My 50PX50U was delivered on May 12 so I still got some time to decide on a return. I'm surprised no one has yet contacted Panasonic.....I was waiting for one of you all to do the dirty work. :) But I'll call 'em up tomorrow and see what they have to say for themselves. Specifically, what adjustment options are available via service mode and whether one of their authorized service dudes would be willing to come over and make adjustments. I'll let you know what I find out. I very much would *not* like to return the TV....I think the detail and imaging is wonderful but green is rearing its ugly head and this forum is searing it into my perception. I'm leary that going to an earlier generation plasma will be dissappointing given what I've seen from the new Pannys.

For those who are familiar with "Howards", the PX500U was in their paper this morning. I went down to look at it but they did not have them. They do have 30 on order but did not know what date they were coming in.

So things are happening.:)

Dave

That's GREAT news! I was hoping to at least be able to compare the 5050 Pioneer to the PX500 in person before I made a decision. I really do hope that these wacked out color reports are isolated incidents. If it's just the electronics on the 50U's and not the G8 glass, that's good.

that's the best news I've heard i a long time! :D

My current settings are: Picture +10, brightness +8, color -2, tint -4, sharpness +15.

FWIW, I watched Sponge Bob today on my old RCA 27" tube (DVE-calibrated, with what seems to me a pretty good picture, considering) and he looked much like the first picture posted by thegamer36 above: yellow front and back, but definitely green sides.

I don't think he's the best example for proper colour decoding.

Good news... Homer appears to be his normal shade of yellow when broadcast in 720p...

http://home.nycap.rr.com/nessus/DSC01033.JPG

For those who are familiar with "Howards", the PX500U was in their paper this morning. I went down to look at it but they did not have them. They do have 30 on order but did not know what date they were coming in.

So things are happening.:)

Dave

Thank you Dave for both your leg-work and posting the outcome.

I wonder if my set is too dark? I need to set my contrast/picture to +20 or higher to have the image seem bright. It never seems as bright as a CRT in the other other room, but maybe plasma never is? If I turn my picture contrast setting to +10 it would be somewhat dim. A setting of 0 is very dim and below unusuable. For that matter, setting the default to Cinema, which I don't, results in a very dark washed out picture. Only in Vivid with the settings turned down does it appear bright enought. Maybe I am fixated on the wrong thing. I went to BB to look at other plasmas and they all seemed dimmer than CRTs, too, so maybe I am just focusing on someting not happening. Should a plasma appear as "bright" as a small CRT?

You are experiencing exactly what a lot of people have when trying to view a properly adjusted TV. 10 years ago I had my first Big Screen calibrated and initially hated it. However, I made myself watch it for a month straight without ever comparing it to the factory "torch settings" that I'd grown accustomed to. At the end of the month I flipped it onto the factory default setting, and could not believe how crappy it looked. Trust me, if you will invest in Avia, Digital Video Essentials or have a pro calibrate you plasma and watch it with the proper settings for a while you will not be sorry. There is nothing more degrading to picture quality than having the contrast and sharpness cranked up to high. Once you get used to a properly calibrated set, you will never be able to watch a set on the vivid setting again.

Scott

I was fooling around with different settings last night and may need some help from some of you experts out there. Of course we all hate sponge bob now, but I put him on my dvd player over component input to the PX50U. I posted my settings above in a previous post.

When I try to get Sponge Bob to look more yellow, I bring down the tint to about -15 to -20. Sponge Bob gets a nice yellow color with the tint pushed down. But that pushes up some of the red. I can play with the color a bit to reduce the red, but cannot get it to an acceptable level. What else can I do to reduce some red?

Thanks for the help.

Spongebob has a green tint on all 4 of my TVs in the house so i don't think he's a good example for setting yellows. He's just a little greener on my 42PX.

Find a commercial with a close-up of some buttered corn on the cob - this is what i used to adjust almost all of the green push out of my display (i captured it on my cable DVR). I've also used hot-rod shows and races on Speed channel to find true yellows.

First time so go easy, but I could really use the help. I just bought a TH-50PHD7UY and love it. It is connected to comcast HD cable. First plasma...Two questions.

1) when viewing an image from close range (under 3ft) with a lot of black in it, I notice tiny color pixels almost like static from the reception, but it is not. I think it is just the plasma gas and that that is normal operation, but can someone confirm it for me?

2) I know it is preference, but what is the optimal configuration for the set (tint, brigthenss, etc.)

Thanks for the help.

The PX50's do not have a PC input, but can I connect my Powerbook DVI output to the HDMI input (with appropriate adapter cable)? Has anyone tried this?

To determine if the green push issue only effects SD, someone should post screenshots of Simpsons on HD and SD.

To determine if the green push issue only effects SD, someone should post screenshots of Simpsons on HD and SD.This is Homer broadcast in 720p... what do you think?

http://home.nycap.rr.com/nessus/DSC01033.JPG

First time so go easy, but I could really use the help. I just bought a TH-50PHD7UY and love it. It is connected to comcast HD cable. First plasma...Two questions.

1) when viewing an image from close range (under 3ft) with a lot of black in it, I notice tiny color pixels almost like static from the reception, but it is not. I think it is just the plasma gas and that that is normal operation, but can someone confirm it for me?

2) I know it is preference, but what is the optimal configuration for the set (tint, brigthenss, etc.)

Thanks for the help.

Set your plasma on 4:3 with black bars. If you see as you say static in the black bars, turn down contrast and or brightness, it will go away.

[QUOTE=optivity]This is Homer broadcast in 720p... what do you think?

Looks great to my eyes in 720p. A shot of a 480i broadcast would be interesting for comparision. Both shots should use the same settings to determine if there's an issue with only the SD color matrix.

First time so go easy, but I could really use the help. I just bought a TH-50PHD7UY and love it......

Actually this is the wrong thread for you. Your 50HD7UY is completely different than the PD/PX units being discussed in this thread (different glass, different electronics, different menus, different features, different adjustability, different housing, etc).

Search this forum for HD7UY topics - there are plenty of em :)

My 50PX50U was delivered on May 12 so I still got some time to decide on a return. I'm surprised no one has yet contacted Panasonic.....I was waiting for one of you all to do the dirty work. :) But I'll call 'em up tomorrow and see what they have to say for themselves. Specifically, what adjustment options are available via service mode and whether one of their authorized service dudes would be willing to come over and make adjustments. I'll let you know what I find out.

Called up Panny and they referred me to a local authorized repair shop....got an appointment for mid-day Wednesday. The guy that I spoke to said he wasn't familiar with service codes but there may be something internal that could be adjusted. Anyway, Spongebob is on a good part of the day on one of the Nik channels but just in case I think I rent out a DVD. Problem in showing this problem is that it is not immediately noticeable so I need to display something obvious. If there is not an adjustment he said they may have to order some replaceable part. I'm not sure I'll allow that if they take my TV and I end up with the same problem weeks later (which I think will happen). I'll keep you all updated. If anyone knows anything about panny service codes that might apply please PM me.

DAN P I had the green push on my pd50. I called and emailed Panny. We had some phone discussions and they replaced my set within about a week. I had to set my tint at -16 to get a decent color. In replacing I mean they sent out a Service Rep. with a new pd50 in hand. Panny was great to me. I see all these complaints about the green issue but no reference about talking to PANNY.

DAN P I had the green push on my pd50. I called and emailed Panny. We had some phone discussions and they replaced my set within about a week. I had to set my tint at -16 to get a decent color. In replacing I mean they sent out a Service Rep. with a new pd50 in hand. Panny was great to me. I see all these complaints about the green issue but no reference about talking to PANNY.

That's great....things worked out for you well. In my case, I don't need to get the tint that low. Looks like your old TV was really fooked. Actually I believe there are much worse examples of push than what I have. My fear is that if I order a new TV, it can be worse than what I have now. You seemed to have a good experience with Panny customer service. The person I talked too seemed disinterested. In any case, someone will take a look at it and Panny is paying for the service call. And Spongebob is the only example I can think of. All the other stuff that is yellow for the most part comes out yellow. It is just those transitional yellow-greens that tend toward green.

Has any one tried a regular color bar test pattern like from an AVIA or DVE DVD? That has a true yellow on it.

Has anyone found in the service menu a way to tweak each input discretely?

I was surfing around the net and saw these guys saying they had the PX500U in stock. So I called them and they confirmed that they were in stock.

shopsunshine

I live in western NY, I would have to pay taxes and shipping, so i am not sure I would buy from them.


[Retail Links Are Not Allowed]

i don't buy it, no way! Really?

The PX50's do not have a PC input, but can I connect my Powerbook DVI output to the HDMI input (with appropriate adapter cable)? Has anyone tried this?

The manual suggests that the HDMI input is not for PC input (probably DVI-D vs DVI-I). I haven't read of anyone actually trying it yet though so I don't believe it is confirmed to NOT work. What I have is an ATI DVI->Component dongle that I attach to my laptop and input the signal via that. I also connect the SPDIF output direct into my amp. WMVHD samples look amazing although I haven't found a resolution that perfectly matches the screen res. I prefer a little overscan to avoid any black bars. If 0 is the quality of SVID input and 100 is the quality of DVI input (which I had with my Dell W4200HD before returning it) the Component input is about 80. I'm let to believe that the ATI dongle has a good chance of working with most DVI outputs not just that from ATI vid cards.

it's gotta be a jp version or something! has to be! can anyone else confirm? I thought they hadn't released yet? my panny contact said they weren't releasing until mid month!!

I went into the service menu today, (thanks, BruZZi) to see what I could find out there about the greenies. My investigation was very limited, but I did find a 'tint' control in the picture adjust submenu. It's on an alphanumeric index, and was set at 05, almost all the way to the left. So it would go only five additional clicks to the left. I changed the setting to 00, and that helped remove green tinge from yellows. I seems to me that it did so without affecting other colors as much as changing tint on the regular picture adjust does, but I haven't done a whole lot of watching since I made the change, and without actual measurements, I can't say that it's not just my imagination working. I haven't even checked it yet against SRS. (Spongebob Reference Standard) At any rate, it allows me to set my regular tint adjustment back to its center position and thus satisfies my anal need for symmetry.

The tint adjustment seems to be set on a color wheel, and while I did play with the settings quite far to the right, I stopped after the colors on the screen became really psychedelic. (You give away your age if you remember when this term was used.) I'm guessing that if I had kept going to the right, the colors would eventually come around and approach normal from the red side, rather than from the green. Why did Panasonic set the correct color center at the far end of the adjustment the range?

There must be some way of adjusting individual color gain so we could try dropping the green intensity without affecting red and blue too much. Anybody have any ideas? Also, I did not notice an obvious place to adjust the picture for overscan, but there must be a place for that also. Any ideas?

I'm pretty new here, but did you guys shut-off the "Color Management" feature?

Apparantley, from what I've been hearing around here, it's on by default out of the factory, and shutting it off supposedly solves any Green Push issues.

Just a thought....

The manual suggests that the HDMI input is not for PC input (probably DVI-D vs DVI-I). I haven't read of anyone actually trying it yet though so I don't believe it is confirmed to NOT work. What I have is an ATI DVI->Component dongle that I attach to my laptop and input the signal via that. I also connect the SPDIF output direct into my amp. WMVHD samples look amazing although I haven't found a resolution that perfectly matches the screen res. I prefer a little overscan to avoid any black bars. If 0 is the quality of SVID input and 100 is the quality of DVI input (which I had with my Dell W4200HD before returning it) the Component input is about 80. I'm let to believe that the ATI dongle has a good chance of working with most DVI outputs not just that from ATI vid cards.

Too bad. I would think DVI with 1:1 mapping would be the best. Powerbooks use nVidia which, unfortunately, is not compatible with your ATI dongle. I have found, however, a VGA to component transcoder box for about $100, but like you say quality may suffer.

http://www.digitalconnection.com/products/video/9a60.asp (http://)

Once I get my 50px50u, might try it. Thanks.

I was surfing around the net and saw these guys saying they had the PX500U in stock. So I called them and they confirmed that they were in stock…
VENDOR NAME… I live in western NY, I would have to pay taxes and shipping, so i am not sure I would buy from them.

Granted, 500s are expected any day now. But some nextag, epinions, and streetprices vendors have indicated 500s in stock for a while!!! [Da, the only way to make a sale is to take an order.] However, as of 6:00 pm today, more reliable vendor websites I checked indicated NOT-in-stock (only PREORDERS are being accepted).

I have no specific knowledge if the vendor you indicated has them in stock. But, to my knowledge, there hasn’t been so much as a photo of the outside carton of a US PX500 posted. Certainly, there have not been any info of a PX500 delivered to an AVS sponsor or US board members posted to my knowledge. But, any day now that could change.

Spongebob has a green tint on all 4 of my TVs in the house so i don't think he's a good example for setting yellows. He's just a little greener on my 42PX.


Well, I've just watched Spongie for the last 30 minutes and he looks very very yellow. This last weekend he looked anything but yellow (read: green). Which makes me think either his color varies from episode to episode (or perhaps season to season....there is no telling when these episodes were produced) or I have very obviously gone mad. The horror. :eek: So I agree Spongie should be used with caution.

I was surfing around the net and saw these guys saying they had the PX500U in stock. So I called them and they confirmed that they were in stock.

shopsunshine

I live in western NY, I would have to pay taxes and shipping, so i am not sure I would buy from them.


[Retail Links Are Not Allowed]

Terrible ratings on resellerratings.com. I seriously doubt they have it in stock when no other retailer does. They appear to be another of these low-ball price New York outfits that won't sen the set unless you buy an extended warranty and overpriced cables. Remember, caveat emptor.

Darren

Has any one tried a regular color bar test pattern like from an AVIA or DVE DVD? That has a true yellow on it.

