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Reviewing some of the Best Plasma Television Sets available for
Home Entertainment

Best Plasma TV Reviews

A series of Plasma TV Reviews covering some of the best yet affordable plasma televisions available on the market. In the process, we look at the latest 1080p plasma TVs as well as a few cheap plasma HDTV options in the $1,000 to $1,500 price range.

Panasonic TH-50PZ700U 50" 1080p Plasma HDTV

Plasma Televisions - among the TVs most in demand

Plasmas are among the most popular of all TV display technologies, and together with LCDs, represent 75% of all TV sales in Japan, Western Europe and North America.

This is no surprise. At some 4-inches in depth, plasma televisions and LCD TVs represent the perfect solution for a stylish big screen without filling the living room with an ugly big box!

However, consumers are not just buying flat-panel TVs. Instead, they are buying HDTVs. Sales of flat-panel HDTVs has long surpassed that of standard definition TVs.  And within a year, sale of 1080p HDTV plasmas and LCDs is expected to outsell 720p HDTVs. This despite that there is no broadcast programming in 1080p yet!

But it is not all equal between Plasma and LCD TV sales. While at the smaller 37-inch to 44-inch screen sizes, LCD is taking over, at larger screen sizes, plasma is the way to go if what you are after is a flat-panel TV. Apart from an edge in picture performance over alternative display technologies, plasma TVs still represent the best price to picture size deal.

In this respect, plasma HDTV sets represent the display technology most in demand among home theater enthusiasts looking for the prefect image at 50-inch screen sizes and above. The reason being that even at these larger screen sizes, prices of high definition plasma television sets have plummeted to a level that is bringing the big screen plasma dream closer to reality.

And as one would soon see in this Plasma TV reviews article, 1080p HDTV plasmas like the 58-inch Panasonic TH-58PZ700U and the Samsung FPT5884 can easily outperform the latest RPTVs. Plasmas support superior picture performance. These giant plasmas - while still relatively expensive - continue to fall in price, making the downfall of rear-projection HDTV sets a possible future reality.

In this series of plasma TV reviews, we look at some of the best plasma televisions; the best does not necessarily imply expensive.

Of course, one has to be careful when opting for a cheap plasma TV, especially if it comes from an unknown brand. It is better to go for a bare-bones model from a major brand. Major TV makers trade off features not picture quality, for the lower price tag.

At the same time, even 'cheap' plasmas represent a substantial investment. We therefore hope that you will find the suggestions presented in this plasma TV Reviews of some assistance when planning your purchase.

Plasma TV Reviews: Cheap Plasma Television Options

Although our objective under this Plasma TV Reviews section is to look at some of the best plasma televisions, yet one can no longer skip over the ever expanding list of cheap plasma TV sets as if these are not worth considering for serious home entertainment use.

The reason is that in the mist of all the fierce competition between new entrants and major manufactures, we have started to see some really cheap plasma HDTVs from a few leaders in the field. Name-brand 42-inch plasmas are readily available at around $1,000 while 50-inch 720p plasma HDTV sets are selling at under $1,500.

For more information on available 'budget' plasma HDTVs, please check our Cheap Plasma TV Reviews.

Top Plasma HDTVs: Practical Home Theater Guide Selection of Premium Plasma HDTVs

Despite the great advancements in LCD display technology, the best plasma HDTV sets still have an edge when it comes to overall picture performance. In particular, the deep shape of black a premium plasma HDTV set can attain has yet to be achieved by the best LCD TVs. And...

This edge in picture performance comes at a somewhat lower price tag than an LCD for the same screen size especially as one crosses the 50-inch domain.

Under this section of our plasma TV reviews article, we present some of the best premium plasma HDTVs. The brands and models featured here are proving to be among the top sellers. These are also the sets that are getting the best ratings from both consumers and professional product reviewers alike.

50-inch Pioneer KURO PDP-5080HD

At a reduced price tag of around $2,500, the Pioneer PDP-5080HD 50-inch 720p Plasma HDTV is one of the most expensive plasmas. And considering, at $2,500, it is selling at almost $1,000 below the suggested retail price!

Yet this expensive price tag is probably the only real negative thing issue one can complain about.

