Are LED TVs better than Plasma

[Psycho Sonny]

I think 4k killed it actually. Panasonic is replacing one of my plasmas on their 5 year warranty..... Guess what they replaced with... A led TV. Happens to be bigger and newer which is nice. Going 60" Samsung 4k this year to replace the other panny plasma. Time has just moved on, and plasma is dead

Oled is the future, but not for a fee years.

no it was cost, the manufacturers weren't making any money on plasmas so they had to shut them down for that reason nothing to do with anything else.

 

[Clairvoyant]

Plasmas are good in the winter. Heats our living room up nicely. lol

 

[NexusK]

3rdly the far lighter simply isn't true either, yes they are lighter but I can pick my 50" plasma up on my own and move it about, in fact i installed it all by myself.

The rest of your points are valid apart from that one. The GT50 in your example is 33KG and the average 50" LED TV is around 15KG. I'd say being less than half the weight counts as being far lighter.

It really doesn't matter as once a TV is installed it's installed but i think you got a bit carried away in the defence of plasma there lol.

 

[DiscoDave]

At the time I bought my plasma (circa 2012) the current offerings from LCD tv's were quite poor in comparison for the price of the plasma.

I saw a well regarded Samsung LCD against the Panasonic Plasma and the complete lack of motion blur/ghosting/delay sold it for me.

Since then however LED-backlit LCD has become the norm which is a suitable replacement for most. If I needed to replace my Panasonic Plasma I'd go LED (or OLED, depending on price).

Watching Movies/F1 on my plasma TV is still a more enjoyable experience compared to most of the other mid-range offerings i've seen.

 

[lucid]

Now tell me I am wrong and that i need my eyes checking.

There was an image test at the annual InfoComm expo several years ago. A selection of projectors were set up under the same lighting conditions. There was a range of quality/cost/brightness/resolutions. All were fed from the same source, set up on factory presets and just adjusted for brightness and contrast, and then the projectors hidden from view. People were asked to vote anonymously on which had the most eye-catching image.

The result was a landslide. When not being viewed critically, most people went for the brightest and most colourful image. It's a trick TV manufacturers use all the time in shop displays.

Setting up a TV properly isn't difficult, but it does take the right tools.

It makes me chuckle when I see people spending hours and hours on specialist forums asking opinions and reading reviews about TVs, and yet the suggestion that they then spend £40 on a decent test disc to get the best from their investment is greeted like a stranger asking for a kidney!

Magazines and review sites are now regularly calibrating TVs before doing reviews. So many of the glowing reviews reflect performance that the average buyer won't ever see.

How much does the average 'tech-savvy' family spends on TVs for the whole house during the course of 10 years: £1500, £2000, more? Given that it's unlikely those TVs will ever be calibrated professionally, wouldn't it be useful to instead gain the knowledge and experience to properly judge the image on a TV in-store? The payback is instant. For example, I saved £70 on the last TV I bought in-store for my house simply because I could adjust the controls on a couple of sets and see which one was doing the best once all the picture processing garbage was turned off.

Coming back to the Plasma versus LCD/LED question; there is no right or wrong. It very much depends on the quality of set, the picture settings (both the presets and the adjusted settings), ambient viewing conditions, and the viewers experience which relates then to what they're looking for from an image.

 

[VincentHanna]

I've always rated Plasmas, and have had 3x different Panasonic sets over the years so have seen how the technology progressed.

For me, they were the best displays for movies.

I now have a 4k Panasonic LED as my main screen, and I put my PC through it for 4k gaming (60hz via DisplayPort) but there are some slight backlight bleed issues that I sometimes notice when watching a movie.

My 55" VT50 Plasma is now in the bedroom, which is a bit overkill but I didn't want it going to waste as it's so good.

 

[MOOGLEYS]

I would still be using your VT50 over any 4k LCD tbh.

 

[VincentHanna]

For movies, I agree.

But it's my main gaming screen, and 4k gaming via PC is lush.

 

[V F]

Setting up a TV properly isn't difficult, but it does take the right tools.

Not a lot of TV's reach the designated saturation coordinates. Most, red and blue are quite undersaturated. Plus a lot have quirky greyscale, especially near black with some form of tint. As well as flaky Gamma crushing black and mid-tones as the panel dims to help blacks.

The vast majority of current consumer LEDs, for example, do not use RGB LEDs. It is just too expensive. (Sony briefly used a true RGB LED-based approach in 2008, but the product was simply not competitively priced.) LED displays generally use blue LEDs only and combine that with a yellow filter to produce white light.