Yes, I set my PD50u using DVE. Colors are perfect on the DVD test disc. Never new anything about this green push issue until i read this thread about Spongebob. I've decided who cares. I never watch cartoons anyway. What bothers me more than the green issue is the macro blocking i see in dark scenes. If this was my primary TV, and not a spare for a bedroom, I would certainly return it, but what the hell the thing was free anyway.

Apparantly there are not a lot of people using AVIA or DVE though because I see a lot of people have there picture setting on +20. There is no way anyone should ever have the contrast set that high, especially on a tv prone to burn in.

Scott

I went into the service menu today, (thanks, BruZZi) to see what I could find out there about the greenies. My investigation was very limited, but I did find a 'tint' control in the picture adjust submenu. It's on an alphanumeric index, and was set at 05, almost all the way to the left. So it would go only five additional clicks to the left. I changed the setting to 00, and that helped remove green tinge from yellows. I seems to me that it did so without affecting other colors as much as changing tint on the regular picture adjust does, but I haven't done a whole lot of watching since I made the change, and without actual measurements, I can't say that it's not just my imagination working. I haven't even checked it yet against SRS. (Spongebob Reference Standard) At any rate, it allows me to set my regular tint adjustment back to its center position and thus satisfies my anal need for symmetry.

If your adjustment turns out to eliminate the "green push" in your set, would you be willing to write the procedures down in an "PX50U Adjustment for Dummies" type style? My Feng Shui consultant tells me I also have an anal need for symmetry. :D

A word of caution to anyone messin' with the service menu. You can easily screw up your nice new plasma by messing with the menu. Be very careful, and at the very least write down all the initial settings, so when you screw it up you have a reference to go back to. Personally, I'd stay away from the service menu, and leave it to the pros who get paid to know how to tweak a display.

Scott

I have been scrutinizing the PX50 (and reading this forum) prior to making a purchase, and have run across an unusual anomaly with this display in 2 different stores. At one vendor, with a selection of plasmas (LG, Pioneer) being fed by the same signal, when the satellite program grid came up the PX50 exhibited uneveness in the vertical lines of the grid. All other displays had perfectly crisp and even vertical lines. At a different outlet, there were 3 different Pannys on a wall with various other Sony, Pioneer, etc. plasmas, all fed the same signal, and when the program grid came up all three Pannys exhibited the same scalloped vertical lines while all the other brands were perfect. So a 50PX50, 42PX50 and a 42PD50 all had this flaw visible while all of the other brands were fine.
Has anyone run across this artifact with the new Panasonics?

I was playing around and thought I'd check the spongebob color on my DLP projector also calibrated with DVE. Here is the pic. Sorry for the blurry pic as my hands are not that steady.

http://img128.echo.cx/img128/4851/misc0590aj.th.jpg (http://img128.echo.cx/my.php?image=misc0590aj.jpg)

Scott

fastpoke:

Hmm... the dark side of sub-pixel control??

man you guys watch a lot of sponge bob! :D

Can we see some pics of some HDtv/movies and not some yellowish/green underwater cartoon character! As you can all see, NICK makes him a bit green anyway! Let see a movie or a game or something!

Just for you.

http://img55.echo.cx/img55/6088/misc0549fh.th.jpg (http://img55.echo.cx/my.php?image=misc0549fh.jpg)

Scott

Well, I've just watched Spongie for the last 30 minutes and he looks very very yellow....much more so than the image Scott posted on the previous page. This last weekend he looked anything but yellow (read: green). Which makes me think either his color varies from episode to episode (or perhaps season to season....there is no telling when these episodes were produced) or I have very obviously gone mad. The horror. :eek: So I agree Spongie should be used with caution.

Checked out a SpongeBob DVD from Blockbuster, with the intent of showing a green Spongie to my service tech who is scheduled to come on Wednesday, and he is quite yellow. So now I'm inclined to cancel this appointment since I cannot reliably show him green push. Watching the Mich/UCLA women's college world series tonite I detected a small amount of green in the softball and certain uniform colors but it is very slight. I have not scrutinized other colors and I would suspect there to be some other variations with a CRT I have in the house.

LOL, thanks! Looks like a great picture aside from that screen door effect? What's with that?

The Simpsons (SD signal) on my PD50U shows some weird green fringes
on Marge's (is that her name?) eyes (bottom) and green fringes on Lisa's
pinkie. Sort of weird - but no big deal.
Generally, I enjoy my DVD programs so much that I don't nitpick the PQ.

LOL, thanks! Looks like a great picture aside from that screen door effect? What's with that?

Not really sure. I was wondering the same thing. The actual image from the plasma didn't show it only the photograph does.

Scott

On page 56 of this thread you will find BruZZi's step-by-step for getting into and out of the service menu. Once in the service menu, I went into the PICTURE ADJUST submenu by tapping the #1 on the remote keypad. Then I used #3 to advance the PICTURE ADJUST submenu to the tint adjustment. When you get there, just note what the index number is so you can return to your original setting if you want to. Use Volume + to raise the index number, turning the pic greener, and Volume - to lower the index number, which tunes out the green. As I mentioned before, my set was already indexed at 05, so I could only reduce the number by five steps.

I think you achieve a somewhat different result from what you get by just changing the index number on the main picture adjustment. Before, I could get rid of the green on the main adjustment all right, but I was unhappy with the other colors then. Faces looked flushed and feverish for example. Now, my green seems pretty much gone, and I believe the other colors are less affected. Faces look natural. I spent a good deal of time tonight critically looking at the picture, and I think I'm finally happy. Spongebob was on Nik at 11:00. He now looks pretty much an O-Cello yellow.

Going into the service menu can be a scary thing the first time you do it, and there is a lot of stuff in there that you can really mess up. But this is a pretty simple adjustment. If you don't go wild you shouldn't have any trouble. Good luck!

Again, does anyone have any suggestion of where to go in the service menu to actually change the color gain one color at a time, or where to go to change horizontal and vertical position and size? I'd love to get rid of any overscan.

Thanks. JK

By the way, you can change the settings for only one input at a time. If you change the settings for the NTSC tuner, say, the settings for the HD tuner, DBS, or whatever, won't be affected. Cheers. JK

Great work, jacx. I spoke to a Panny service tech today and he was clueless about service mode. It's kind of ridiculous that an owner can research their way into this mode but the pros have no idea. I'm kind of leary about messing with this myself.....it would be nice to know some sort of command to set everything back to factory default if you really mess something up.

By the way, you can change the settings for only one input at a time. If you change the settings for the NTSC tuner, say, the settings for the HD tuner, DBS, or whatever, won't be affected. Cheers. JK

Can anyone else confirm this? I asked this question before if the service menu could be used to effective adjust per input settings - and the response I received was no.

JCPZero

LOL, thanks! Looks like a great picture aside from that screen door effect? What's with that?
I've read that this may be kind of a moire interference pattern between the pixel grid of the panel and that of the camera. One suggestion I've seen is to take the picture in portrait (camera on its side) and from further back, zoomed.

Rich H and some others have posted suggestions in the past for getting good screen shots of plasmas; try a search. If you've seen Rich's outstanding gallery you'll know what's possible.

Good luck... Perry.

Interesting: in Japanese market there appears to also be a PX300 model, very simialr to PX500 in looks, but slightly different. Also, looks like the PX500 in Japanese market has a 10/100 Base-T port on it. I am wondering if it has some built in Satellite recpeption capability for Japan that requires this.

For what it's worth...

I stopped by a B&M today, and they expected to have the PX500U in their warehouse the 17th, in stores the 20th. Price was about $700 more than they were selling the PX50U for. While they were more than happy to take preorders, they did not know the specs "since Panasonic doesn't have them listed on their web page".

Sorry if this is a bit vague, but I am new and trying to abide by the forum rules. Hope it helps anyway.

On page 56 of this thread you will find BruZZi's step-by-step for getting into and out of the service menu. Once in the service menu, I went into the PICTURE ADJUST submenu by tapping the #1 on the remote keypad. Then I used #3 to advance the PICTURE ADJUST submenu to the tint adjustment. When you get there, just note what the index number is so you can return to your original setting if you want to. Use Volume + to raise the index number, turning the pic greener, and Volume - to lower the index number, which tunes out the green. As I mentioned before, my set was already indexed at 05, so I could only reduce the number by five steps.

I think you achieve a somewhat different result from what you get by just changing the index number on the main picture adjustment. Before, I could get rid of the green on the main adjustment all right, but I was unhappy with the other colors then. Faces looked flushed and feverish for example. Now, my green seems pretty much gone, and I believe the other colors are less affected. Faces look natural. I spent a good deal of time tonight critically looking at the picture, and I think I'm finally happy. Spongebob was on Nik at 11:00. He now looks pretty much an O-Cello yellow.

Thanks jacx.

I couldn't stand it any longer and found the post with the procedure you outlined above. Mine was set at 05 and I changed it to 00 and centered the tint in the regular consumer menu. Watched some HD programs and decided it was too much red-blue. Went back and changed it to 02 and I think it's pretty close to my liking now.

I agree that the service menu adjustment is better than the regular consumer menu, i.e., it doesn't affect the other colors as much. I'll do some more critical viewing to see if my opinion remains favorable. :cool:

Interesting: in Japanese market there appears to also be a PX300 model, very simialr to PX500 in looks, but slightly different. Also, looks like the PX500 in Japanese market has a 10/100 Base-T port on it. I am wondering if it has some built in Satellite recpeption capability for Japan that requires this.

The px300 is the previous model that was replaced by px500 in May. It was introduced last summer, and I believe it had the same G7 panel that the professional models have in the US.

The 10/100 Base-T port provides the network connection for the built-in browser (t-navi feature).

Thanks jacx.

I couldn't stand it any longer and found the post with the procedure you outlined above. Mine was set at 05 and I changed it to 00 and centered the tint in the regular consumer menu. Watched some HD programs and decided it was too much red-blue. Went back and changed it to 02 and I think it's pretty close to my liking now.

I agree that the service menu adjustment is better than the regular consumer menu, i.e., it doesn't affect the other colors as much. I'll do some more critical viewing to see if my opinion remains favorable. :cool:

Has either one of you gone back and calibrated the set with DVE or Avia after making the service menu changes? I would be curious to see if that threw the original calibration off.

Darren

thehan: thanks.

Counting down the days on my PX500, estimated arrival is Friday.

Foos-Man, where did you order your PX500 from?

Ditto!

Just got off the phone with TVA. Disappointed to hear they will not be carrying the PX500 'as its part of their Onyx line.' I was hoping to purchase from them as soon as it was out.

The 10/100 Base-T port provides the network connection for the built-in browser (t-navi feature).
Now that's a cool feature. I'd like to see that on our models.

Now that's a cool feature. I'd like to see that on our models.

I'd like to see wireless internet support instead. Actually, I'd like to see wireless connections between components but so far only JVC has dabbled in this to my knowledge.

thehan: thanks.
Counting down the days on my PX500, estimated arrival is Friday.

Congrats Foos-man! Can you confirm that you got a delivery service reference tracking number and it is really for real being delivered this Friday? Or are you being strung along with hopeful statements about what may not ship to customers until next week?

$700 more for the PX500U seems a bit steep considering it only adds a PC port, you can still hook up a PC to the 50U, and TV Guide, which can also be replaced with numerous other options on the PX50U. Is $700 more for the 42" or 50"?

but it's not just the PC input. it's also the cable card slot, photoviewer, better sound system, PCMCIA slot, and the EPG.

And if you're telling me I can get rid of a cable box from an already cluttered and crowded system and eliminate some wires, it's almost worth it on that alone! Besides, I'm paying a dumb rental fee on this darn thing anyway! I also think it looks a ton better too, but that's just me. IMHO, it's honestly a no brainer. I just hope they correct that green push issue everyone's talkin' about!

but it's not just the PC input. it's also the cable card slot, photoviewer, better sound system, PCMCIA slot, and the EPG.

And if you're telling me I can get rid of a cable box from an already cluttered and crowded system and eliminate some wires, it's almost worth it on that alone! Besides, I'm paying a dumb rental fee on this darn thing anyway! I also think it looks a ton better too, but that's just me. IMHO, it's honestly a no brainer. I just hope they correct that green push issue everyone's talkin' about!

I agree with your logic on the CableCard slot, but not with your need to spend $700 extra to get it...the PX50U also has the slot.

It would be worth it IF THE US PX500 ALSO HAS:
• the ability to stretch HD, and
• some form of PIP (eg. split display).

It would be worth it IF THE US PX500 ALSO HAS:
• the ability to stretch HD, and
• some form of PIP (eg. split display).


oh right, it's supposed to have the split screen display too! Totally forgot about that one! Thanks HDidiot! Here's what they're saying:
"The PX500 series offers a few special feature that the PX50 series doesn't have. First off, you get the convenience of SD/PC card slots. These slots make it easy to view photos taken with your SD Memory Card-compatible digital camera. You don't even have to connect a cable. There's also TV Guide. This built-in program guide provides a handy on-screen list for checking what's on the tube. It also makes it easy to set up the recording of a broadcast on your DVD recorder or VCR. A PC Input lets you connect your computer and view images on your plasma panel. Another handy feature is the Multi Window function, allowing you to watch two programs on the same screen. The sound system is also different, and you can read more about that below. Incredibly slim and elegant, you'd never guess that the TH50PX500 includes an integrated speaker system. But just wait until you turn it on and crank it up. The TH50PX500's Smart Sound Speaker System uses four slim speaker units and two woofers for terrific sound. Placing the slim speakers beside the screen achieves an acoustic imaging not possible with below-screen speakers. With an improved aperture design, the twin woofers reproduce crisp and clear bass sounds. This inconspicuous speaker system delivers high-quality sound with clear definition and natural presence, with crisp, clear dialogue that seems to come from the center of the screen."

