LCD/LED vs PLASMA

Yep I agree but unfortunately people seem more interested in how thin the bezels are and if you can wave your hands about and shout at the TV to change channels than if it has massive blobs on the screen, vertical banding and backlight bleed.

That's why I still have my 32" HD crt for general tv and 24" crt monitor for pc gaming! crt still craps on everything else pq wise - it's just a shame they're massive and don't come in large sizes.
 
Mmm when you buy an LCD or plasma in a shop it should have a disclaimer saying "image quality may vary from good to extremely bad, feeling lucky punk?"
 
That's why I still have my 32" HD crt for general tv and 24" crt monitor for pc gaming! crt still craps on everything else pq wise - it's just a shame they're massive and don't come in large sizes.

yea, the laser rear projector was good too as were standard RPTVs, but these ``American monsters`` all became unpopular because they were too big and bulky, but RPTVs had a nice smooth image.... but my plasma is harsh and razor sharp...the image almost has too much contrast/ too black...because blacks in real life are dark grey !!!!

when i look at HD and glance around the room at the same time, my room is far softer and out of focus than the tv, the tv also has shadows that are too black and pronounced, but that's what people seem to want, this is Pioneer's fault... the Kuro, blacker than black .... no greyer than grey

real life is also stereoscopic/3D and this is probably what's missing, the tv has no true perspective/ depth of field
 
That's why I still have my 32" HD crt for general tv and 24" crt monitor for pc gaming! crt still craps on everything else pq wise - it's just a shame they're massive and don't come in large sizes.

Good CRTs were excellent. They look better with a badly encoded image, otherwise I'll take a good Plasma for everything else.
 
They still have the edge contrast and black level wise. Better motion too and, if looked after, few of the nasties that plague plasma and lcd/led (no phosphor lag on my crt!). tbh I would have been happier with most of the flat panels I've bought over the years had I not kept my crts as when outputting to both the difference in pq is clear. My last Panny was an ST30 and it just couldn't compete.
 
I want one of those Sony FW900 24" CRT monitors... I think they are almost as much second hand now as they used to cost new... Collectors items.
 
The main problem with CRTs is the geometry, it would have to be a fearsomely expensive set to not have issues. Anyway where are you going to find a 1080p CRT with HDMI ports?

Black levels, motion and general performance on my Panny G30 are excellent. I've never noticed Phosphor lag to be honest. Performance compared to an LCD/LED set is massively improved. Whatever minor improvements a best of breed CRT may have are not worth the power consumption, space required or other compromises required.

My old 19" FD Trinitron monitor is going to get recycled next week. It's not been used in a couple of years - there's not point keeping it any longer. Good in it's day ... 14 years ago!
 
Last edited:
I want one of those Sony FW900 24" CRT monitors... I think they are almost as much second hand now as they used to cost new... Collectors items.

:) That's what I use with my PC. It must be over a decade old and there literally isn't a display I've seen that comes close. The living room monster is a 32" JVC crt that outputs at 1125i - no hdmi though, just component.

Whatever minor improvements a best of breed CRT may have are not worth the power consumption, space required or other compromises required.

It's all subjective, bar the footprint and size limitations. Standard def looks a whole lot better than you'll get on a plasma or lcd/led and when watched side by side, even the kuro looked quite flat and lacking depth in comparison. It's a shame HD crt sets never really took off in the UK - they're great, especially for gaming. No dodgy motion and 0 input lag. OLED needs to step up and give us pq and performance better than what we had 15 years ago!

My old 19" FD Trinitron monitor is going to get recycled next week. It's not been used in a couple of years - there's not point keeping it any longer. Good in it's day ... 14 years ago!

Nice :) Ebay it - ppl still want Trintons.
 
Last edited:
<SNIP>when i look at HD and glance around the room at the same time, my room is far softer and out of focus than the tv, ...

...real life is also stereoscopic/3D and this is probably what's missing, the tv has no true perspective/ depth of field<SNIP>
Yeah. But you're trying to compare real life to a video display. That's really not possible.

Our eyes aren't limited by scan lines or pixels. We see a dynamic range far in excess of what even the best photographic camera can capture in a still frame. Our eyes constantly adjust exposure whether we are looking at dark, middle or bright areas. We are doing the equivalent of High Dynamic Range (HDR) processing without even realising it.