So, IF consumer displays start supporting Rec. 2020 and IF to achieve that support the displays must employ narrow band primaries, then I can see this becoming a serious problem. We just aren't nearly there yet, and unless Rec. 2020 becomes the consumer standard we may never be.

It makes me chuckle when I see people spending hours and hours on specialist forums asking opinions and reading reviews about TVs, and yet the suggestion that they then spend £40 on a decent test disc to get the best from their investment is greeted like a stranger asking for a kidney!

Best disc ever created. Shows you everything the display is doing.
www.displaycalibrations.com

 

[Psycho Sonny]

I have tweaked my GT50 using generic recommended settings from AVforums.

I have always wanted a proper calibration but I can't justify spending £200-£400 on one (I'm in Glasgow and afaik there isn't anybody local who is cheaper than £300-400).

What would you guys recommend I buy to tweak it? I have been into the advanced controls and the settings in there just look very complex, there is no way i could tweak it properly without proper training and one of those special calibration cameras imo. So I have been happy to just use it with the generic recommended settings. Picture blows any other tv i've seen in anyones home out the water so I'm quite happy but if I can make it better for less than £50 I'm all for it.

 

[V F]

I have tweaked my GT50 using generic recommended settings from AVforums.

http://www.tlvexp.ca/2012/12/the-fruits-of-copying-settings-the-pioneer-lottery/

I have always wanted a proper calibration but I can't justify spending £200-£400 on one (I'm in Glasgow and afaik there isn't anybody local who is cheaper than £300-400).

What would you guys recommend I buy to tweak it? I have been into the advanced controls and the settings in there just look very complex, there is no way i could tweak it properly without proper training and one of those special calibration cameras imo. So I have been happy to just use it with the generic recommended settings. Picture blows any other tv i've seen in anyones home out the water so I'm quite happy but if I can make it better for less than £50 I'm all for it.

You'll never get to see a calibrated picture for £50. An X-Rite i1 Display Pro is £160. Calman is £100 to £250 dependant on what package but HCFR is free… but you need a lot of knowledge as it isn't a step by step guide like Calman. HCFR can give you the same results even if you have a Spectrophotometer to profile the Colorimeter.

 

[lucid]

Not a lot of TV's reach the designated saturation coordinates. Most, red and blue are quite undersaturated. Plus a lot have quirky greyscale, especially near black with some form of tint. As well as flaky Gamma crushing black and mid-tones as the panel dims to help blacks.
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Saturation used to be more of a problem with CRT TVs. They really struggled. Flat panels are much better in this respect. I'm seeing and measuring far better saturation from flat panels than ever I saw from consumer grade tube-based TVs. That's not to say that ll flat panels are perfect, but if one refers to the published CIE colour space diagrams then you can see that those tested aren't bad and quite a few are actually pretty good.

Quirky greyscale and flaky gamma..... well yes. But that's consumer TV.

What I'm referring to in end-user set-up though isn't at such a high level as adjusting greyscale and gamma. That's beyond the reach of average consumer looking for a quick £50 fix. What I'm talking about is just the basic PLUGE set up which is more than most TVs will ever get treated to. That, and, with the right test patterns, adjusting sharpness and the motion processing controls will make a significant difference to most TVs.

Best disc ever created. Shows you everything the display is doing. www.displaycalibrations.com

Interesting. I'll order a copy to have a look at it. I take it though that the "shows you everything" bit refers to the disc being used with the appropriate calibration software and a suitable meter?

 

[V F]

That and he has every pattern to show if the TV is clipping. As I had found out, AVSHD was showing no clipping but the saturation steps in 21pt was clipping in yellow and cyan.

The disc really is feature rich and helps to look for any banding, break up in gradients and anything else. The other part that was really interesting compared to other discs, you could set step 17/Gamma correctly while still crushing his 0.5 near black.
Plus not many discs show you the colour steps near black and white to see if they're also clipping or too high near black.

Mascior's disc has the Offset/Cuts steps near black but doesn't show the near white colour steps to see which colours quickly run out.

He uses quite a lot of specialised hardware and software. That and Ted's disc allows you to do 3DLUT for video processors. 9,261 colour patches. For eeColor and Lumagen.
He has many workflows to choose and different timed patterns from 10s to 1 second. As well as he supplies you Calman workflows etc


His disc is compatible with, LightSpace, ChromaPure, CalMan and HCFR.
http://www.displaycalibrations.com/patterns_overview.html

Ted uses with his disc, S/W: LightSpace CMS, SpaceMan ICC, SpaceMatch DCM, CalMAN 5, CalMAN RGB, ChromaPure, CalPC, ControlCAL
Meters: JETI Specbos 1211, Klein K-10A, i1PRO2, i1PRO, SpectraCAL C6, i1D3, C5

Quite a number of experts using his disc now.