And about the cable card slot, is there any real point in utilizing it if you still have to use your box for your TV Guide?

But again, these are all additional features that are important to ME and might not be for everyone! So TO ME, it's worth it for a 50" PDP right around 4k!

For what it is worth, the Japanese model has the following features:

- split display plus double tuners, so you can watch 2 HD programs side by side
- HD stretch, but it needs to be enabled manually.
- EPG
- limited internet browser (supports pictures, some javascript, css, but not video, flash)
- SD card slot
- "technical" menu in user mode which allows setting individual color gain, etc.

It does not have a PCMCIA slot.

Also, it may well be that the US model may have a completely different feature set.

All that said, I hardly use any of those extra features and mainly just watch TV / movies. The HD stretch is sometimes useful as it also supports the overlay of gray sidebars. However, I definitely would not pay an extra $700 for those. There is no px50 in Japan, and online the px500 can be had pretty much for what the px50 goes for in the US.

$700 more for the PX500U seems a bit steep considering it only adds a PC port, you can still hook up a PC to the 50U, and TV Guide, which can also be replaced with numerous other options on the PX50U. Is $700 more for the 42" or 50"?

What are the other options that substitute for the TV Guide on the PX50U? I'd like to gain that advantage without spending the several hundred dollar premium on the 500U.

For what it is worth, the Japanese model has the following features:

- split display plus double tuners, so you can watch 2 HD programs side by side


don't know if i'd ever use this, but sounds kick butt!:D but yeah i definitely hear you, if they're not important to you, why don't drop the extra money!? but i'm certainly looking forward to getting rid of my cable box to make some extra space and hopefully hooking it up to my PC! i'm also on the fence about my audio, so a nice built in system along with the other features i plan to utilize, makes it all worth it to me!

Well, I am willing to spend the extra $700 just for the looks of the PX500 and I'm not kidding.

So what do you guys think of that?:)

Dave

For what it is worth, the Japanese model has the following features:
…

Thanks for reminding us thehan about what PX500 features we just don’t know about. We don’t know about them because, to my knowledge, the soon to be delivered PX500 has not yet been delivered to customers in the US. If it had been, there would have been so many flame postings to this thread.

The HD stretch is sometimes useful as it also supports the overlay of gray sidebars. …

Sometimes useful is way way understating it. Panny has too long delayed implementing HD stretch on all consumer models. Some [but not original aspect purist] believe a TV alone that can’t hide bars should just be thrown out.

Well, I am willing to spend the extra $700 just for the looks of the PX500 and I'm not kidding.

So what do you guys think of that?:)

Dave

LOL, i was trying to be subtle, but now that it's out there, i'm definitely with ya on that one! :D are you just tryin' to egg me on?

I just made the purchase of the 42PD50U and gladly no sign of green push. Can someone suggest the best settings for the video.
Thanks

mscappa,

No egg'n you on. I will be checking this one out when it hits the stores and if it meets my needs I will purchase it.

I do like the styling of the PX500 (and thats just a personal thing), I just need to see it in person to confirm it.

Dave

What are the other options that substitute for the TV Guide on the PX50U? I'd like to gain that advantage without spending the several hundred dollar premium on the 500U.

http://www.titantv.com

Well, I am willing to spend the extra $700 just for the looks of the PX500 and I'm not kidding. So what do you guys think of that?:)
Dave

I don’t care what it cost, its worth it just for the looks I mistakenly thought that about my last girlfriend. Hopefully, that type of plasma thinking is neither flawed nor OT.

I don’t care what it cost, its worth it just for the looks I mistakenly thought that about my last girlfriend. Hopefully, that type of plasma thinking is neither flawed nor OT.

your "girlfriend" huh?:p

speakin' of looks, check out these recent sexy shots of the px500 line!
http://www.hdtvexpert.com/pages/pan_tv_line.htm

http://www.titantv.com

That's a pretty great resource! local cable providers have the same type of thing, but that certainly takes it to the next level!

too bad you can't hook up your PC, 'cause then you'd be all set! :D

That's a pretty great resource! local cable providers have the same type of thing, but that certainly takes it to the next level!

too bad you can't hook up your PC, 'cause then you'd be all set! :D

If you have a graphics card with DVI you can hook it up to the HDMI port on the TV using a HDMI/DVI cable. Your HDMI port becomes free if you use the cable card. Depending on your graphics card you can do some tweaking which would be covered in the HTPC forum.

I don’t care what it cost, its worth it just for the looks I mistakenly thought that about my last girlfriend. Hopefully, that type of plasma thinking is neither flawed nor OT.

What is it about the px500 that *looks* all that different than the px50? I have the px50 and I can answer, 'not much.' :confused:

If you have a graphics card with DVI you can hook it up to the HDMI port on the TV using a HDMI/DVI cable. Your HDMI port becomes free if you use the cable card. Depending on your graphics card you can do some tweaking which would be covered in the HTPC forum.

oh brother......you're right, don't think i'd mind switching inputs to view my tv guide via my computer(HDMI), not to mention not being able to navigate the tv guide with a remote! sure, fine it's POSSIBLE, but c'mon! :rolleyes:

I can just see myself now, "shoot, was the game on 674 or 647 or was it 467? no problemo, let me just boot up the ol' PC here...." :D

What is it about the px500 that *looks* all that different than the px50? I have the px50 and I can answer, 'not much.' :confused:

Looks the same to moi:
http://search.vanns.com/?q=panasonic+42px500u&submit.x=23&submit.y=22

What is it about the px500 that *looks* all that different than the px50? I have the px50 and I can answer, 'not much.' :confused:

cheriDave, see what you started!? ;)

IMHO, the slight recessed glass gives it a much more elegant and refined look, the rounded side speakers, slick lines that frame the glass nicely, the black bevel trim dresses it up, and over all, just has less of the plastic look! reminds me much more of the onyx line! You don’t see it? I don't own either so i'm unbiased, but have seen the px50 at BB! :) NOW, am eagerly awaiting to see the 500 in person as well!

What is it about the px500 that *looks* all that different than the px50? I have the px50 and I can answer, 'not much.' :confused:

Aside from the obvious black-over-silver combination, it looks completely different to me:

500U
http://www.vanns.com/shop/servlet/image/item/11488/image.gif

50U
http://www2.panasonic.com/static//LargerPhoto/TH-42PX50U_L_Angle_Rev.jpg

great shots:
http://www.panasonic.co.uk/plasma-tv/th37pe50cab/th37pe50.pdf
in person:
http://www.hdtvexpert.com/pages/pan_tv_line.htm
or the first page of this thread show them side by side:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=505878

beauty's in the eye of the beholder!

I was in a local B&M shop last week and bought one based on an estimated arrival date of the 10th. I wrote this earlier...the owner showed me an email from the Panasonic rep stating they would be in by mid-June, but were estimating the 10th. They were only getting 3.

i'm guessing it releases post the father's day rush! no need to disrupt a great push by the px50's, you know? Foos believe me, I truly hope i'm wrong, I WANT ONE NOW!

I gotta have it pre Father's day. That's the only day all year I get a pass to couch surf!

IMHO, the slight recessed glass gives it a much more elegant and refined look, the rounded side speakers, slick lines that frame the glass nicely, the black bevel trim dresses it up, and over all, just has less of the plastic look! reminds me much more of the onyx line! You don’t see it? I don't own either so i'm unbiased, but have seen the px50 at BB! :) NOW, am eagerly awaiting to see the 500 in person as well!

Hmmm...if the PX500 has the same green push as the PX50, at least it'll look good when it's turned off. :D

I was all for trying the CableCard ... that is, until I got HD DVR. Now, I can't imagine being without it. At only $10 a month, I can't understand why most people would spend thousands on a TV, but not get this great little invention.

cheriDave, see what you started!? ;)

IMHO, the slight recessed glass gives it a much more elegant and refined look, the rounded side speakers, slick lines that frame the glass nicely, the black bevel trim dresses it up, and over all, just has less of the plastic look! reminds me much more of the onyx line! You don’t see it? I don't own either so i'm unbiased, but have seen the px50 at BB! :) NOW, am eagerly awaiting to see the 500 in person as well!

MMMmmmm.....good. How's, this....I like the uncluttered and smooth lines of the px50. Not trying to impress with layering of the surface, but streamlined in elegant simplicity. The px50 couches the glass in a smooth windswept frame that melts away leaving the viewer with no distractions. Other than a spectacular picture that transports one from metal and plastic to a window into another reality.

:p

I was at a store comparing PD50 and PX50... what setting do you guys use for BEST PQ?

I thought Standard was definately best, but wasn't sure about "Black level" setting... if I put it as dark, then blacks were really good (like frames around the picture) BUT, I lost details in the dark areas of pictures. Now, if I chose "Light" then the picture looked better in dark shades (more details), but the blacks were grayish... what setting is mostly recommended? What about color setting (HD/SD)?

I also noticed a LOT OF BLURRINESS viewing SD... I could see more suttle things on CRT, Rear projection and even LCD displays they had there... however, on HD or DVD... these two untis were much better than all the rest...

Does anyone have any authoritative substantiation regarding the 50PX500 in regard to 3:2 pull-down.

That's pretty much my interest in the PX500 vs. the PX50. I'll probably still watch a fair amount of SD programming and that feature seems like a good thing to have.

Does anyone have any authoritative substantiation regarding the 50PX500 in regard to 3:2 pull-down.

That's pretty much my interest in the PX500 vs. the PX50. I'll probably still watch a fair amount of SD programming and that feature seems like a good thing to have.

Vanns said that the PX500 has 3:2 pulldown "for sure".

I was all for trying the CableCard ... that is, until I got HD DVR. Now, I can't imagine being without it. At only $10 a month, I can't understand why most people would spend thousands on a TV, but not get this great little invention.
kind of off topic, but i couldnt agree more. I have the SA 8300 from time warner, and there is NO WAY i could get a cable card and give that up. Im more impressed with that thing then with my plasma.

kind of off topic, but i couldnt agree more. I have the SA 8300 from time warner, and there is NO WAY i could get a cable card and give that up. Im more impressed with that thing then with my plasma.Fortunately, I have two HDTVs and my 36" CRT-TV requires an external STB to receive D* signals. I'm having a CableCARD installed on my 50PX50U this Friday and will move my SA8300HD-DVR to my CT-36HL42. One good thing about Time Warner is the ability to swap around services & equipment almost at will. With the Panasonic PX series PDPs there is always the option to try this interface & it's been my experience that technical types like to play around with all the options their equipment allow.

kind of off topic, but i couldnt agree more. I have the SA 8300 from time warner, and there is NO WAY i could get a cable card and give that up. Im more impressed with that thing then with my plasma.


I have to admit, everyone I know and their uncles RAVE about their DVR's! I'm scared to get one though! I hear once you go DVR, you can't go back! Like I hear you can't just watch normal television anymore! My wife thinks I'm a couch potato now? I can't even imagine what she'd say then!

Don't get me wrong, I MIGHT be calling them soon! :D

Still off topic...but... Don't be scared...my experience is you'll watch a larger quantity of TV in a similar amount of time compared to without the DVR...maybe even higher quality, since some shows you ordinarily might not watch faithfully are so easy to record. "House" is an example for me, I don't think I ever watched it live, but saved them for later.

I held off for a while getting one, but now I see the DVR (especially HD-DVR) as a modern convenience just a notch below the microwave.

Gaaaah ... I was pretty sure that I didnt have the 'Green Monster' on my PD50U but last night I was watching 'Road Trip' on Discovery HD Theater when I noticed that the Yellow Mustang convertible seemed to have a lime-green tint to it. Did anyone else watch this show? They were driving up the PCH from LA to San Fran and hitting all the scenic spots along the way. It might be that I'm getting paranoid but that just spoiled my entire evening :(

My settings :

Picture +15
Brightness +12
Color +5
Tint -2

Everything else I watched afterwards looked good. The grass in the Braves baseball game, Green Goblin's eyes in Spiderman etc. Maybe the Mustang was lime-green?

Gaaaah ... I was pretty sure that I didnt have the 'Green Monster' on my PD50U but last night I was watching 'Road Trip' on Discovery HD Theater when I noticed that the Yellow Mustang convertible seemed to have a lime-green tint to it. Did anyone else watch this show? They were driving up the PCH from LA to San Fran and hitting all the scenic spots along the way. It might be that I'm getting paranoid but that just spoiled my entire evening :(

My settings :

Picture +15
Brightness +12
Color +5
Tint -2

Everything else I watched afterwards looked good. The grass in the Braves baseball game, Green Goblin's eyes in Spiderman etc. Maybe the Mustang was lime-green?

I know exactly what your talking about 'cause I watched the same show. I even went to the Ford Mustang website and if it is a current year model, the color should be 'screaming yellow.' The color I saw was neither lime-green or screaming yellow. It seemed to be a muted yellow.

I also spent part of last nite watching the Michigan/UCLA women's softball world series. Boring gameplay but the Michigan uniforms have lotsa yellow in them. And the softball is yellow green. It makes a good test when comparing the colors of your plasma with another set in the house. I found the yellows to be slightly different but not by a wide margin. BTW, The third and final game will be tonite I think.

I can't wait to hear if people see no "green push" in anything with the 500U. I hope we get reports soon.

This issue has been reported in all the new panny models. I suspect the 500u will be no different.

This issue has been reported in all the new panny models. I suspect the 500u will be no different.
One can hope.

Hopefully Tweeter will get it in first and I can test it out.

One can hope.

Hopefully Tweeter will get it in first and I can test it out.
Stopped by my local Tweeter (suburban Chicago) Monday night and the sales rep said they have 400+ on order (probably for the entire Chicago market) with an estimated arrival date of 6/17 in their warehohuse.

