two hundred bucks and they're great." Certainly the tube amplifiers so beloved by many audiophiles are relatively finicky, silly devices when looked from a common point of view. But they do something different, perhaps subtle to most people, but something different to the sound which is important to many people, and which makes them worth the money.

And so it goes with plasma. I find the picture has a different look - one that I find significantly more organic, fluid and natural. I love the solidity to the plasma image and the realism it adds. When I switch to looking at a CRT after watching a good plasma, I find myself quite aware of and annoyed by the jiggly, imprecise CRT picture. The imprecision of an electron beam scanning a phosphor screen, which we'd all grown so accostomed to, becomes to my eyes obviously imprecise and antiquated. It just can't match the precision of a fixed pixel design like a plasma.

Just today I brought my brother-in-law, who has a fantastic wide-screen CRT, to see a bunch of plasmas at the local high-end AV store. He was VERY skeptical about plasmas, having seen the previous generation. As we drove to the store he unfurled the long list of reasons why plasmas aren't up to CRT standards. Once in the store it didn't take long for him to agree that the plasmas looked stunning - and certainly better than any CRT we could find. We even auditioned the much heralded Loewe screens, said to have perhaps the best consumer CRT picture available. The Plasmas just stomped all over them. The store was packed on boxing day, full of high end CRTs and Rear View Projection screens, yet it was the good plasmas that had people standing in groups, slack jawed. People were *not* commenting on how slim and cute the panels were so much as they were remarking they'd never seen that level of picture quality before. I heard over and over things like "My god, it's just amazing..it's like 3d, like you're on the set..." Frankly, I've never heard those kind of comments
from customers standing in front of CRT screens.

Panasonic plasma tvs, btw, have virtually licked the previous twin achilles heels of plasmas. The panasonic plasmas, especially the 42" do CRT-like black levels, as well as CRT level color scales.

Another point is this: even in TVs specs aren't everything. I've found that one tv can excell in all sorts of technical areas, pixel counts, black/grey scales, what have you. Yet another TV, which on paper does not sound as promising, can still look better. For instance, my older Panasonic Tau TV can actually look better than the newer, larger models in some instances. The newer models are HDTV ready, with all sorts of wiz-band processing added to process and "smoothen" the picture. But I find the added processing in many new tvs to add obvious and distracting artifacts. My Panasonic produces virtually no disturbing artifacts, and it's moderate size mitigates the imperfections found in many sources. So the picture actually appears sharper. I've also seen HDTV look better on a plasma screen with a lower pixel count vs. one whose pixel count actually matched HDTV specs. There are intangibles in the TV buying experience that makes seeing with one's own eyes a must. (If you are picky).

So, for me and a growing number of other movie nuts, the bigger CRTs don't have much value. They just look like a big bulky-assed TV and they do not compell me to upgrade from what I have. Whereas the better plasmas have a "picture-window" quality that makes my credit card want to jump out of my pocket.

Just adding another perspective.

Rich H.

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