Plasma or LCD? 356
WeeBit asks: "I saw a news article on why you should buy Plasma instead of LCD TV's. It just sparked my interest. Flat panel TV's have the market now, and our analog TV's are on their way out. I am sure many will be thinking of purchasing their new flat panel within the next couple years. Have you given this any thought? Panasonic, has been pushing ads that sell the consumer on the plasma TV's over the LCD's. Is this a good argument, or is it just hype? Which do you prefer Plasma or LCD? Why?"
Panasonic say: Buy Our TVs Film At 11. (Score:5, Interesting)
Meanwhile, their current range of LCDs aren't that great, and are generally considered to be, if anything, worse than their previous generation (they're cheaper to make, though). They're losing market share hand over fist to Sony right now.
Exactly how unbiased do you think a press release from them extolling the virtues of Plasma are going to be? Roughly as much as the one explaining why you should buy one of their Blu-Ray players, instead of Toshiba's HD-DVD, really.
Personally, I think both technologies have their place. Plasma really comes into its own at 50" and larger sizes, where LCD's finer dot-pitch is less of an issue, and you can't even get a decent-value plasma below 42" - the rare 37" ones are ludicrously overpriced in comparison to LCD. But Panasonic are definitely over-selling Plasma in their marketing.
Re:Google is your friend (Score:2, Interesting)
Most people choose where they want a TV to go, and buy one that is the right size for the space, or smaller if they can't afford one that big. If you've got a 50" space to fill, then sure, Plasma is the winner. If it's 32" or lower, Plasma can't fit your needs. Overall, I think it's a fairly neutral thing - 40" seems to be the hotspot, and both are fine there.
Re:CRT (Score:4, Interesting)
Then there's the fact that the two of us nearly did ourselves serious injury taking my 32" CRT up the stairs. The 32" LCD that replaced it weighed 17kg. Including the packaging, which never made it up with the CRT, because that wouldn't have negotiated the corner.
For small sets, CRT is still unbeatable on value and image quality. But for the living room it's dead as a dead thing.
What about the frickin' lasers? (Score:3, Interesting)
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/10
Re:I'm cynical (Score:3, Interesting)
I had a plasma for 4 days.
On day 3 I watched an inning of baseball. Turned off the TV. Went to the store.
When I came back I could still see the score. (The red sox were winning). I was very angry.
The next morning the score was still there.
I returned the TV on day 4.
Re:Neither (Score:4, Interesting)
If the (currently vaporware) SED TV [wikipedia.org] ever gets out it will make plasma and LCD obsolete.
Re:I'm cynical (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:LCD (Score:4, Interesting)
The LEDs definitely have shorter time to full brightness, I hear they enable the sets to do a richer color gamut, and of course are much more longer lasting and less sensitive to power cycles. With LEDs DLPs ought be *the* sets to have if you have longevity in mind. LCD panels theoretically could break down more easily under heat, and I know damn well how easily LCD panels get dead pixels (every flat panel I've had developed at least one screwed up pixel within two years). The heat doesn't apply to flat-panel sets so much, but the dead pixels do. Plasma I hear has been criticized for losing quality over years, as well as burn-in. There have been improvements, but still... You're left with LCoS type systems, CRT, and DLP. DLP and LCoS may benefit equally from LED light instead of lamp. CRT projection has been very solid over the years, but subject to burn in.
Re:CRT (Score:3, Interesting)
My CRT Sony WEGA weighs over 200 pounds and I think that most of the weight is in the face of the CRT. This set requires a special TV stand just to hold the weight and there is NOTHING to hold onto when moving it. The old Sony TVs were rectangular boxes that had carrying handles, the newer ones are odd shaped round cornered blobs with no handles; the only flat parts are the bottom of the cabinet and the face of the CRT.
It pissed me off when the set was delivered. I had paid for in-house delivery and box removal, which the salesman said was supposed to mean that the TV would be unpacked and set in place. I live on the 2nd story of a condo with a significant number of stairs from the parking lot up to the common door of the condo. I would have been happy if the set had been carried up the stairs and left in my living room, still in the box. I took the day off of work to be home when it was delivered. The delivery truck driver arrived by himself, with no helper.
The driver told me that the warehouse didn't know that the set weighted so much so they didn't send a helper and that either I had to help him carry it up the stairs or he would leave the set at the curb. I called the store that I bought it from and was told that the delivery was my responsibility and that they had just arranged it for me. I called the delivery company and was told that they didn't have anybody to send out to carry it in and that they would refund me the difference between curb side and inside delivery. I was also told that if the driver helped me carry to it upstairs that I wouldn't get the $15 refund. If I refused delivery, I would have to pay for the delivery attempt, pay for storage, and pay again for another delivery. I helped the driver carry it upstairs.
I talked to a lawyer about it and was told that I was out of luck; the law was on the side of the cartage company and the retailer was totally out of the loop, they had simply acted as my agent to arrange delivery.
Re:Be sure to *look* at them first (Score:3, Interesting)
It is very common practice to modify screen settings to sell the preferred (ie larger profit) display.
If you have the time (and patience), you can sit there and tweak each individual display to see the 'best' picture each can achieve.
Re:Neither (Score:2, Interesting)
LCDs and Plasmas are both being heavily marketed like we simply HAVE to have one or the other, a bit like Republicans/Democrats or Labour/Conservative. Personally I see problems with both technologies and I WILL stick with my 20+ year old Decca CRT until it actually fails. Just two months ago I recycled my old 14" portable which had served me well for around 20 years, but I haven't bothered replacing it since I can live without TV in the bedroom. I only hope that when the main TV does finally pack in I'll still be able to get a CRT to replace it.
Works for us (Score:3, Interesting)
Small Miss did watch “Bird Television” one morning for breakfast, by sliding the curtains wide & looking out into the front yard. That’s the one regression we’ve seen — & it was cute.
As well as power, you save a lot of space; not just for the box itself, but for the watching area.
Re:LCD (Score:3, Interesting)