Plasma Concepts said they will be acrrying the 50PX500U but no details yet ($, date).

w0mbat,
from what i've read, the green decoding problem, makes a few specific shades of yellow show up as bright neon green (as opposed to the the "lime-green tint" you mentioned). also, this seems to happen only on SD sources. given that, it doesn't sound like that's what you saw.

for example, last week, i was watching Best Week Ever on TiVo (connected by S-Video), and a shot of "Lynette" on Desperate Housewives had most of her hair (which is blonde) parts of her face, showing green. dialing down the contrast to about -18 - -22 eleminated it completely, but then HD stuff looked off. so far i've only noticed it on TiVo and not on my SA8300HD box.

when i first got my PD50, after reading these forums, i was convinced i was seeing the (IMO) incorrectly named "green-push" all over the place. now i think that overall, this TV just reveals the limitations of my previous set :)

DanP and Negative Zer0,

Can you guys share your pic settings? I'm using the Motorola - DCT6200 with components.

Negative Zer0,

Are you saying that what we saw was normal? I can tell you definitively that the car color did not seem normal to me. I am pretty big auto enthusiast and quite familiar with the color pallettes used in sports cars and the weird lime-green on the mustang really bothered me. It might be that I need to calibrate my set properly (I hope). Maybe I can try some of your pic settings and see if they help.

thanks guys (for letting me know I'm not completely nuts)

DVR is like crack. We have HD-DVR and as someone else said, it rates just behind the microwave. Being able to fast forward commercials and not having to worry about missing shows rocks. We don't watch anything live anymore (other than sporting events).

well, i certainly know better than to argue with an enthusiast! ;) i dunno if what you saw was normal or not, and i'm certainly no authority; i'm merely suggesting alternatives. is it possible that it was a custom colour? that may explain it, i dunno. calibration may be an issue for you, then again, it may be an issue for me too!

i've only just received my replacement colour filters for DVE yesterday, so i haven't been able to properly calibrate my set for colour. soon as i do though, i'll let you know. as for the other settings, i currently have

Picture = 18-20
Brightness = 8-10
Black Level = Light

based on what i've seen on these boards, those do seem high, but using Avia, this was where i was able to get the white test panels to actually look white, and to give be excellent black performance and shadow detail.

DanP and Negative Zer0,

Can you guys share your pic settings? I'm using the Motorola - DCT6200 with components.

Negative Zer0,

Are you saying that what we saw was normal? I can tell you definitively that the car color did not seem normal to me. I am pretty big auto enthusiast and quite familiar with the color pallettes used in sports cars and the weird lime-green on the mustang really bothered me. It might be that I need to calibrate my set properly (I hope). Maybe I can try some of your pic settings and see if they help.

thanks guys (for letting me know I'm not completely nuts)

I can only remember the color/tint settings as I'm at work. Anyway, color is +2 and tint-3 and I use a component connection. I agree that the car color seemed suspicious to me though I'm not an auto enthusiast like you. And for me, the color didn't strike me so much as lime as it did a color that seemed unusual.....kind of a muted yellow. Still we may be seeing the same imaging but the way individuals describe and perceive color is subjective. I know that lighting of the scene can be a factor, exposure setting of the camera, etc. But it is strange that everything else in the program seemed to look fine. It is too bad I can't compare it with another TV....I have another one in the house but not HD and not including a Discovery HD feed.

Is there any official panasonic response to the 'green push' issue?

I was all set to get a Panny, but is this issue a show stopper or just a minor annoyance?

I was in a local B&M shop last week and bought one based on an estimated arrival date of the 10th. I wrote this earlier...the owner showed me an email from the Panasonic rep stating they would be in by mid-June, but were estimating the 10th. They were only getting 3.

Hey Foosman, which B&M in Austin? I'll be in Austin on Friday.

w0mbat,
from what i've read, the green decoding problem, makes a few specific shades of yellow show up as bright neon green (as opposed to the the "lime-green tint" you mentioned). also, this seems to happen only on SD sources. given that, it doesn't sound like that's what you saw.

Actually, my experience was that it occurs in HD too. I previously posted about seeing a lime green race car on the HD channel at Tweeter. I was unable to change the setting (i.e. turn off color management) due to no remote being available, so I wasn't able to try to correct this.

Darren

Stopped by my local Tweeter (suburban Chicago) Monday night and the sales rep said they have 400+ on order (probably for the entire Chicago market) with an estimated arrival date of 6/17 in their warehohuse.

Plasma Concepts said they will be acrrying the 50PX500U but no details yet ($, date).

I checked with Tweeter as well and the 400+ they have on order is for their main warehouse in Atlanta. This will be allocated across all their various stores. I'm assuming it'll take at least a week beyond 4/17 to actually arrive at the stores, plus add a couple days for the stores to set them up.

None of the sales guys I spoke with new anything about the tv other than the price difference. I was hoping they'd have some inside information related to some of the outstanding questions we have on this thread.

Just a few more weeks.

Is there any official panasonic response to the 'green push' issue?

I was all set to get a Panny, but is this issue a show stopper or just a minor annoyance?

I really would not call it a showstopper by any means. Most of the time the PQ is brilliant. There just seem to be these anolamies once in a while that just become a nuisance.

I checked with Tweeter as well and the 400+ they have on order is for their main warehouse in Atlanta. This will be allocated across all their various stores. I'm assuming it'll take at least a week beyond 4/17 to actually arrive at the stores, plus add a couple days for the stores to set them up.

None of the sales guys I spoke with new anything about the tv other than the price difference. I was hoping they'd have some inside information related to some of the outstanding questions we have on this thread.

Just a few more weeks.


400, that's it? INCONCEIVABLE! I have a feeling they're not putting any word on the street yet in order to continue the great sales on the px50 line going. Their pretty close in price, so why ruin a good thing before you ABSOLUTELY HAVE TO!? all speculation of course! ;)

I really would not call it a showstopper by any means. Most of the time the PQ is brilliant. There just seem to be these anolamies once in a while that just become a nuisance.I agree. I have become particularly sensitive to this green/yellow issue. Most times the rendering of these colors appear to be quite normal to me... but once in a while I can see greens that can be construed as "neon" and yellows that appear to be "muted." Since these renderings appear to be more an exception than the rule I'm inclined to attribute them to the content/program provider. DTVs tend to unmask the signal/program shortcomings that remain hidden by lower resolution analogue TVs.

I'm inclined to attribute them to the content/program provider. DTVs tend to unmask the signal/program shortcomings that remain hidden by lower resolution analogue TVs.
But don't you see the problem on DVDs as well? If not, then this issue is really a non-issue for me.

I have seen the green issue on my PX50 with DVD's, High Def and Standard Definition programs.

But don't you see the problem on DVDs as well? If not, then this issue is really a non-issue for me.I'll confess to not watching any DVDs on my 50U, other than a couple with the nieces/nephews (Lion King & Finding Nemo). I'm not much into the hassle of renting "scratched" up DVDs anymore... and I don't buy them... or music CDs, etc... I guess it's an 'old age' kind of thing...

Those contemplating a PX50U or PX500U purchase may want to read this thread:

RBE like effect on PX50U (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=540599&page=1&pp=40)

You may want to view these sets in person with certain material before buying. Wish I was aware of this before I bought mine from TVA. This is much more annoying to me than the "green-push". At least with the "green-push" I was able to adjust most of it out through the service menu.

I have seen the green issue on my PX50 with DVD's, High Def and Standard Definition programs.
Hmm, thought it was just with SD TV. That is too bad.

Hmm, thought it was just with SD TV. That is too bad.

I suspect we would not even be aware of green descrepencies if it were not for the fact that the default setting on the new pannys (color management "on") makes such a substantial and negative impact. Now, all our attention is on green. How about red? How about blue? Anyone look at those yet? I just betcha, we can find all sorts of problems with those colors too if we try. Rainbows is not something I've seen and is reported by how many people? Two? Anyway, lets all not get into herd mentality here and paint things in a black and white manner. The new pannys have spectacular pictures and the main problem they have is a bad initial setting and a whole lot of TV enthusiasts who read too much. ;)

Anyway, lets all not get into herd mentality here and paint things in a black and white manner.

MmmmmOOOOO! :D

The new pannys have spectacular pictures

I love every one of the 50 series I've seen. They are indeed spectacular!

. . .and the main problem they have is a bad initial setting and a whole lot of TV enthusiasts who read too much. ;)

What's too much??? ;)

I suspect we would not even be aware of green descrepencies if it were not for the fact that the default setting on the new pannys (color management "on") makes such a substantial and negative impact. Now, all our attention is on green. How about red? How about blue? Anyone look at those yet? I just betcha, we can find all sorts of problems with those colors too if we try. Rainbows is not something I've seen and is reported by how many people? Two? Anyway, lets all not get into herd mentality here and paint things in a black and white manner. The new pannys have spectacular pictures and the main problem they have is a bad initial setting and a whole lot of TV enthusiasts who read too much. ;)
Or maybe there is a genuine problem and there are those that are just in denial.

I suspect we would not even be aware of green descrepencies if it were not for the fact that the default setting on the new pannys (color management "on") makes such a substantial and negative impact. Now, all our attention is on green. How about red? How about blue? Anyone look at those yet? I just betcha, we can find all sorts of problems with those colors too if we try. Rainbows is not something I've seen and is reported by how many people? Two? Anyway, lets all not get into herd mentality here and paint things in a black and white manner. The new pannys have spectacular pictures and the main problem they have is a bad initial setting and a whole lot of TV enthusiasts who read too much. ;)

Unfortunately for me, listening to this PollyAnna like praise for this set led me to spend over $4K for a set that has serious issues, most importantly, the "rainbow issue" or whatever you want to call it. Just because YOU don't see it, doesn't mean it isn't there.

I HIGHLY SUGGEST that anyone in the market for the PX50U or PX500U view these sets in person with the the type of program material that will show this "rainbow" weakness unless you know you can return it for a refund.

And just for the record, I own two other CRT-based direct view HDTVs. I know the fidelity and color accuracy that can be provided by a well engineered and built HDTV without other artifacts.

Unfortunately for me, listening to this PollyAnna like praise for this set led me to spend over $4K for a set that has serious issues, most importantly, the "rainbow issue" or whatever you want to call it. Just because YOU don't see it, doesn't mean it isn't there.

I HIGHLY SUGGEST that anyone in the market for the PX50U or PX500U view these sets in person with the the type of program material that will show this "rainbow" weakness unless you know you can return it for a refund.

And just for the record, I own two other CRT-based direct view HDTVs. I know the fidelity and color accuracy that can be provided by a well engineered and built HDTV without other artifacts.

I'm in 'denial'.....a 'PollyAnna?' I think we need not get personal here with ad hominem attacks. It is not in the spirit of this forum nor in good taste. I've spent many hours comparing my px50 to another TV I have and have attempted to provide honest opinions. The fact is, I *can* return the TV if I choose to do so. I am not defending a purchase but rather providing what I hope to be useful information. I don't deny what anyone else is seeing with their Panny. In fact, I acknowledge at the top of this page that people are reporting green push with *all* new Panny models. Also, I should point out that other members have gotten into service mode to change the green intensity of their image. It is not like it is unfixable if it bothers you.

Yeah, what up with the uncalled stuff?

Why suggest that people are "in denial" with no evidence whatsoever?

Sure, there are sets that have an unadjustable green problem. Does it mean that all sets have the issue? No...

For the record, I, nor the approximately 6 or 7 people who have seen my PX50 noticed any green issues with the yellows. No one's seen any "rainbows" either.


"Just because YOU don't see it, doesn't mean it isn't there."

Likewise, just because YOU had these issues, doesn't mean that others have it.

I just purchased the PD50u fron Circuit City the other day and have no green push. I personally know the salesman and he said he has not had heard of any complaints about the green issue. I hope everything works great and the set is awesome.

Since when is suggesting that some people are in denial a personal "attack". A little sensitive don't ya think?

The fact is there are a lot of people who are dyed in the wool loyalists who defend "their" company or "their" model regardless of what evidence is produced to the contrary.

DanP stated that, "main problem they have is a bad initial setting and a whole lot of TV enthusiasts who read too much." saying that there really isn't a problem at all despite the numerous accounts from other individuals. My denial comment was just a counter comment to his premise that these issues aren't real at all, just figments of people's imaginations.

Let's not get dramatic with the accusations of "attacks".

Maybe I should use "smilies" more. Lets try it again.

Or maybe there is a genuine problem and there are those that are just in denial. ;)

I'm darn glad to learn about these issues because I was seriously considering one of these Pannys. There now appears to be 2 very real issues that have yet to be fully fleshed out.

I noticed the flashes of yellow-green that some people are calling a "rainbow." It didn't really bother me, although I saw it more than the similar effect I've seen on my DLP front projector. I noticed it much more in scenes with small areas of intense brightness surrounded by dark areas. My solution was to turn down the white level a bit. I don't miss the really bright whites, and I don't see the flashes much unless I force myself to see them.

Play nice, guys. JK

Since when is suggesting that some people are in denial a personal "attack". A little sensitive don't ya think?

The fact is there are a lot of people who are dyed in the wool loyalists who defend "their" company or "their" model regardless of what evidence is produced to the contrary.

DanP stated that, "main problem they have is a bad initial setting and a whole lot of TV enthusiasts who read too much." saying that there really isn't a problem at all despite the numerous accounts from other individuals. My denial comment was just a counter comment to his premise that these issues aren't real at all, just figments of people's imaginations.

Let's not get dramatic with the accusations of "attacks".

Maybe I should use "smilies" more. Lets try it again.