This Pioneer plasma HDTV set has constantly emerged in a number of plasma TV reviews as capable of producing excellent shadow detail and the deepest shade of black ever measured from a non-CRT TV. Black-level performance is a most important aspect in picture quality. A deep shade of black improves the realism of dark scenes while making colors look richer and more saturated. This renders the Pioneer as the best plasma television for those who want to enjoy the most in home theater image quality.

The Pioneer KURO PDP-5080HD comes with a rich feature list, an excellent ant-glare screen coating, removable speakers, superb connectivity with four HDMI inputs and a PC input, and a CableCARD compatible with TV Guide EPG. Most important, it has an exceptional clean image with little video noise and hardly any judder. Native screen resolution is 1365 x 768 pixels; this is more than enough at this screen size. All is packed up in a functional simplistic design that does not distract the viewer's attention from what should be the center of attraction - the image.

Apart from the expensive price tag, the only other complains we encountered about the PDP-5080HD relates to its color accuracy and temperature control. The Pioneer has a slightly less-than-perfect color accuracy due to a minor inaccuracy with the green primary color. It also lacks a user-menu for fine color temperature control. But these issues did not prevent this Pioneer from earning the highest praise in plasma TV reviews at CNet and other major plasma TV review sites.

Pioneer is marketing all of the 2007 plasma line-up under the mini-brand KURO. The Pioneer PDP-5080H forms part of a series that comprises the Pioneer PDP-4280HD 720p Plasma HDTV. This smaller model shares the same specs sheet as its bigger brother expect for a slightly lower screen native resolution (1024 x 768 pixels); we therefore expected the PDP-4280H to perform similarly.

Update 11^th April 2008: Reuters had reported in March that Pioneer would be pulling off the plug on plasma panel production though it still plan to continue selling plasma TV sets using panels purchased from Matsushita. This decision came as Pioneer plasma TV sales had continued lagging behind major rivals - including Matsushita's Panasonic brand - in the past 18 months. In a questionable marketing move last year, Pioneer decided to stop referring to its plasmas as Kuro plasma TVs and instead refer to them simply as Kuro HDTVs; this in the light of the present general fall in plasma TV sales world-wide due to competition from their LCD flat-screen rivals.

Samsung FP-T5084

The Samsung FPT5084 50-inch 1080p Plasma HDTV represents Samsung's first attempt into the ever increasing array of 1080p-resolution plasma televisions.

Substantially more affordable than the Pioneer, this Samsung turned out to be a solid first effort.

It has brought about a lot of positive remarks in a number of plasma TV reviews appearing on major sites.

It is also one of the few flat-panel displays that has succeed to earn a consistent five-star rating from consumers feedback at stores like amazon and Best Buy.

While not cheap, yet with a reduced on-line price tag of $2,200, this 1080p plasma TV managed to find the right balance between price and performance. It is also a top seller at amazon, with a sales rank of #303 in electronics at the time of this write-up.

This success is not just a matter of a reasonable price tag. The Samsung FP-T5084 plasma 1080p HDTV is capable of reproducing a deep level of black. Colors are accurate while and the image is clean and free from noise. Overall, it is able to stand up against the tough competition from major brands like Panasonic and Pioneer.

CNet - in their plasma TV review for the FP-T5084, complained of a somewhat non-linear gray-scale and a not so-effective glare-reducing screen. Yet these were not enough to prevent this Samsung from earning among the best scores overall from the CNet editors in the said plasma TV review report.

The fact that the Samsung FP-T5084 is a 1080p set means that it can handle the full 1920 x 1080 pixels in a 1080p HDTV signal. One might expect that this means a sharper picture. However, at this screen size, it would be hard to discern the benefits of a larger pixel count when TV viewing takes place from normal distance. (More on viewing distance in our TV Viewing Distance guide). We are not saying that there aren't any benefits associated with a larger pixel count - but at this screen size, these mainly lead to more correct rescaling when viewing 1080i content rather than to a sharper image.

Features include plenty of picture controls, fine color temperature settings and user-adjustable grayscale with individual gain and offset adjustments for red, green, and blue to allow the user to zero in the set's grayscale setting. It also comes with a comprehensive connectivity base that includes 3 HDMI inputs and a PC connection. Other features include a solid collection of aspect ratio controls, a dynamic contrast ratio of 15,000:1, picture-in-picture, a swivel table-top stand, a functional easy to operate remote and equally easy to navigate menu. All is packed up in a stylish extra-wide design with a piano gloss black finish.

