Convince me: Plasma or LED LCD

In My Humble Opinion
1

My old TV died a few months ago, it was an “early adoption” 42 inch Standard Def Sony Plasma. I couldn’t afford to replace it straight away, but now I have a new job and can look into getting a new big-ass TV.

I’ve never been an advocate of HD. I can see it’s a clearer sharper picture, but that has never been a factor for me. The increased scale and the leap from 4:3 to 16:9 was more important to me than resolution, so Blu-Ray this and HD that has never been a motivator. However, now HD is inescapable, so I may as well embrace it. Plus, there is another newer factor that makes me like HD, described below.

I’ve looked around in stores, and online, to see what looks good and what people are saying, and it comes down to this:

LCD has crappy black levels and is best at smaller scales. So that’s out.

So it comes down to LED LCD or Plasma.

Plasma Pros: Great black levels. Vivid colour. Cheaper.

Plasma Cons: Heavy in weight. Uses a lot of power. Generate heat.

LED LCD Pros: Nice black levels, almost as good as Plasma. Light in weight. Uses less power. Has interploation feature, making for smoother frame rate and fantastic real image.

LED LCD Cons: Expensive. Not backlit, but edge lit, means uneven image quality. Still LCD, so has narrow viewing angle and subtle refresh response time image retention.

The thing that makes Plasma appealing is how it’s half the price of LED LCD.

The thing that makes LED LCD appealing is the interpolation feature. Let me expand.

If the point of HD is to make TV watching a whole new experience than SD, then resolution isn’t enough. It needs more. And that smooth interpolated framerate really works for me. It makes everything look so much nicer and more appealing. I know a lot of people dislike that feature, calling it the “soap opera effect” but I am entranced by it. It makes Plasma look juddery and annoying.

But is that enough to shell out an extra $1000?

I don’t know. What do you think?

2

Hate it. Hate it, hate it, hate it. So, you can see why I have a plasma :D.

But another thing to consider is that LCDs are considerably brighter and will hold up better in rooms ( picture-wise ) where you can’t control ambient light so well. Not a major issue for me in my cave-like abode, but it can be with some people.

I’m partial to plasmas for all the reasons you stated and I don’t care about the weight ( I never move my TV ), the heat ( negligible impact in my place ) or increased energy costs ( a very minor expense for me ).

But ultimately I think you should go with what you’re going to enjoy unless it will break you financially. If you really like that “LCD look”, get substantial enjoyment from your TV and can afford that extra bit of cash without going hungry or missing a rent payment, I’d say do it. Life is too short to not enjoy when you can.

3

Note that you can get LCDs with “full array” LED backlights in which the LEDs are behind the whole display, or edge-lit LED backlights, in which they’re along the edge.

4

The full array ones are even more expensive, and I can’t even find any in most of my local shops. I did see a display model, which was amazing, but ridiculously priced, double the other LED LCDs.

I like the “life’s too short” argument, though…

5

Guano Lad, I went this a few weeks ago and in Australia.

I met all the same arguments you are experiencing.

I ended up getting a Samsung 51 inch Plasma because of the quality of the picture and the price (it was under $1500). I had started the journey wanting a backlit LED LCD.

They (for me) were far too expensive, and the picture quality of the Plasma was really great. There are other things such as side viewing (important if you have a big TV room) where the plasma is better.

The usage of power- what does it come to? $20 a year? Really, not a factor.

At the end of the day if I get five good years out of this great. I will see what is around then.

6

I had another look in teh store, this time they were playing an action movie (Tron Legacy) so I got to see some of the motion effects on the LED LCD. They were distracting, I have to admit, though I’m sure I would get used to it.

But the exact equivalent Plasma, indeed the one Cicero just mentioned, the Samsung 51 inch, was really amazing, and for such a low price, so I have to admit I’m leaning towards the Plasma now.

7

I went back and forth every day depending on what I wanted the TV to do. When I imagined cuddling up with a movie at night, I wanted plasma. When I imagined the TV being on for hours at a time playing Nick Jr to an empty room because the kids had left in on, I wanted LED.

In the end, I figured the TV would spend a lot more time tuned to crap rather than high def action movies, so I went with LED.

8

Some plasmas have something very similar to that interpolation stuff on LCDs- but combined with the higher frame rate on plasmas, it gives a very smooth picture indeed.

http://www.presentationtek.com/2010/05/13/600-hz-sub-field-drive-for-plasma-hdtv-explained/

About a year ago, I went with a Panasonic plasma- it blew away the comparable LCD tvs in every way except power consumption, weight and heat. It was about the same price, but had wildly better picture quality, same published longevity, viewing angles, that 600 hz subfield stuff, and looked cool also.