Or maybe there is a genuine problem and there are those that are just in denial. ;)

I'm darn glad to learn about these issues because I was seriously considering one of these Pannys. There now appears to be 2 very real issues that have yet to be fully fleshed out.

I used a 'wink' after "main problem they have is a bad initial setting and a whole lot of TV enthusiasts who read too much." To elaborate there are many people who stated seeing green push at their B&M without stating whether they saw color management on or off. There is no doubt in my mind that color management 'on' creates green push (substaniated by just about everyone who has addressed it) but it can be turned off. How many data points does that represent? And how many people read that and have reinforced in their mind the green push problem based on a setting that will guarantee it?

I've never owned a Panny therefore I am not a 'loyalist.'

I never stated that what people are seeing is a figment of their imagination.

Quote me if you like but don't stick words in my mouth.

I hope to get my hands on a digital camera tomorrow to take a picture of a DVD frame "Meet the Fockers." It has a great deal of yellow-green in it that seems abnormal. The same frame is pictured at rottentomatoes.com. You may be surprised at what you see (hint: the colors are the same).

BTW, This is the image I'm talking about:

http://images.rottentomatoes.com/images/movie/gallery/1139375/photo_27_hires.jpg

If you have the DVD and a new panny I'd be curious to know how you see this.

Patrick TX: I bought it at A&B TV on Anderson Ln. They came down $500 off what they have it listed at.

As for the problems causing people to not buy one of these units:
- As mentioned a million times throughout this forum, if you read posts on any given forum about any given unit, you can convince yourself it has major problems. There is no perfection! These are consumer products. I am on my 3rd HDTV and every single one of them has certain issues, but I have thoroughly enjoyed and continue to enjoy watching them.
- You should be more concerned about reliability issues and the darn thing not working, because you absolutely won't enjoy it then.
- I don't own a single Panasonic product. This is their 8th generation panel and IMO for the money the best product available. I am a videophile and only picked the PX500 after careful investigation and research of the PD50U/PX50U/PX500U and other brand PDSs.
- I was initially spooked by the green push issue. I personally witnessed it in the store. I also personally witnessed 4 others in other stores that looked awesome. My conclusion is that this has been blown out of proportion due to poor settings. Even if there is green push, I will take this any day over crappy blacks and dark movie scenes where you can't see anything.
- I think Panasonic has made some tradeoffs to give even brighter/vivid images with the same or better blacks as in the past and still keep the power reasonable. The downside may be some of the 'color management' side effects and green issues. If this is the case, then I think they made the right choice because these displays really shine!

... My conclusion is that this has been blown out of proportion (partially) due to poor settings. Even if there is green push, I will take this any day over crappy blacks and dark movie scenes where you can't see anything.
- I think Panasonic has made some tradeoffs to give even brighter/vivid images with the same or better blacks as in the past and still keep the power reasonable. The downside may be some of the 'color management' side effects and green issues. If this is the case, then I think they made the right choice because these displays really shine!

I totally agrree with this line of thinking. I am also convinced that if any other plasma regardless of make or model is placed under the microscopic scrutiny & watchful eyes of avs forum members, that plasma will also have issues. For someone like me that is a good thing, because even after carefully reading everything I could about the reported "green push" issue some people are having and even seeing it in person, I still gladly choose the panasonic pd50/px50/px500 series over all other current offerings for my viewing enjoyment.

i'm with ya too foos! can't wait to hear about your px500!!

I totally agrree with this line of thinking. I am also convinced that if any other plasma regardless of make or model is placed under the microscopic scrutiny & watchful eyes of avs forum members, that plasma will also have issues. For someone like me that is a good thing, because even after carefully reading everything I could about the reported "green push" issue some people are having and even seeing it in person, I still gladly choose the panasonic pd50/px50/px500 series over all other current offerings for my viewing enjoyment.
Given the issues that have been brought to light recently I can't imagine still going with these Pannys when the Pioneers are available in a similar price point. Whatever makes you happy in the end though is all that matters.

After following this thread for some time, I took the plunge and bought a 42PX50U several weeks ago. Overall, I continue to be wowed by the picture. HD is awesome and SD is much better that I expected it would be. After adjusting the picture settings based upon what I have read here, I don't see much green push. Yellows are yellow although sometimes yellows appear "muted" as reported by others here. Fortunately for me, I don't see a "rainbow" effect and I'm not going to go out of my way to try to discover any. I think shadow detail could be a little better in dark scenes but I haven't calibrated with Avia yet so I really can't complain.

I do have issues that perhaps someone can help me with. I simply can not stretch or alter the picture using the "Aspect" button on the remote. I am well aware that you can't stretch HD on this set. However, I can't stretch 480p or 480i passed through from a D* HD Tivo box using component cables. After pressing "Aspect," the "TV" button on the remote flashes three times and nothing else happens. Pressing the "Recall" button shows "480i" or "480p," "Standard," and "FULL." I also plugged a DV camcorder into the Video 1 jacks. The 480i picture was stretched since the aspect is apparently stuck on "FULL." Pressing the Aspect button does nothing. Also, this may be unrelated, but the "Zoom Adjust" in the Picture Menu is always grayed out. Sorry if the answer to this issue is obvious but any help would be appreciated.

My "free" TH-42PD50U arrived today and I just finished setting it up (traded in a bunch of Marriott Reward points for it).

In testing the DVD player connection, using the S-Video works fine. But, when I switch to a component video cable, the image is very very blue. I swapped the component cables for another set, but the same result occurs.

What does this sound like?

My "free" TH-42PD50U arrived today and I just finished setting it up (traded in a bunch of Marriott Reward points for it).

In testing the DVD player connection, using the S-Video works fine. But, when I switch to a component video cable, the image is very very blue. I swapped the component cables for another set, but the same result occurs.

What does this sound like?

The heretofore unreported dreaded "blue push" :p

Could it be that you Color Temp setting on that input is set to "Cool"?

Dunno about you, but to say that someone is a "dyed in the wool loyalist" who is in "denial" is basically saying, "Yeah, you know that you can see the problem, but you are such a defender of your brand/purchase that you can't admit to it."

I understand that you're afraid to buy because several members have had various issues, and that's fine, but I suggest you not go around saying that kind of un-backed up statements about people who are perfectly happy with their purchase.

The initial settings of the TV, which come with Color Management on, are set to push green. Many people have reported that adjustments basically get rid of the green push. Then you get the enthusiasts in here (myself included), who every time they see some lime green, start wondering, was that supposed to look green? Only to find out later that the image actually is supposed to have some green in it.

The "rainbow" effect seems to be more dependent on the individual. I've seen maybe less than five owners who've reported that they've seen it. I "tried" to see it tonight by making my eyes do all sorts of weird movements, and looking at different types of programming with shadows and motion and such, but could not see anything like what people have described.

This is an enthusiast forum, everything will get nitpicked. When you go over to the DVD forum, you'll see literally hundreds of posts about how this or that is wrong with practically every single DVD player on the market today.

Dunno about you, but to say that someone is a "dyed in the wool loyalist" who is in "denial" is basically saying, "Yeah, you know that you can see the problem, but you are such a defender of your brand/purchase that you can't admit to it."

I understand that you're afraid to buy because several members have had various issues, and that's fine, but I suggest you not go around saying that kind of un-backed up statements about people who are perfectly happy with their purchase.



I said:
there are a lot of people who are dyed in the wool loyalists who defend "their" company or "their" model regardless of what evidence is produced to the contrary.

"un-backed up statement"?? There are many truths that we all know. I wasn't speaking of anyone in particular I was playing devil's advocate to a statement that was "basically" calling everyone who has a green push problem a sheep.

Thanks for the suggestion and veiled threat about how to converse. I generally agree with your stance although it has absolutely zero bearing in this current discussion.

And yes, there are many people who are aware of problems with "their" brand/product but continue to deny it because they are "fan boys". I'm submitting that final statement without evidence. Just consider it an opinion.

I really would not call it a showstopper by any means. Most of the time the PQ is brilliant. There just seem to be these anolamies once in a while that just become a nuisance.

Yeah, a $3000 anomoly.

Yeah, a $3000 anomoly.

And to quote another review:

"It also gives back a lot of green--the color, that is. Grass in a scene set in a meadow looked a bit like Astroturf; flesh tones often had a greenish or yellowish cast."

You think I'm talking about the new Panny's? This is a review of the Pioneer PDP-5040HD. http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/article/0,aid,117342,pg,7,00.asp How in the world can anyone buy a Pio with push issues like this. :eek:

(Just kidding Pio owners).

After following this thread for some time, I took the plunge and bought a 42PX50U several weeks ago......

I do have issues that perhaps someone can help me with. I simply can not stretch or alter the picture using the "Aspect" button on the remote. I am well aware that you can't stretch HD on this set. However, I can't stretch 480p or 480i passed through from a D* HD Tivo box using component cables. After pressing "Aspect," the "TV" button on the remote flashes three times and nothing else happens. Pressing the "Recall" button shows "480i" or "480p," "Standard," and "FULL." I also plugged a DV camcorder into the Video 1 jacks. The 480i picture was stretched since the aspect is apparently stuck on "FULL." Pressing the Aspect button does nothing. Also, this may be unrelated, but the "Zoom Adjust" in the Picture Menu is always grayed out. Sorry if the answer to this issue is obvious but any help would be appreciated.

It's normal for the TV button to flash 3 times when hitting a button, it's just letting you know which device you just operated.

The problem with your aspect button has been reported by a few other people and they were able to restore correct operation by temporarily connecting the RF cable directly to the TV's RF input and that seemed to "unstick" something on the TV and the aspect button started working again. Zoom Adjust in the menu will only be available when the TV is actually in ZOOM mode so once you get your ZOOM/JUST feature working it should become available.

It was before i'd bought mine and i thought maybe they were trying to stretch a 4:3 broadcast on an HD channel (which most plasmas will not do) but it did turn out to be a glitch with their TV. Mine worked fine out of the box, but i did have to configure my SA8000HD DVR (connected via Component) to Stretch 4:3 Picture so that the STB doesn't introduce black sidebars when watching the regular analog channels but that's the fault of my DVR, not the TV.


Here's the thread with the other few guys that had your problem:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=538357&page=1&pp=30

Report back if it works for you, and maybe also add your experience that the other thread so future searchers can find a resolution to their problem.....

I said:


"un-backed up statement"?? There are many truths that we all know. I wasn't speaking of anyone in particular I was playing devil's advocate to a statement that was "basically" calling everyone who has a green push problem a sheep.

Thanks for the suggestion and veiled threat about how to converse. I generally agree with your stance although it has absolutely zero bearing in this current discussion.

And yes, there are many people who are aware of problems with "their" brand/product but continue to deny it because they are "fan boys". I'm submitting that final statement without evidence. Just consider it an opinion.

All right, your general point is taken.

In the same vein, there are also those people who take the issues that a minority of owners have had, and try to make it seem as if the entire product line is faulty and issue-ridden. When in fact, the majority of owners are perfectly fine with their set.

I do remember those discussions a couple years back talking about the green push on the Pioneers. I don't know for sure, but most of those owners were able to dial it out with adjustments as well.

DVE had a little blurb about how some makers intentionally set the TV push green out of the box to make their TV stand out when displaying sports scenes and outdoor scenes in the store. Maybe Panasonic and Pioneer were/are guilty of this.

Actually, my experience was that it occurs in HD too. ...

earlier in this thread, someone mentioned a green ball in the NCAA Women's Softball Championship. i happended to catch it last night on ESPN HD, and the ball was deffinitely green with the Tint control set to -3 (Color Mgmt = OFF). changing the Tint to -18 made the ball yellow (but of course now everyone's face has a more reddish look to it).

i not a softball fan, but i assume the ball is not supposed to be green (against a green field! :D) anyone else saw this game and/or noticed this problem on this show? pity the series is over, it would have been a great opportunity to test this problem collectively, with a single reference point.

earlier in this thread, someone mentioned a green ball in the NCAA Women's Softball Championship. i happended to catch it last night on ESPN HD, and the ball was deffinitely green with the Tint control set to -3 (Color Mgmt = OFF). changing the Tint to -18 made the ball yellow (but of course now everyone's face has a more reddish look to it).

i not a softball fan, but i assume the ball is not supposed to be green (against a green field! :D) anyone else saw this game and/or noticed this problem on this show? pity the series is over, it would have been a great opportunity to test this problem collectively, with a single reference point.

I went to a womens softball game one time and the balls are green. Now, maybe my spectacles have a green push to them, but I doubt it.

Scott

Yeah, a $3000 anomoly.

Actually, it was a $0 anomaly for me. I redeemed some Marriot Rewards for the set. So, I really have no reason to complain if Spongebob shows up a little green :D

The balls used in that softball game are a neon yellow/green (more yellow than green). I finally got my PX50U looking really nice yesterday. The yellow on the Michigan Uniforms looks yellow and all the faces and such are not beet red anymore. I can post my settings when I get home tonight.

I did go to CC yesterday to look at that game on their feed and check out the other plasmas there. Most, if not all the plasmas, had a greenish hue to them especially when you looked at the uniforms from the Michigan players. I did not calibrate any of the TV's, but to my eyes I still picked the Panny over the Pioneer 5050HD. There is something I like better about the Panny picture. Even the Pioneer had a hint of green on the uniforms.

Well, I am thinking the green issue is mostly in my head. I was running outside with my girlfriend yesterday and I kept seeing green tints to everything. A yellow fire hydrant, yellow tape blocking off a broken piece of pavement, the yellow insulation around some power lines.

