I have a 3 year old Samsung SP-S4243 EDTV with HD tuner built in. I fixed the power supply, but it has a real problem with what seems to be called "Posterization" or "False Contouring" compared with a Sony CRT 34HS510 and HD box. From research, I get the impression all older plasmas do it. I will try to get a picture of it, very evident on dark scenes, Jay Leno's new show. I even tried an HD box with it, same exact image as the built in tuner.

Yes, older sets are more susceptible. The degree of banding or false contouring depends on both the signal and the set handling the signal. Obviously if the signal has little to begin with it won't show on the set. But when it is present some older sets can't handle it very well at all. I had an older 50" Toshiba plasma which showed horrible false contouring. However, now I see nothing on my Kuro.

Yup, older plasmas do experience that more significantly. Interestingly, the Sammy plasmas experience this the least of any plasmas now and it's been that way the last year or 2.:cool:

Yup, older plasmas do experience that more significantly. Interestingly, the Sammy plasmas experience this the least of any plasmas now and it's been that way the last year or 2.:cool:

Oh, but of course nothing beats the Samsungs! :cool:

Oh, but of course nothing beats the Samsungs! :cool:

Oh I'm sorry, I forgot. I'll restate what i said and I'm sure there'll be no objections:

Interestingly, the Pioneer Kuro plasmas experience this the least of any plasmas now and it's been that way the last year or 2.:cool:

Oh I'm sorry, I forgot. I'll restate what i said and I'm sure there'll be no objections:

Interestingly, the Pioneer Kuro plasmas experience this the least of any plasmas now and it's been that way the last year or 2.:cool:

Well, then can you show us some proof that the Samsung's show less false contouring than any other set? Otherwise I'll just take it as FUD:)

Oh I'm sorry, I forgot. I'll restate what i said and I'm sure there'll be no objections:

Interestingly, the Pioneer Kuro plasmas experience this the least of any plasmas now and it's been that way the last year or 2.:cool:

I object. I've never seen posterization or clayface on my Pioneer 6070HD and it's pre-Kuro. The video feeds in the Bust Buy/Magnolia is terrible, but just like when I bought my 6070, the Pioneers deal with that terrible signal much better then any other set on display. The Pannys showed clayface then, and they still do today.

I object. I've never seen posterization or clayface on my Pioneer 6070HD and it's pre-Kuro. The video feeds in the Bust Buy/Magnolia is terrible, but just like when I bought my 6070, the Pioneers deal with that terrible signal much better then any other set on display. The Pannys showed clayface then, and they still do today.Odd, i have a 2005, 2007, and 2009 Panasonic plasma and none of them show clayface or posturization. Must be a source problem :)

Well, then can you show us some proof that the Samsung's show less false contouring than any other set? Otherwise I'll just take it as FUD:)

Excerpt from last years UAV review of the Sammy 50A550:

One area in which many plasmas run into trouble is their ability to reproduce smooth gradations in color and brightness. On some plasmas I've reviewed, the underwater shots in the "Shallow Seas" episode of The Blue Planet on Blu-ray are heavily solarized—you see obvious bands of color instead of a smooth gradation as the water lightens and brightens toward the surface. This solarization effect is also obvious in shots of an open blue sky or any time a bright object is shown against a dark background—a rising moon is a perfect example.

I can't really say if Samsung's 18-bit Natural True Color processing gets the credit here, but I can say that the PN50A550 handled all these scenes and more with almost no visible solarization. It's the best performer in this regard I've seen so far.


http://www.ultimateavmag.com/flatpaneldisplays/708sampn50/index3.html

I object. I've never seen posterization or clayface on my Pioneer 6070HD and it's pre-Kuro. The video feeds in the Bust Buy/Magnolia is terrible, but just like when I bought my 6070, the Pioneers deal with that terrible signal much better then any other set on display. The Pannys showed clayface then, and they still do today.

Umm, you may wanna reread what you objected to. Your reaction seems looks defensive.

Excerpt from last years UAV review of the Sammy 50A550:

That excerpt is not proof of your claim at all.

From your quote:

It's the best performer in this regard I've seen so far.

Right off the bat, 2009 displays are excluded. Further, do you know what makes and models that Lawrence E. Ullman had seen and employed the same test on prior to that review?

If so, please share. Otherwise, the excerpt means little other than that particular Samsung does a very admirable job in the area discussed.

I was reading consumer reports reviews and they noticed panny contouring but not samsung. I am still on the fence pan vs sam so I don't have a stake in either. Consumer reports may not be super videophile testing but i tend to believe what they say.
This is one thing I do notice on a lot of sets myself, but I realize a lot of it seems to be low end source material.

I was reading consumer reports reviews and they noticed panny contouring but not samsung. I am still on the fence pan vs sam so I don't have a stake in either. Consumer reports may not be super videophile testing but i tend to believe what they say.
This is one thing I do notice on a lot of sets myself, but I realize a lot of it seems to be low end source material.