By comparison, all video images are restricted to 8 bit per colour, so 256 shades of gray (0-255 ring any bells :) ). But in reality it's less than that. We have legacy issues that mean it is restricted down to about 220 shades of gray. Even with 8K video resolution, there's still no way that a video image can match the dynamic range of a decent camera let alone the human eye. Having said all that, what we achieve with video images is remarkable. This brings me on to the next point...


<SNIP>my plasma is harsh and razor sharp...the image almost has too much contrast/ too black...because blacks in real life are dark grey !!!!

...the tv also has shadows that are too black and pronounced, but that's what people seem to want, this is Pioneer's fault... the Kuro, blacker than black .... no greyer than grey

real life is also stereoscopic/3D and this is probably what's missing, the tv has no true perspective/ depth of field<SNIP>
Pretty much everything you mention there is what we calibrators address when setting up a video display using reference standards. Even a set up with a decent test disc which includes colour filters (Video Essentials HD Basics) goes a long way to addressing a lot of the common problems with the out-of-the-box TV settings.

It still amazes me the time, the effort and the money people will spend researching and buying a new TV. But asking them to spend the cost of a take-away for two to get their new purchase working properly seems to be a huge and insurmountable hurdle. Why??? :confused:
 
They still have the edge contrast and black level wise. Better motion too and, if looked after, few of the nasties that plague plasma and lcd/led (no phosphor lag on my crt!). tbh I would have been happier with most of the flat panels I've bought over the years had I not kept my crts as when outputting to both the difference in pq is clear. My last Panny was an ST30 and it just couldn't compete.

my panny isn't perfect for motion but you get used to its faults.....but compared to a CRT it's miles better, the CRT is years old now and it really shows.

you only get a good image on a CRT because the screen is so tiny, you expand that to 50'' and it'll look horrid

the CRT has a rich smooth image... YES it's tiny, you dont notice its faults

the panny looks brilliant on HD/GAMING..... the CRT is far better for Audio, the Panny has rubbish audio...all flat screens do

finally yes, the new Panny needs calibrating but i have to run it in first.
 
It still amazes me the time, the effort and the money people will spend researching and buying a new TV. But asking them to spend the cost of a take-away for two to get their new purchase working properly seems to be a huge and insurmountable hurdle. Why??? :confused:

Mmm yes a lot of people seem to spend £1000's on a TV and then just leave it on one of the out of the box settings.... I bet if you went and looked and everyones TV, maybe 10% of them would actually have a calibrated image.. When you get the colours right it is night and day difference compared to the out of the box settings.
 
Last edited:
... I bet if you went and looked and everyones TV, maybe 10% of them would actually have a calibrated image..
I'd lay odds on that it's far less than that. There are 26.4 million households in the UK. I'd be amazed if 0.1% of the main TVs are adjusted correctly for just the basics of brightness, contrast, colour and sharpness.
 
10% of people that have gone out and bought an expensive TV then... Probably not even 10%..
 
Last edited:
This thread has turned out even dafter than I expected, yeah let's all go out and buy a CRT,
 
I would be interested in one of those 24" CRT Sony Fw900 monitors because the selection of PC monitors is not very good... but for a TV I would rather have a plasma.
 
I'd lay odds on that it's far less than that. There are 26.4 million households in the UK. I'd be amazed if 0.1% of the main TVs are adjusted correctly for just the basics of brightness, contrast, colour and sharpness.

and the majority of those sets (which will be of the much cheaper variety) may well not be worth calibrating in the first place

(look on AVforums at the cheaper TV's and few of them improve drastically from out of the box>>> calibrated)

Im not doubting that in some cases you can get a good tv to look great just by calibrating, and you can get a great tv even better. For the most part it wont make a jot of difference (especially to an untrained eye)
 
Hmmm well as long as the TV is decent then it will look much better calibrated. Anything above about £400.
 
Im not doubting that in some cases you can get a good tv to look great just by calibrating, and you can get a great tv even better. For the most part it wont make a jot of difference (especially to an untrained eye)

Have you ever seen a calibrated screen next to an uncalibrated one?
 
Back
Top Bottom