Instead of getting a professional calibration, I will be spending the $200 on a good shrink! :)

earlier in this thread, someone mentioned a green ball in the NCAA Women's Softball Championship. i happended to catch it last night on ESPN HD, and the ball was deffinitely green with the Tint control set to -3 (Color Mgmt = OFF). changing the Tint to -18 made the ball yellow (but of course now everyone's face has a more reddish look to it).

i not a softball fan, but i assume the ball is not supposed to be green (against a green field! :D) anyone else saw this game and/or noticed this problem on this show? pity the series is over, it would have been a great opportunity to test this problem collectively, with a single reference point.

Take a look re: ball color:

http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/ritter5.jpg

It can appear either more yellow or green depending on lighting, camera exposure, et. al.

I agree Wombat, my wife thinks I am nuts. But I got her trained to look for yellow and greens. When i got home yesterday, she said the colors looked better because some actreeses hair was blonde and not yellow/green blonde like the day before. She approved of my calibration.

Well, I am thinking the green issue is mostly in my head. I was running outside with my girlfriend yesterday and I kept seeing green tints to everything. A yellow fire hydrant, yellow tape blocking off a broken piece of pavement, the yellow insulation around some power lines.

Instead of getting a professional calibration, I will be spending the $200 on a good shrink! :)

Haha, totally know what you mean!

I'm beginning to look at any bright yellow/green colors, whether in real life, TV, or computer screen, with a critical eye.

If I stare hard enough, it's almost as if I can detect a touch of green in most bright yellow objects. It's a disease I tell you...

Actually, it was a $0 anomaly for me. I redeemed some Marriot Rewards for the set. So, I really have no reason to complain if Spongebob shows up a little green :D

I'm lucky too as my wife got the set for free as a signing bonus to take a new job. I'm also lucky they shipped the plasma 2 days prior to her quitting the job. I love the TV despite the issues being discussed.

Scott

The heretofore unreported dreaded "blue push" :p

Could it be that you Color Temp setting on that input is set to "Cool"?

Actually it is cool (but I tried the other Color Temp settings as well). Imagine covering the screen with a giant piece of blue filter material and you will have some idea what this looks like. Kind of like a black and white picture except using blue instead of white.

Actually it is cool (but I tried the other Color Temp settings as well). Imagine covering the screen with a giant piece of blue filter material and you will have some idea what this looks like. Kind of like a black and white picture except using blue instead of white.

Couple of shots in the dark......are you *sure* the component cables aren't crossed somewhere. Are you seeing too much blue because you are missing the other colors (are the other colors present?) Secondly, does your TV have a second component connection (like my 50px50) and have you tried that? Maybe your DVD player could be kaput also.

That's cool about the Marriott rewards points, I saw that it was offered and was wondering if anyone ever redeemed points for one.

I'm a Marriott sl*t too.

Got this pic from DVE. Note the yellow, green and light-green baloons. I was playing around tonight with DVE. Settings on 42pd50u are
picture 0
brightness 0
color -5
tint -7
sharpness -15
color temp normal (normal gave the best gray scale)

http://img225.echo.cx/img225/7060/misc0628od.th.jpg (http://img225.echo.cx/my.php?image=misc0628od.jpg)

Scott

Here is another showing both yellow and green. Sorry for the screen door effect. Not sure what to do to get rid of it in the pics. I no photographer.

http://img40.echo.cx/img40/8449/misc0608jg.th.jpg (http://img40.echo.cx/my.php?image=misc0608jg.jpg)

Scott

If there was obvious green push the yellow bar would be tinged green. Doesn't look like it to me.

Well, I just ordered my 50PX50 online today. If anyone has received their set via shipping, is there a tip indicator on the box? I'm just curious to know if to check for it on delivery.

Can't wait to get it at my new house.

If there was obvious green push the yellow bar would be tinged green. Doesn't look like it to me.

But the woman's face is way too pink and her skin tone does not look natural. This is the same effect i get on my 42PX50. In order to get all yellows to look yellow without any green tint, i have to set the tint to the point that skin tones are too pink. As i set the tint level so that skin tones look more natural, the green tint starts to creep back into many yellow items (police caution tape, hot buttered corn on the cob, NYC taxi cabs, etc). The only way i was able to get these items to be pure yellow was to move the tint more red but skin tones go back to pink. None of these items should show green tint or green edges or green in the shadows, but they do. I'd trapped all these scenes on my DVR so i was able to pause and play back the yellow stuff while i made my adjustments. Some channels and programs are a little worse than others, while some are fine. I had to settle on ever-so-slightly-pink tint to most skin tones which left me with occasional ever-so-slightly-green tint on many yellow items.

Scott, can you adjust her skin tone till it looks normal (not pink) and see if that adds green tint to the yellow square?

have you guys used the color filters that come with DVE to adjust the tint? using the filters, i noticed that turning color matrix to SD (instead of HD) made the reds and greens fall in line just a little bit better. and as a result skin tones would lose that rosey cheek look. also, you should just fiddle with the color setting (once you get the tint in line with the filters) i think that color adjust has the greatest affect on pink skin.

Here are my current settings. Let me know what you think.

Service Menu:

Tint from 05 to 02
Color from 30 to 28

Consumer Menu:

Pic Mode: standard
Picture: +10
Brightness: +8 or +5
Color: -2 or 0
Tint: -10
Sharpness: +15
Color temp: normal
Color Mgmt: off
Video NR: off
3D Y/C filter: off
Color Matrix: HD
MPEG NR: off
Black Level: light

The problem with your aspect button has been reported by a few other people and they were able to restore correct operation by temporarily connecting the RF cable directly to the TV's RF input and that seemed to "unstick" something on the TV and aspect button started working again. Zoom Adjust in the menu will only be available when the TV is actually in ZOOM mode so once you get your ZOOM/JUST feature working it should be come available.

Thanks Randy! I haven't had a chance to check out this fix yet but I will do so tonight and report back.

I've discovered something interesting and I hope someone else can confirm what I'm experiencing... In preparation to have a CableCARD installed in my 50PX50U today, I have removed the STB and connected the coax cable to the antenna input on the PDP. I did a reset & have selected TV input. I get all analogue channels and the digital audio out connection works. The problem is...

Under Picture settings I can no longer change the Black Level adjustment from Dark --> Light. This option is grayed-out and is set to Dark. I'm hoping after the installation of the CableCARD this option will be available again.

Anyone encounter this situation? There seems to be no mention regarding this feature (or lack thereof) in the operating instructions.

Here are my current settings. Let me know what you think.

Service Menu:

Tint from 05 to 02
Color from 30 to 28

Consumer Menu:

Pic Mode: standard
Picture: +10
Brightness: +8 or +5
Color: -2 or 0
Tint: -10
Sharpness: +15
Color temp: normal
Color Mgmt: off
Video NR: off
3D Y/C filter: off
Color Matrix: HD
MPEG NR: off
Black Level: light

Your settings are almost the same as my settings.

How do you adjust tint and color in the service menu?

jrock65,

check a few pages back in this thread someone had a posting of how to do it.

I've discovered something interesting and I hope someone else can confirm what I'm experiencing... In preparation to have a CableCARD installed in my 50PX50U today, I have removed the STB and connected the coax cable to the antenna input on the PDP. I did a reset & have selected TV input. I get all analogue channels and the digital audio out connection works. The problem is...

Under Picture settings I can no longer change the Black Level adjustment from Dark --> Light. This option is grayed-out and is set to Dark. I'm hoping after the installation of the CableCARD this option will be available again.

Anyone encounter this situation? There seems to be no mention regarding this feature (or lack thereof) in the operating instructions.

See page 25 of the manual (i downloaded the PDF version as it's easier to search for keywords). This setting only applies to external sources and defaults to Dark when using the TV's own tuner.

"Black level
Select Dark or Light.
Valid only for external input signals."

On another note, when you removed your cable STB and started using the TV's own tuner did you notice a reduction in picture quality? My TV's tuner does not give as good a picture as my SA8000 and SA8000HD cable DVRs do (both with SD and HD content).

someone mentioned earlier that tva would not be carrying the px500. i just confirmed via phone that they will carry the px500 models. tva did not have a specific eta at the time, but for those that are interested in purchasing from a site sponsor here's another option.

See page 25 of the manual (i downloaded the PDF version as it's easier to search for keywords). This setting only applies to external sources and defaults to Dark when using the TV's own tuner.

"Black level
Select Dark or Light.
Valid only for external input signals."

On another note, when you removed your cable STB and started using the TV's own tuner did you notice a reduction in picture quality? My TV's tuner does not give as good a picture as my SA8000 and SA8000HD cable DVRs do (both with SD and HD content).Thanks for your reply... I missed that... I'll try & do another picture calibration with Avia tonight to see how well the PDP performs. I wasn't paying a lot of attention to the picture quality other than to verify everything was functional. But the various channels I viewed in 480i Just mode appeared very similar to what I was seeing through the SA8300HD-DVR using the HDMI connection. I'll see how the CableCARD option goes... At least one good thing with Time Warner in Albany NY is they are accommodating with my equipment swap requests. And at $150/mo. they should be. ;)

Leeda2 - that is great to hear on TVA. I spoke with them two days ago, and they were quite clear that they were not going to carry it because it was the "onyx line". Didn't really understand what that meant but am very happy if they do carry since their perfect pixel guarantee, good praise on board, good prices, etc. mean I will likely be buying from them. Glad to hear it. Hope the guy I got was just confused.

Here are my current 50px50u settings.......

Consumer Menu:

Pic Mode: standard
Picture: +10
Brightness: +10 (I lower it to +5 at night for DVDs)
Color: -4
Tint: -8
Sharpness: 0
Color temp: normal
Color Mgmt: off
Video NR: off
3D Y/C filter: off
Color Matrix: HD
MPEG NR: off
Black Level: light

Have not yet screwed around with the Service Menu.. but will soon

Occasionally i will use "bias" lighting: ropelight from HomeDepot

No green push :D :D, Skin tones look normal (to me). Spongebob is yellow like a lemon. :) :)

But the woman's face is way too pink and her skin tone does not look natural. This is the same effect i get on my 42PX50. In order to get all yellows to look yellow without any green tint, i have to set the tint to the point that skin tones are too pink. As i set the tint level so that skin tones look more natural, the green tint starts to creep back into many yellow items (police caution tape, hot buttered corn on the cob, NYC taxi cabs, etc). The only way i was able to get these items to be pure yellow was to move the tint more red but skin tones go back to pink. None of these items should show green tint or green edges or green in the shadows, but they do. I'd trapped all these scenes on my DVR so i was able to pause and play back the yellow stuff while i made my adjustments. Some channels and programs are a little worse than others, while some are fine. I had to settle on ever-so-slightly-pink tint to most skin tones which left me with occasional ever-so-slightly-green tint on many yellow items.

Scott, can you adjust her skin tone till it looks normal (not pink) and see if that adds green tint to the yellow square?

I'll try to do that tonight when I get home.

Scott

Well, I just ordered my 50PX50 online today. If anyone has received their set via shipping, is there a tip indicator on the box? I'm just curious to know if to check for it on delivery.

Can't wait to get it at my new house.

Yes, there are shock indicators on the box. Mine had two. Just FYI, I worked in the TV business for years, and almost every plasma we received showed evidence of shock by the indicators. I was actually surprised when mine got delivered at home and there was no shock on the indicator. Chances are, if the indicator shows shock, there will not be a problem.

Scott

Leeda2 - that is great to hear on TVA. I spoke with them two days ago, and they were quite clear that they were not going to carry it because it was the "onyx line". Didn't really understand what that meant but am very happy if they do carry since their perfect pixel guarantee, good praise on board, good prices, etc. mean I will likely be buying from them. Glad to hear it. Hope the guy I got was just confused.

I think he was just confused. The Onyx line has a XVS30 suffix in the model numbers, but the PX500 is part of the Viera line like the PX50/PD50 series.

I to am unable to get my settings from Dark to Light. I to have a STB ( DTV )

Here are my current 50px50u settings.......

Consumer Menu:

Pic Mode: standard
Picture: +10
Brightness: +10 (I lower it to +5 at night for DVDs)
Color: -4
Tint: -8
Sharpness: 0
Color temp: normal
Color Mgmt: off
Video NR: off
3D Y/C filter: off
Color Matrix: HD
MPEG NR: off
Black Level: light

Have not yet screwed around with the Service Menu.. but will soon

Occasionally i will use "bias" lighting: ropelight from HomeDepot

No green push :D :D, Skin tones look normal (to me). Spongebob is yellow like a lemon. :) :)

Sometimes spongy looks like a lemon and sometimes a lime. BTW, with all this focus on green, you would think that the new pannys are uniquely plagued. I've read three reviews of Pios and each one referred to green push. In fact in the Sept/Oct edition of Perfect Vision the $10K MSRP 43 inch Pio was termed 'significantly oversaturated' with green.

But the woman's face is way too pink and her skin tone does not look natural. This is the same effect i get on my 42PX50. In order to get all yellows to look yellow without any green tint, i have to set the tint to the point that skin tones are too pink. As i set the tint level so that skin tones look more natural, the green tint starts to creep back into many yellow items (police caution tape, hot buttered corn on the cob, NYC taxi cabs, etc). The only way i was able to get these items to be pure yellow was to move the tint more red but skin tones go back to pink. None of these items should show green tint or green edges or green in the shadows, but they do. I'd trapped all these scenes on my DVR so i was able to pause and play back the yellow stuff while i made my adjustments. Some channels and programs are a little worse than others, while some are fine. I had to settle on ever-so-slightly-pink tint to most skin tones which left me with occasional ever-so-slightly-green tint on many yellow items.

Scott, can you adjust her skin tone till it looks normal (not pink) and see if that adds green tint to the yellow square?