 

[lucid]

I do quite a bit of that with the clipping already Spears & Munsil. It also has a very comprehensive set of motion patterns. I never really took to AVSHD. I know many enthusiasts grabbed it because it was/is free, but it just appears to be a bunch of ChromaPure test patterns.

Ted's disc for 30 Euro is worth a look for curiosity if nothing else.

 

[Twirlywoos]

That and he has every pattern to show if the TV is clipping. As I had found out, AVSHD was showing no clipping but the saturation steps in 21pt was clipping in yellow and cyan.

The disc really is feature rich and helps to look for any banding, break up in gradients and anything else. The other part that was really interesting compared to other discs, you could set step 17/Gamma correctly while still crushing his 0.5 near black.
Plus not many discs show you the colour steps near black and white to see if they're also clipping or too high near black.

Mascior's disc has the Offset/Cuts steps near black but doesn't show the near white colour steps to see which colours quickly run out.

He uses quite a lot of specialised hardware and software. That and Ted's disc allows you to do 3DLUT for video processors. 9,261 colour patches. For eeColor and Lumagen.
He has many workflows to choose and different timed patterns from 10s to 1 second. As well as he supplies you Calman workflows etc


His disc is compatible with, LightSpace, ChromaPure, CalMan and HCFR.
http://www.displaycalibrations.com/patterns_overview.html

Ted uses with his disc, S/W: LightSpace CMS, SpaceMan ICC, SpaceMatch DCM, CalMAN 5, CalMAN RGB, ChromaPure, CalPC, ControlCAL
Meters: JETI Specbos 1211, Klein K-10A, i1PRO2, i1PRO, SpectraCAL C6, i1D3, C5

Quite a number of experts using his disc now.

Hi

You sound like you know your stuff. I will be upgrading next year from my aging Sony KDS55a2000 as the bulbs keep going every 4 months and there is flickering on the set so I think the TV is dying,

I have an i1 display pro that I have been using with DisplaycalGUI to calibrate my monitors and would like to venture to DIY calibration for my TV.

The Blu Ray you shown does it include all the patterns I need? How does it differ from his free version? I do like tinkering and learning so would you suggest I start of with the open source HCFR or would that be too much hassle for a novice? What is the difference between Calman and Chromapure there are several variations of the software with different price ranges and add-ons that "auto calibrate"? Which one do you use?

Thanks

edit - I just read he is making a new version of that disc.

 

[delta0]

You will start a war with that kind of question.

LED is now better.

 

[spoffle]

"LED" TVs aren't even LED anyway

 

[delta0]

"LED" TVs aren't even LED anyway

They are. It refers to the backlight and the naming helps separate it from LCD which uses fluorescent backlight. They both produce images on LCD screens and generally now the much higher performing systems are LED.

 

[crinkleshoes]

You only refer to games... not movies or TV.

It's long been thought that even previous generation LCDs were better than plasma for gaming... but just for that... gaming... not TV or Movies.

OLED on the other hand...

 

[Mercury464]

Different technologies, each with positives and negatives. LCD has greater brightness, Plasma had better black levels and thus greater contrast, Plasma panels were more responsive and so handled motion better. Plasma had better screen uniformity, which is the single biggest problem with LED back-lit displays as far as I'm concerned.

Plasma was just too expensive to manufacture and it wasn't scaling in a sustainable way, screens were getting bigger, resolutions were getting greater, it was a great technology and it went as far as it could.

We're in this situation now, where we're kind of stuck with LED back-lit displays, ticking over until OLED matures and it's not really maturing as fast as it needs to. It pretty much marries the two most valuable assets of both Plasma and LCD, that being black levels and brightness respectively.

The problem for me with LED back-lit displays is the half-assed way that all of the manufacturers go about delivering the technology for the sake of cutting down on costs. There are now so many different implementations of LED back-lighting, that buying a display has become at least as much about choosing which uniformity artefacts you can stand the most, as what you want feature wise. You can have banding, blooming, clouding, vignetting or a screen that looks like a dirty newspaper print, but you have to have at least one of them.

This problem of there not seeming to exist a "perfect" solution with LCD technology, is why we really need OLED to take over, even when you buy an expensive display, you still feel as though the problems have been "masked", rather than eliminated. LCD is old, the technology is old and it needs to be retired, just like Plasma has been, they're both antiquated technologies and display panels need to move on.

So in my opinion, they're both crap, they've had their turn, they were both good and bad in their own ways, but we need to move on.