My Panasonic 50" Plasma, the 50PZ800U, arrived today., right on schedule. I was very anxious to get it and despite the fact that it arrived early in the delivery window, It still seemed like it couldn't get here fast enough. The delivers brought it in the door, unpacked it, set it up, and put it on my console. Overall, a fine experience. Didn't like that it took almost a week to get here, but really you shouldn't expect much more when ordering something like this online.
My first thought when they placed it on my console was, "Wow, this is a beautiful TV." My second thought was, "Wow, this thing is huge!"
I'll have to post my thoughts on the TV in a little bit when I get a chance to really put the TV through its paces. But here are my initial thoughts. Keep in mind that this is my very first HDTV, so my perspective is one of a neophyte.
TVs don't look the same as they do in the store - Seriously, it's like night and day. I looked at this TV A LOT in the store and my opinion of it is very different than now. I read all the forums, and everybody would say that you shouldn't judge a TV by how it looks in the store. It was really hard for me to do this. The bright fluorescent lights completely distort the picture. Most of the time, TVs are set to "vivid" mode which makes the picture extremely bright and over saturates the colors. In the store it looks great. At home, it looks like everyone has bright orange skin. This TV has a THX mode which is supposed to make the picture extremely accurate. In the store, the picture looks washed out. At home, it is by far the best setting.
HDTVs need HD material - Don't get me wrong, the Standard Def material I have seen looks OK, but it doesn't look great. I have played several different sources on this TV. The best sources have been of course Blu-Ray Movies and over the air HD signals. The TV looks fantastic when using these high quality sources. SD sources like SD TV and standard DVD look OK.
I did have a little bit of a scare. It seems the TV doesn't like it when I connect my PC via HDMI. The TV refused to power on and the little red light in the front blinked at me seven times. I had to dig around the AVS forums to find an answer. I was forced to unplug the HDMI connection and power cycle the TV. This bothers me a little bit but it is something I can work around.
More thoughts after I get a chance to use the TV a little more. But so far, so good!
You know, I realized on Sunday night when I was going to Gavin's and heard the Laker game playing all around his neighborhood that you made a great sacrifice to come to the softball game on Sunday. Thank you. :)
ReplyDeleteLooks real sharp. Have fun.
ReplyDeleteThanks for noticing! Yes, the Laker game was on during the softball game. I had actually forgotten until Saturday. By then, I didn't think it was right to back out.
ReplyDeleteThanks, its an awesome TV so far.
ReplyDelete