Here I changed color from -5 to -10. It helped a bit. I could probably take the color down some more if needed. She is not this pink in real life on my screen.

http://img24.echo.cx/img24/6653/misc0uj.th.jpg (http://img24.echo.cx/my.php?image=misc0uj.jpg)

Scott

Thanks Randy! I haven't had a chance to check out this fix yet but I will do so tonight and report back.

Randy, thanks for pointing me to the fix. It worked like a charm.

Randywalters, here is one more with color -10 and tint 0.

http://img225.echo.cx/img225/3836/misc0633ho.th.jpg (http://img225.echo.cx/my.php?image=misc0633ho.jpg)

The next one is Vivid setting just for kicks.

http://img59.echo.cx/img59/9076/misc0648pn.th.jpg (http://img59.echo.cx/my.php?image=misc0648pn.jpg)

Scott

This weekend is my point of no return date for my Panny 50px50u. So I decided to finally compare the TV with others under circumstances as controlled as possible (specifically a Pio 5050 which was my second choice). Happily, one of the newer CCs in my area had a great plasma selection, a good viewing area against a wall where nearly all the plasmas are together, and, best of all, a high quality live feed from HDnet. They didn't have a 50px on display but they did have a 42px......same TV different size.

Immediately I saw what everyone has been complaining about with greens. With an exercise show on, and a multicolored sail promimently displayed the yellow part showed up as a light lime green on the Panny where on every other TV it was yellow. I checked the pic settings, tint was set way down and color management was on. And as I've been telling everyone here, CM is a green switch it needs to be off. So I set tint to -2 (my setting at home) turned CM off, and as John Madden would say, 'bam'/'whop'/'boom' the green became yellow and the Panny's yellow sail looked pretty much like all others.

After viewing the Panny specifically against the Pio 5050 I was surprised just how similar they looked when adjusted. The color palette was very similar though the Pio seemed to push the greens more than Panny and both pushed greens a bit more than all the other plasmas. Mostly, the yellows on the Panny/Pio looked alot like the yellow on the other plasmas. It was only on certain yellow-greens did the TVs push the green spectrum more.....a very small percent of content that I saw actually only a couple times in the 40 minutes I was viewing. Still, when I looked at both plasmas and compared them with the others, there were no better plasmas PQ wise IMO. Both great TVs. Looking at blacks, I could see where the Panny excelled but I could be easily happy with the Pio. Still there is no reason for me to switch out the Panny for the Pio.

CC also has last years Panny.....I didn't have time to seriously compare the PQ of that TV to the others.

I just got the latest Home Cinema Choice (UK HT mag). They complain about a Hitachi and a Loewe and one other non-Panasonic plasma pushing greens too, even when calibrated properly. The Hitachi won the comparison they were doing, and they mentioned that on the calibrated display, it's something you really have to look for. They kind of say that older plasmas were worse than newer with this.

DanP: good information, glad to hear the green is just a setting issue. I was in Fry's today and noticed yellow lines in the road were green on a 42PX50. I tried adjusting the tint, but the movie ended. It was on default Vivid mode settings. Panasonic definitely has an issue with the out of the box settings. The blacks blew everything else away on the floor (no Pioneer's present though)...there were some Sony's nearby that really showed the difference...the Sony's were grey compared to the Panasonic.

For those keeping score:

Still waiting on my PX500U that had an estimated arrival of 6/10 that I pre-ordered from a local store. I was told a week to 10 days from today. Argh...the pain.

Anyone else expecting a PX500U?

But the woman's face is way too pink and her skin tone does not look natural. This is the same effect i get on my 42PX50. In order to get all yellows to look yellow without any green tint, i have to set the tint to the point that skin tones are too pink. As i set the tint level so that skin tones look more natural, the green tint starts to creep back into many yellow items (police caution tape, hot buttered corn on the cob, NYC taxi cabs, etc). The only way i was able to get these items to be pure yellow was to move the tint more red but skin tones go back to pink. None of these items should show green tint or green edges or green in the shadows, but they do. I'd trapped all these scenes on my DVR so i was able to pause and play back the yellow stuff while i made my adjustments. Some channels and programs are a little worse than others, while some are fine. I had to settle on ever-so-slightly-pink tint to most skin tones which left me with occasional ever-so-slightly-green tint on many yellow items.

Randy, you hit the nail on the head. Most here disagree, but at the 4K-5K price point, I was expecting a "top of the line" PDP to do better than a $200 Chinese made CRT. "They" had several years to perfect this technology, but I guess there will always be a large number of people who will accept crap as long as there is some kind of "wow" factor. I too would accept the color inaccuracies if this PDP didn't also suffer from the "greeny" RBE. Oh well, I guess I'll have to wait for the SED displays before I can truly enjoy some large screen, direct view video nirvana.

Some channels and programs are a little worse than others, while some are fine.Your statement basically confirms most cable provider's dirty little secret, which is; how woefully poor/inconsistent their signal delivery and cable equipment are. If some channels look fine and others don't... it's not your PDPs fault... the problem originates with your cable provider which is magnified using display technology that renders a picture as intense as does Plasma. I had a CableCARD installed in my 50PX50U yesterday and can assure you I see a perceptible improvement regarding picture clarity for both SD/HD content and the color renderings are more accurate.

For PD50U owners, the lack of a CableCARD interface puts most in the situation of being dependent on their cable provider's STB; but for those with a PX50U they can improve their PDPs performance by switching to a CableCARD which prevents some 2nd rate STB from mucking around with the incoming signal and the PDPs ability to decipher it.

Randy, you hit the nail on the head. Most here disagree, but at the 4K-5K price point, I was expecting a "top of the line" PDP to do better than a $200 Chinese made CRT. "They" had several years to perfect this technology, but I guess there will always be a large number of people who will accept crap as long as there is some kind of "wow" factor. I too would accept the color inaccuracies if this PDP didn't also suffer from the "greeny" RBE. Oh well, I guess I'll have to wait for the SED displays before I can truly enjoy some large screen, direct view video nirvana.

There is no way that these sets can't blow away a $200 CRT (made in China or not). The fact that you think they can't tells me you haven't a clue, and will likely never be happy with any set ever. Now, I was lucky enough to get my pd50u for free, and having sold tv's for more than 10 years, believe me, there is no WOW factor for me. I have a Sharp HDTV DLP projector, a Mitusbishi HDTV RPTV and a few Sharp LCD's. I really don't need this plasma, so if it didn't perform as well as my other sets I would sell it to someone needing the, as you put it, "wow factor." I would encourage anyone looking at plasmas to seriously consider the Panasonics.

Scott

After adjusting tint and color to get rid of the green push on my set, I don't feel that faces are too pink at all. All the colors seem about right.

I'm sure my TV is not as accurate as a professional grade CRT, but the color rendition looks more natural than any CRT I've had before (all Sony, who supposedly makes the best CRTs.)

It's just unfortunate that a few people, just because they were unhappy with their set, have to keep insisting that others are willing to put up with "crap" just because of the "wow" factor.

Maybe it's more likely that the large number of other people really like the PQ of their set, and feel that it is far from any "crap".

Randy, you hit the nail on the head. Most here disagree, but at the 4K-5K price point, I was expecting a "top of the line" PDP to do better than a $200 Chinese made CRT. "They" had several years to perfect this technology, but I guess there will always be a large number of people who will accept crap as long as there is some kind of "wow" factor. I too would accept the color inaccuracies if this PDP didn't also suffer from the "greeny" RBE. Oh well, I guess I'll have to wait for the SED displays before I can truly enjoy some large screen, direct view video nirvana.

Greeny RBE....in the Pannys in particular? I think there have been other posts suggesting RBE is not a characteristic of these models but can happen in plasma technology regardless of model (as they have been observed in other models). Of course, DLPs are the worse in this regard.

$4K to 5K plasma=top of the line in your mind? What universe do you live in? The price point is a low price breakthrough in the world of HD PDPs.

To suggest that the typical Pannys buyer succumbs to the 'wow factor' and doesn't realize it is 'crap' implies that all of us new Panny owners are not very bright. There seems to be alot of intelligent discussion here about the Pannys puctuated periodically by hyperbolic and whiny posts....like yours. I agree you should steer far away from these TVs. And if you steer far away from this thread you won't be missed as you add nothing productive.

$4K to 5K plasma=top of the line in your mind? What universe do you live in? The price point is a low price breakthrough in the world of HD PDPs.Right. This spring was the 1st time I could actually afford the BIG screen TV I wanted... a 50PX50U, so I went out and bought it. After 6 weeks of ownership I have no regrets. The more I watch and adjust the PDP the better my picture being rendered. I had a CableCARD installed in the PDP yesterday and can clearly see improvement in both SD/HD picture renderings. Colors appear to be a bit more saturated and true to form. My problem right now is my cable company, Albany Time Warner who installed my CableCARD, will not pass ATSC DD audio through the digital optical output of the PX50U. When cabled to my DD DTS-ES 6.1 receiver all ATSC/PCM goes through the optical output to the receiver but when DD sound is passed the receiver goes into "Pro Logic" mode the sound output stops. I called TW for support and they said "there is no support" for that feature through their CableCARD.

Silly me... I thought if I were using TWs equipment and paying for their digital service I might expect DD sound through their CableCARD? In order to properly express my dissatisfaction with TWs customer service I decided to return my SA8300HD-DVR and drop $50 worth of their CATV services... which after my latest $5400 purchase appears to meet with the WAF. Maybe I'll switch from broadband to DSL Internet service while I'm at it? I'll try Verizon DSL for a while and save $15/mo. in the process by dropping TW-RR.

For the time being I'll keep the CableCARD installed in the PDP and TWs basic digital package plus their HD digital tier. Hopefully HD-DVD will arrive soon since I have an open HDMI port and I'll go back to renting DVDs more often.

... To suggest that the typical Pannys buyer succumbs to the 'wow factor' and doesn't realize it is 'crap' implies that all of us new Panny owners are not very bright. There seems to be alot of intelligent discussion here about the Pannys puctuated periodically by hyperbolic and whiny posts....like yours. I agree you should steer far away from these TVs. And if you steer far away from this thread you won't be missed as you add nothing productive.

So has this turned into the Offical Fanboy thread?

Rationalizing defects = "intelligent discussion"
Critidizing display = "steer far away from this thread"

LOL

So has this turned into the Offical Fanboy thread?

Rationalizing defects = "intelligent discussion"
Critidizing display = "steer far away from this thread"

LOLI guess... I have to admit that after 6 weeks of being a happy PX50U owner... I'm still 'lovin' it! That is, watching my PDP. Unfortunately a lot of miss-information gets passed on this (and other) thread(s) because some PDP owners don't have the first clue how to 'optimize' the performance of their home entertainment systems given their equipment and the CATV/Satellite/OTA provider they use. Those who 'hysterically' proclaim their TVs are malfunctioning really need to address all of the factors that comprise their in-home entertainment systems before 'trash talking' the 50U series PDP. If you don't understand what you're looking at… you’re not qualified to make recommendations to those seeking advice.

As is generally the case... "those of you who think you know everything are annoying to those of us who do..."

So has this turned into the Offical Fanboy thread?

Rationalizing defects = "intelligent discussion"
Critidizing display = "steer far away from this thread"

LOL

Don't knock it until you've tried it. Maybe this thread is not for you. If you really don't have anything constructive to say please refrain from posting here.

We already have enough stuff to worry about here.

Thanks.

Dave

So has this turned into the Offical Fanboy thread?

Rationalizing defects = "intelligent discussion"
Critidizing display = "steer far away from this thread"

LOL

Is comparing the Pannys to a $200 Chinese CRT 'intelligent discussion? Or implying that it exhibits RBE exclusive among plasmas (it doesn't.....read the other thread). To contest those things make's one a 'fanboy?' My Gosh, do you have anything else to bring to the table other than invalid equations and smack talk?

Is comparing the Pannys to a $200 Chinese CRT 'intelligent discussion? Or implying that it exhibits RBE exclusive among plasmas (it doesn't.....read the other thread). To contest those things make's one a 'fanboy?' My Gosh, do you have anything else to bring to the table other than invalid equations and smack talk?Pictures with CableCARD to come... damn... I wish I had DD 5.1 sound! Hey… Albany Time Warner… what’s up with your digital audio service using your CableCARD to audio optical out?

So has this turned into the Offical Fanboy thread?

Rationalizing defects = "intelligent discussion"
Critidizing display = "steer far away from this thread"

LOL

It's perfectly fine to talk about the shortcomings of a display. Just try not to suggest that owners who are happy with their set are simply fanboys who are willing to put up with crappy displays because of some wow factor. This goes for all products, not just Panasonic.

Speaking of gripes about my PX50, I have a few.

I want another HDMI input.
Individual input memory settings would have been nice.
The table-top stand sticks out too far (4 inches) in the back, meaning that the gap between the TV and the wall is a bit too large.
The channel changes when going from one format (i.e. from 720p to 1080i) take way too long. I suspect that both the TV and the HD DVR are to blame.
SD channels can look really crappy sometimes.

It's perfectly fine to talk about the shortcomings of a display. Just try not to suggest that owners who are happy with their set are simply fanboys who are willing to put up with crappy displays because of some wow factor. This goes for all products, not just Panasonic.

Speaking of gripes about my PX50, I have a few.

I want another HDMI input.
Individual input memory settings would have been nice.
The table-top stand sticks out too far (4 inches) in the back, meaning that the gap between the TV and the wall is a bit too large.
The channel changes when going from one format (i.e. from 720p to 1080i) take way too long. I suspect that both the TV and the HD DVR are to blame.Sorry jrock but I have to disagree... it's your DVR & CATV signal, not your PDP to blame.
SD channels can look really crappy sometimes.For a noticeable improvement in SD quality... try a CableCARD. :)

I was very excited to see on the Vann's website the listing of all the features of the px500. This included 3:2 pulldown. I went over to check the px50's specs, and to my surprise it also listed 3:2 pulldown for the px50. However, I think it has been demonstrated very early in this thread that the px50's do not have this feature. Which leads me to question all of the information posted on Vann's website. Can anyone clarify this? Am I wrong, do the px50's have 3:2 pulldown?

