Video Asylum

Posted by David Aiken (A) on February 23, 2007 at 22:41:05

In Reply to: Is Plasma Still King? posted by AbeCollins on February 23, 2007 at 13:42:28:

I was having trouble deciding whether to get a plasma or LCD when I came across a joint review of a plasma and an LCD screen from the same manufacturer. The review opened with the reviewer saying that he knew what the readers wanted to know was which was best, but he was going to ask "Where will you be using it?" before responding. One of the points he made about LCDs was that the screen was much less reflective and that you could view them successfully in much higher light settings.

One of the things that was plaguing me with my CRT screen was the on-screen reflections. My room is a family room with lots of window space and while I keep curtains on the window behind the screen, there's still a reasonable amount of light in the room during the day when I do a lot of my viewing. There's also a planted aquarium with a bright, metal halide lamp above it for plant growth, and it made a strong reflection.

Once I'd read that one comment I went out looking again, I compared the reflectivity of both in the shops, and I came home with an LCD. I no longer have a reflection problem and room brightness is not an issue, even in the middle of the day when the room is at it's brightest. A plasma screen simply would not work in my situation.

Yes, plasma does do a number of things affecting picture quality better than LCD but if the plasma is going to be unviewable because of reflections and the amount of brightness in the room, the LCD will win hands down on picture quality in that room.

I wouldn't consider a plasma in my current room. I would if I had a room I could dim or totally darken, but I don't have that.

David Aiken