What issue of CR and what models did they compare?

That excerpt is not proof of your claim at all.

From your quote:



Right off the bat, 2009 displays are excluded. Further, do you know what makes and models that Lawrence E. Ullman had seen and employed the same test on prior to that review?

If so, please share. Otherwise, the excerpt means little other than that particular Samsung does a very admirable job in the area discussed.

Couldn't have said it better myself :)

I don't know. I use the online service, which they update at a different pace than the magazine.
They said both sets had excellent pictures (b650 v10) but in the panasonics the only downside not was banding.
They put the samsung on top maybe because of that but only by the slightest edge

The newer sets are awesome indeed in comparison to mine. I'd like to hear from owners of old school plasmas. I remember seeing the effects on bright scenes on plasmas in about 2002. I'm trying to decide if I should change out the main board to improve it. I'm going to try to get a photo of what it does tonight.

Odd, i have a 2005, 2007, and 2009 Panasonic plasma and none of them show clayface or posturization. Must be a source problem :)

As I recall, last time I went to the bother of trying to get to the root if it ... the Panasonic fans said it was avoidable by turning down various settings.

As I recall, last time I went to the bother of trying to get to the root if it ... the Panasonic fans said it was avoidable by turning down various settings.Yes, that was on the 2006 PX60U model. Panasonic had done something different than on the PX50U model (which never had the problem) and owners were complaining about clay face with some sources, and in response to those owner complaints they came up with a firmware update that corrected the problem.

Here are some closeup shots of is what it is doing: I notice sunny scenes show much less. My LCD and CRT sets do not show this if I compare. If I go 8 feet away not bad picture:

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c395/FavoriteMystaque/100_0743.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c395/FavoriteMystaque/100_0748.jpg

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c395/FavoriteMystaque/100_0752.jpg

That excerpt is not proof of your claim at all.

From your quote:



Right off the bat, 2009 displays are excluded. Further, do you know what makes and models that Lawrence E. Ullman had seen and employed the same test on prior to that review?

If so, please share. Otherwise, the excerpt means little other than that particular Samsung does a very admirable job in the area discussed.

Well I suspect for some of you, even a professional review saying something positive or superior about Samsung will never be sufficient.
In any event I was asked for proof and provided it. It is by the way, more than the blind faith some of you rely on.:cool:

I specifically chose last years review to support my assertion that Samsung has licked this issue a few years now.

Now, what do you think about what my set is doing (an Old Samsung). I will watch out for visual artifacts on new plasmas when I can buy one, sounds like they still have them.

Well, you have an edtv with electronics that aren't on par with hdtv sets. Add to that it's relatively old. The only thing you can do is upgrade to an HDTV. Even Samsung's 4 series plasmas will be a BIG improvement over your current tv.

Well I suspect for some of you, even a professional review saying something positive or superior about Samsung will never be sufficient.

You desperately need to learn to read. No one is questioning that Samsung does a fine job.

In any event I was asked for proof and provided it.

Wrong.

There is nothing in that article indicating that Samsung is better than all other brands/models in that area as you claim. The reviewer asserted that it's the best that he had seen on any display on which he had run that test. You don't know what other displays he's seen, nevermind those that he tested for the same problem. In looking up prior reviews on that site from the same person, I came up with two: one LCD and a Vizio plasma from several years ago.

I got the TV as a project, solved its power problem for free. I'm thinking that I should replace the mainboard where all the processing occurs, as it is hard to believe picture quality that poor was OK to ship out, but it could be normal from what I've been told here. Picture is the same with DVDs and external DTV tuners. My goal is a good set to give to my sister, who has no TV at all, but may notice this digital stuff. Anybody else have an EDTV in use (Panasonic, Samsung, Philips?) that has the contouring?

Old Samsungs had pretty bad false contouring, though I don't know if it was THAT bad. In any case, I wouldn't spend any money buying parts, it's really not worth it.

I wish I was absorbed in the tech a few years ago, then I would know for sure if this TV of mine needs a board, or "they all do it". The total cost (TV from Craigslist and cost to replace the board myself) is acceptable if it helps, and set has low hours (1900) on it. "Plasma TV repair training 101" for me.

Well, then can you show us some proof that the Samsung's show less false contouring than any other set? Otherwise I'll just take it as FUD:)

I was at Sears one day observing a Samsung B550 right next to a Panny S1 and a LG PS60, all running the exact same demo loop, and the Samsung did in fact show noticeably less false contouring than on the Panasonic and LG models.

The Panasonic did have better motion than the Samsung though. I think Samsung lied with their claims of full 1080 lines of motion resolution because they felt the need to keep up with Panasonic, which was pushing this in their advertising pretty hard.

Just one more reason I avoid purchasing Samsung products if I can help it. I don't like the way they do business.