Overall, the Samsung FPT5084 1080p Plasma HDTV is an excellent performer, and deserves a place among the best 1080p plasma HDTV sets. It features exceptional accurate primary colors, and while its black level performance does not exactly match that of the Pioneer PDP-5080HD, yet it is still on par with similar premium 1080p HDTV sets from Panasonic. 

Samsung features a 58-inch model in this same series, the Samsung FPT5884 58-inch 1080p Plasma HDTV. Both sets come with an identical specs sheet and are therefore expected to perform very much the same.

A detailed plasma TV review of the Samsung FPT5084 1080p plasma HDTV is available on our site here.

Panasonic TH-50PZ700U

This year, Panasonic has comes out with a total of 8 different 1080p plasma HDTVs. These cover screen sizes from 42-inch up to a massive 65-inch diagonal. This renders Panasonic as the plasma TV maker that has come out with the largest range of 1080p resolution plasma TV sets.

The Panasonic TH-50PZ700U 50-inch 1080p Plasma HDTV featured here forms part of Panasonic mid-level series of plasma 1080p HDTVs.

Other models in this series include the TH-42PZ700U 1080p Plasma HDTV which together with the other Panasonic TH-42PZ77U, are the only 42-inch 1080p plasmas presently available on the market, and  the Panasonic TH-58PZ700U 58-inch 1080p plasma TV.

The TH-50PZ700U comes with a suggested retail price of $3,000 though it is readily available at around $2,200 to $2,400 on-line. At this reduced price level, the Panasonic offers a strong blend of performance and value.

In particular, the TH-50PZ700U is capable of producing a deep shade of black with excellent shadow detail. True that its black level is not as deep as that of the Pioneer PDP-5080HD. However, it is on par with other premium plasmas such as the Samsung FP-T5084 referred to earlier on in the plasma TV review article.

Image on the Panasonic is clean and relatively free from video noise and false contouring. Color accuracy is not among the very best due to a slightly inaccurate primary color of green. However, overall color rendering still looks clean - partly thanks to a rather accurate grayscale. In any case, the slight color inaccuracy is surely not enough to tarnish an overall excellent picture quality. Furthermore, the TH-50PZ700U is one of the few plasma HDTV sets that is capable of doing a fine job even with good quality standard definition material.

The Panasonic TH-50PZ700U comes in a basic glossy black design. Feature wise, it lacks a few basics. In particular, it has just two HDMI inputs instead of the more common three ports found on most 2007 plasma TV models. At the same time, it comes with a PC input and an SD card slot. Similarly, it lacks picture-in-picture support and as well as user controls to fine tune the set color temperature (as instead is possible on the Samsung). However, this Panasonic plasma TV still incorporates enough picture controls to let the user tweak the picture for best performance.

The TH-50PZ700U is capable of delivering superb picture detail. But this is not due to its higher 1080p pixel count but rather to its deep shade of black and accurate grayscale. The 1080p native resolution would help scale 1080i content better in that it is 1:1 ratio. But other than this, at this screen size, it would be hard to enjoy the full benefit of a larger pixel count under normal viewing distances. You will have to sit quite close to the screen to appreciate the benefits of 1080p. But then you may risk noticing video artifacts and noise in the picture which may ruin an otherwise enjoyable viewing experience.

Instead, the benefits of a 1080p pixel count would start to show up on the larger screen of the 58-inch PT-58PZ700U model in this same series of Panasonic 1080p plasma HDTVs.

A detailed plasma TV review of the Panasonic TH-50PZ700U 1080p plasma HDTV is available on our site here.

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Featured Plasma TV Reviews - Link Summary

Plasma TV Reviews for Current Products

Cheap Plasma HDTV Reviews

Panasonic TH-50PZ700U 50-inch 1080p Plasma HDTV

Samsung FP-T5084 1080p Plasma HDTV  

Achieved Plasma TV Reviews

TH-PX60U Panasonic Plasma Television Series

Hitachi HTD52 Series of High Definition Plasma TVs 

TH-PX50U Panasonic Plasma Television Series 

HP-R52 Series of HD Samsung Plasma Televisions 

The 42PF9630A Philips Plasma TV 

Panasonic TH42PA20U/P 42" EDTV Plasma Monitor

Samsung Tantus HPN6339 63" HDTV-Ready Plasma TV

Toshiba 50HP81 50" TheaterWide® HD

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