I’m absolutely satisfied with it… and compared to my father & brother’s Sony Bravias, I got the much better deal.

9

Last year I replaced my CRT HD (do they even make those anymore? My god, that thing was heavy!) with an LED LCD (LG brand) and have not regretted it for a second. We have south-facing windows in the living room and glare was always a problem when watching before sunset. From what I understand, plasma would have been even worse than the tube. Not a problem with the LED LCD.

The only time I ever notice the uneven backlighting is when the screen is fully black, e.g. for the 2 seconds after the end of the a commercial break. If there’s actually a picture to be shown, the lighting is not an issue. Plus, there are about 4700 different controls – color, brightness, backlight level, sharpness, motion enhance, so on, so forth – each settable from 1 to 100, so with enough tweaking you can get the picture to look pretty much any way you prefer it to look.

I concede I don’t have much experience with plasma, but I don’t hesitate to recommend LED LCD.

10

Doesn’t plasma have a color fade after a few years (or was that the older models)?

If I were paying alot of money for a TV, I want it to last for years (and yes, I’m still on a JVC 27" CRT that I’ve had for about 13 years).

11

Ditto in every respect. I’ve had the 58" 3D Panasonic Plasma since February and have never once been anything but thrilled with its performance. After callibration, the heat and power consumption were greatly reduced and the blacks are simply stunning. I’ll probably rarely use it for 3D even though the 3D BluRay and glasses came with the package. They put their best electronics in the 3D sets though and that was compelling enough a reason to go that direction. I looked at everything and to me this hands down provided the most realistic picture.

12

A friend of ours got the edge-lit LCD and it was really obvious. He upgraded to the same plasma as us pretty quickly.

13

I have one of each type and they serve different purposes.
The 40" Sony Bravia LCD is in the living room of an open floor plan area. Lots of windows, lights from other rooms, etc. We watch normal things like news, network shows, kids shows, etc. on this set while doing other stuff in the room that requires lighting like eating, reading, etc.
It works great in the respect that it gives a decent picture and I never have to worry about glare or reflections off the screen. However, it doesn’t have the WOW factor.
In the basement family room is the 60" Samsung plasma. Used for HD movie viewing and HD sports. B-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l picture. Deep blacks, smooth motion. However, the nature of this TV to reflect every single light source off the screen no matter how minor bugs me to no end. Therefore the room is very light controlled and any light sources are kept at bay. This set would NEVER work in the upstairs setting.
So in summary I guess I fing the LCD/LED sets to be very utilitarian/functional/practical in everyday use while the plasma sets give the superior performance but not without requiring special considerations/needs.

14

My current (broken) TV is a plasma, with I assume as reflective a screen as they still are these days, and reflectivity on it isn’t a problem for my setup. It faces away from windows, and only has minor reflections during daylight hours, which are of dark objects anyway (coffee table, couch). I almost always watch TV at night with all the lights off. So for me, though it may be a problem in some future home I have, it is not currently an issue that concerns me.

This is an extremely useful thread, thanks everybody, and I believe I am likely to go with the Plasma, probably Samsung. I won’t be buying for a few weeks yet, but I’ll update this thread when I do.

15

Updated:

Bought a Panasonic Plasma, because it has IFC, Intelligent Frame Creation. It does the same interpolation effect as LED LCD, so I get the smooth motion I was after, and can turn it off if I turn out to dislike it.

Now I just have to figure out how to get 5.1 surround sound out of it.

16

DLP is better than all the rest.

17

GuanoLad- just enjoy it. Great buy.

18

I didn’t realize the thread was old, but I was going to suggest a plasma.
I never understood the weight argument. Unless you plan to move it around a lot, IMO, weight shouldn’t play into it. Besides, my 50 inch plasma probably weighs about as much as my 30 inch CRT (and less then my first 50 inch plasma).

Also, WRT to the Soap Opera thing. You can turn that off. I think on a Panasonic it might be called Video Smoothing, but it’s ungodly distracting.

As for 5.1, you’ll probably have to get a receiver to do that.

19

Plasma is a phosphor-based display just like a CRT, so the phosphors will absolutely fade over time. burn-in is still an issue but I think some of that is due to the default brightness level being cranked way up.

20

You couldn’t be more wrong on that. It’s the most impractical, especially in brightly lit rooms, which for some days is 90% of available watching time. In any case, it’s definitely not suited for my home.

I have a receiver, an older one I’ve had for about six years, and I expected the optical cable to work if I strung it from the TV, but apparently not. The TV and BluRay player only produce 5.1 via HDMI, and not via Optical. I have no idea why that should be, it seems like it would work, but there you go. So a new AV receiver with a plentiful array of HDMI ports is required.