Nevertheless, the colors and whites were better on the Samsung, along with a sharper pic with more detail (even after I turned the default sharpness setting of 20 back to zero), but the blacks, shadow detail and motion were better on the Panny. So neither the Panny nor the Sammy is superior to the other in all categories. You have to pick which factors are most important to your viewing enjoyment.

So I bought a Pioneer for just a few hundred more, which is just about better than both of them in everything....except....I now see phosphor trails!

Hopefully they will go away in time. If not, I will be looking to get rid of the 500M when something better and bigger comes along.

Odd, i have a 2005, 2007, and 2009 Panasonic plasma and none of them show clayface or posturization. Must be a source problem :)

Well I have a 500M and on occasion I have witnessed posterization or FC or whatever you want to call it. I saw it with the Panasonic, LG, and Samsung on the demo that looped over and over at Sears. But it was noticeably less on the Samsung, which goes to show that not all sets handle it equally.

So essentially I have seen it on all manufacturers from the cheapest to supposedly the best. Yes, oftentimes it is a result of a poor source, and is likely not the fault of the display.

But that's not to say that there aren't tangible differences between the various makes/models.

The only way to really to know for sure (and if I reviewed displays for a living I would certainly take the time to do this) would be to make a demo disc with various known clips that have shown false contouring, and then line up a bunch of displays and feed them the identical signal and see which handle it the best.

As I said, there was a clear difference in Sears with the Sammy/Panny/LG all lined up running the exact same feed. Since it was a short demo loop and I knew where to look for it, I waited around a few cycles so I could be sure that my eyes were not playing tricks on me.

In this particular instance the Sammy handled it the best, with minor FC compared to the other two brands, where it was much more prominent.

I had a 2007 Hitachi 55" plasma that showed exactly what the pictures above do on every dark scene I saw on it. DVD, HD cable although Blu-Ray looked slightly better. I finally traded it back to the dealer for the Panasonic HT-50PZ850U and WOW! What a difference! I have not seen any problems since. That Hitachi set drove me nuts for about 7 months. I never watched a single movie without pausing it to try to adjust out the false contouring, (which was futile). Katzman

Docu.....couldn't where they lie in the feed chain have something to do with the signal as well?
For instance, my BB runs crappy component cables for LONG stretches to many displays and almost alwyas the ones towards the end of the line have more negative effects shown.
I had assumed it was because of how far they were stretching the run?

Also, I saw phosphor trails minimally on my two Kuro's(8&9g), also on an 08 Panny I owned shortly....but none on an 09 Panny nor 09 Sammy. Can't remember how the 08 Sammy was.

Also, I have read that it is next to impossible for the naked eye to perceive the difference between ~900/950 and 1080, is this incorrect?

Docu.....couldn't where they lie in the feed chain have something to do with the signal as well?
For instance, my BB runs crappy component cables for LONG stretches to many displays and almost alwyas the ones towards the end of the line have more negative effects shown.
I had assumed it was because of how far they were stretching the run?

Also, I saw phosphor trails minimally on my two Kuro's(8&9g), also on an 08 Panny I owned shortly....but none on an 09 Panny nor 09 Sammy. Can't remember how the 08 Sammy was.

Also, I have read that it is next to impossible for the naked eye to perceive the difference between ~900/950 and 1080, is this incorrect?

I've worked in a Sears electronics dept for about 3 years. When I started we had a godawful patchwork of component video cables all running off a DishNetwork box. This was replaced a few months later by a Sencore box which outputs ntsc channel 3 at 480i and ATSC channel 14.1 at 1080i, distributed via coax and tuned by the sets' own analog/digital tuners.

In some locations in the dept. the signal strength is so low the ntsc feed is pretty unwatchable but the digital feed is fine. I use this to demonstrate the "cliff effect" inherent in digital broadcast vs analog broadcast.

My point is that if you're comparing in a Sears store just grab the remote and see if the demo loop is on a broadcast channel or a component input--if it's a larger Sears-owned store vs one of the franchise branches it should be fed via coax and running on a broadcast channel. Alternatively look behind the sets and see if they've got coax going to the RF input or component.

Our loop still has a lot of upconverted stuff and (imho) too many video game screenshots in between the live action HD film clips. I have customers who breifly look at the current Beatles Rock Band game demo and think it really looks horrible.

From what I've seen the Samsung plasma has better blacks than the Panny in our very brightly lit showroom (not applicable to the average home environment). The Panny Plasmas we had 2 or 3 years ago did have clayface, especially if any of the "noise reduction" features were turned on.

Pannys also come out of the box with the sharpness too high-contributing to a grainy look that is not as smooth as the out-of-box look of the Samsungs.

In our experience we get more returns of Samsung plasmas than of Pannys, but more LG returns than Sammy or Panny put together. Kinda off topic but the most-returned set right now is the 55 inch Samsung 8000 series LED/LCD.