Darren

OK, This Panny-Boy is guilty...

I have not read the last 40 or so posts to this thread and I know I probably should. For all I know, there is probably some piece of info that is critical to my viewing pleasure. Sigh, that is the story of my life...

Anyway, as for stories and lives... I have been using the pd50u since the early delivery days (I pre-ordered, sight unseen) and I do have some feed-back to provide:

This set is great and I am am glad I have it.

Best of wishes to all of you that are looking for a set. For those of you who already have something, I hope you enjoy your decision :)

I am trying to figure out if my existing 32" wide stand is wide enough the accommodate the included pedestal stand of the 50PX50. Would someone mind posting the length of the included stand?

Thanks in advance.

Kelly

I am trying to figure out if my existing 32" wide stand is wide enough the accommodate the included pedestal stand of the 50PX50. Would someone mind posting the length of the included stand?

Thanks in advance.

Kelly

It's 32" wide exactly....lucky you! Make sure it can hold 100 lbs.

Some renderings from this evening for your perusal...

http://home.nycap.rr.com/nessus/DSC01107.JPG

http://home.nycap.rr.com/nessus/DSC01123.JPG

http://home.nycap.rr.com/nessus/DSC01124.JPG

Optivity: that grass is too green, should be more yellow...just kidding.

My son was watching Sponge Bob (okay, so was I) on our trusty 34" CRT HDTV that we've enjoyed for many years and a TW HD-DVR STB. Low and behold he had hints of green all over him. I go back to Optivity's comments: I think the source is to blame. I've seen other episdoes where he wasn't nearly as green.

Thanks for the quick reply Dan. Sounds like I will be replacing my 250lb CRT this week! Now I have to to find someone willing to help me move my old set... :D

Optivity, those shots look great exept for the big-ass station logos that drive me absolutely nuts. How do you capture those shots without the screen door effect I keep getting when I take photos of my plasma?

Scott

It's 32" wide exactly....lucky you! Make sure it can hold 100 lbs.

I wonder why the 50PX50U stand is 1/8" narrower than the stand for the 42PX50U (mine measures 32-1/8" across). I would have thought the stand for the 50" would be wider than the one on the 42" . . . .

I wonder why the 50PX50U stand is 1/8" narrower than the stand for the 42PX50U (mine measures 32-1/8" across). I would have thought the stand for the 50" would be wider than the one on the 42" . . . .

I measured again....width doesn't break 32". Maybe I have an Asian stand and yours is Mexican. :p

Yes, optivity you are obviously a Panny loyalist fanboi who can't see the greeny RBE which makes the TV not even comparable to cheapo Chinese CRT. ;) BTW, those are excellent images that capture the Panny color palette very well. And those blacks are sumthin.

I measured again....width doesn't break 32". Maybe I have an Asian stand and yours is Mexican. :p

Nope, TV came from Japan. I measured again and still got a little over 32" wide, so i tried a different tape measure and it's now a hair UNDER 32" wide. Obviously my first tape measure is incorrect :o

Optivity: that grass is too green, should be more yellow...just kidding. :eek: How do you capture those shots without the screen door effect I keep getting when I take photos of my plasma?The screen shots were captured with a 4 mega pixel digital camera from ~10' to the panel (no flash). Once transferred to the PC; I open the file with MS Paint, Stretch/Skew to downsize the image 50% & then 50% again before saving it as a JPG image. By the time it's published for public consumption... who knows how accurately it reflects what the panel really renders? However, this is basically what I see on my PDP except in it's 50" diagonal size. ;)

Sorry jrock but I have to disagree... it's your DVR & CATV signal, not your PDP to blame.
For a noticeable improvement in SD quality... try a CableCARD. :)
optivity, noticeable improvement in sd??? Any difference in HD? I cant live without my dvr now that i have it on the 37px50, but if i get a 50px500 i may go with the cablecard, any disadvantages to it? The sd can look HORRIBLE at times, if cablecard can improve that I may go with it.

optivity, noticeable improvement in sd??? Any difference in HD? I cant live without my dvr now that i have it on the 37px50, but if i get a 50px500 i may go with the cablecard, any disadvantages to it? The sd can look HORRIBLE at times, if cablecard can improve that I may go with it.

I'm not impressed with the picture quality of my 42PX's internal cable tuner - it isn't quite as good as the picture i get through my TWC SA8000 DVR. It doesn't matter though, i'd never watch TV live again as long as we have DVRs.

I'm not impressed with the picture quality of my 42PX's internal cable tuner - it isn't quite as good as the picture i get through my TWC SA8000 DVR. It doesn't matter though, i'd never watch TV live again as long as we have DVRs.

Randy, how long do channel changes take on your SA8000HD when you go from 1080i to 720p, or 1080i to 480i?

Mine takes ridiculously long, like 5 seconds.

Any updates on the PX500U and when they will be in stock anywhere?

Thanks.

optivity, noticeable improvement in sd??? Any difference in HD? I cant live without my dvr now that i have it on the 37px50, but if i get a 50px500 i may go with the cablecard, any disadvantages to it? The sd can look HORRIBLE at times, if cablecard can improve that I may go with it.I've been using a CableCARD since Saturday and so far my observations are that picture clarity & color renderings are better for all SD/HD content. As you move from one connection type to another (e.g. composite --> component --> HDMI --> CableCARD) there are incremental improvements made to the picture the PDP renders. IMO the internal tuner/scalar/electronics in my $5000 PDP has to be at least a wee bit better than some cheapo cable box designed to resist the shock treatment that most users administer to things they don't own.

For the extra $2/mo. why not try the CableCARD and judge things for yourself? While I agree a DVR is nice to have... in my reality... I wind up erasing half the stuff I record without ever watching those programs anyway.

As for CableCARD disadvantages: one-way communication so there is no program guide, PPV or On-Demand services. Without a cable box there is no option to stretch/zoom HD content with a PX50U, but after 6 weeks I see no evidence of image retention so I'm not as paranoid about 'black bars' being displayed once the PDPs phosphors are fully aged. The BIGGIE in my case is Albany Time Warner does not pass DD 5.1 through the PDPs optical audio output with their CableCARD, so I have to use my DD DTS-ES 6.1 channel sound system in stereo mode only. Hopefully your CATV provider passes the full digital signal you pay for... on to you.

I've been using a CableCARD since Saturday and so far my observations are that picture clarity & color renderings are better for all SD/HD content. As you move from one connection type to another (e.g. composite --> component --> HDMI --> CableCARD) there are incremental improvements made to the picture the PDP renders. IMO the internal tuner/scalar/electronics in my $5000 PDP has to be at least a wee bit better than some cheapo cable box designed to resist the shock treatment that most users administer to things they don't own.

For the extra $2/mo. why not try the CableCARD and judge things for yourself? While I agree a DVR is nice to have... in my reality... I wind up erasing half the stuff I record without ever watching those programs anyway.

As for CableCARD disadvantages: one-way communication so there is no program guide, PPV or On-Demand services. Without a cable box there is no option to stretch/zoom HD content with a PX50U, but after 6 weeks I see no evidence of image retention so I'm not as paranoid about 'black bars' being displayed once the PDPs phosphors are fully aged. The BIGGIE in my case is Albany Time Warner does not pass DD 5.1 through the PDPs optical audio output with their CableCARD, so I have to use my DD DTS-ES 6.1 channel sound system in stereo mode only. Hopefully your CATV provider passes the full digital signal you pay for... on to you.

oo no on demand or program guide, guess im gonna have to live with the poor sd quality from the cable box. Maybe try s-video connection as some people seem to have better luck with that. The # = stretch is pretty usefull too, i use it all the time, wouldnt want to give that up either.

I'm not impressed with the picture quality of my 42PX's internal cable tuner - it isn't quite as good as the picture i get through my TWC SA8000 DVR. It doesn't matter though, i'd never watch TV live again as long as we have DVRs.If your TVs tuner doesn't render a better picture than SciAtl's prior generation 8000 series STB... it sounds like there are other problems with your set-up which are not related to the tuner(s). Like any other network... data communications is as robust as the weakest link.

Any updates on the PX500U and when they will be in stock anywhere?

Thanks.

I have one on order at my local Tweeter store, and stopped by yesterday to find out expected delivery. Salesguy told me their warehouse schedule says July 1st!!

Randy, how long do channel changes take on your SA8000HD when you go from 1080i to 720p, or 1080i to 480i?

Mine takes ridiculously long, like 5 seconds.

Painfully slow. It goes through several contortions when switching between these formats. My previous 32" HD-ready Panny tube did pretty much the same thing so i'm already used to it. The SA8000HD actually changes channels pretty quickly, it's the TV that slows the process down as it resolves the new output format of the new channel.

oo no on demand or program guide, guess im gonna have to live with the poor sd quality from the cable box. Maybe try s-video connection as some people seem to have better luck with that. The # = stretch is pretty usefull too, i use it all the time, wouldnt want to give that up either.


but you're considering waiting for the px500's you said, right? They have the program guide that you can use with the cable card! Just a thought.....

I have one on order at my local Tweeter store, and stopped by yesterday to find out expected delivery. Salesguy told me their warehouse schedule says July 1st!!

July 1st? Yikes, that really bites! i was shootin' for next week sometime! the guy who emailed me back from panny told me mid-month. That's not mid-month........
ugh, so annoying! Thanks for the update!! Anyone else hearing anything different?

Foos-Man, any other word from your px500 order?

Now you know... "SA 8300HD greenish tint" (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=548624)

I just got off the phone with Panasonic online store and they said the following:

42" 500U will be shipping out Monday June 20.
50" 500U will be shipping out Monday June 27.

They sell at MSRP. These ship dates are from their online store, meaning that other online stores and bm stores may be close to getting them as well. Let's hope this is true.

I just got off the phone with Panasonic online store and they said the following:

42" 500U will be shipping out Monday June 20.
50" 500U will be shipping out Monday June 27.

They sell at MSRP. These ship dates are from their online store, meaning that other online stores and bm stores may be close to getting them as well. Let's hope this is true.

JUST AS I THOUGHT! Right after the big fathers day sales push! I can't friggin wait!! gotta start movin' some money around now! Daddy's gettin' a new PDP! :D

July 1st? Yikes, that really bites! i was shootin' for next week sometime! the guy who emailed me back from panny told me mid-month. That's not mid-month........
ugh, so annoying! Thanks for the update!! Anyone else hearing anything different?

Foos-Man, any other word from your px500 order?

Tweeter got the 50pu's in about a week after TVA did (at least where I live).....and I think TVA was one of the first e-tailers to ship 'em out. I asked Tweeter to give me a call when they had 'em in.....by that time my 50u was nearly broken in.

Tweeter got the 50pu's in about a week after TVA did (at least where I live).....and I think TVA was one of the first e-tailers to ship 'em out. I asked Tweeter to give me a call when they had 'em in.....by that time my 50u was nearly broken in.


Thanks DanP! Unfortunately, I don't see px500's on their site AT ALL! For a PDP that's due out AT LEAST by the end of the month, you'd expect SOMETHING? No pricing, no pre-order info, nada. After chatting online with one of their sales Rep's, they don't have an exact time frame for expecting them in either, so it kinda makes me a bit weary. You'd think they could at least give me a rough timeframe or something?

Call me crazy, but I've noticed something about yellows while I'm here sitting at work.

The highlighter than I'm holding in my hand is bright yellow under direct light. But lo and behold, if I put it under some shading (like under my desk), it definitely gets a light-greenish tinge to it.

It could possibly be why sometimes objects appear yellow and other times they take on a greenish tinge. It happens in real life depending on lighting and shadows.

Call me crazy, but I've noticed something about yellows while I'm here sitting at work.

The highlighter than I'm holding in my hand is bright yellow under direct light. But lo and behold, if I put it under some shading (like under my desk), it definitely gets a light-greenish tinge to it.

It could possibly be why sometimes objects appear yellow and other times they take on a greenish tinge. It happens in real life depending on lighting and shadows.

SHHHHHHHH!!!! You must edit your post immediately! If THEY find out that we've discovered their secret about yellow then we're all done for! ;)

Call me crazy, but I've noticed something about yellows while I'm here sitting at work.

The highlighter than I'm holding in my hand is bright yellow under direct light. But lo and behold, if I put it under some shading (like under my desk), it definitely gets a light-greenish tinge to it.

It could possibly be why sometimes objects appear yellow and other times they take on a greenish tinge. It happens in real life depending on lighting and shadows.

I would check out webmd to see if someone can tell you how to open your brain's service menu. See if you can cut back the tint on the optic center of your brain.

Scott

I am going to buy my first plamsa in August, should I get the Panasonic TH-42PX50U 42" Flat Panel HD-Ready Plasma TV or wait until I can get the 42" 500U? Also, I will need the panny side speakers as I will not be getting an a/v reciever for this unit. What is the model number of the suggested side speakers? Lastly, anyone have a link for the either the manual or exact dimensions on the 42" 500U or the TH-42PX50U 42? Thanks Phil

…Lastly, anyone have a link for the either the manual or exact dimensions on the 42" 500U or the TH-42PX50U 42? Thanks Phil

Maybe the dimensions in the combo manual for the TH-37PX50U, TH-42PX50U, & TH-50PX50U will help:

http://service.us.panasonic.com/OPERMANPDF/TH37PX50U.PDF

You guys are cracking me up.

I am expecting my PX500U between 6/15-6/20, I know this is not exact, but it is all I am getting from the store...supposedly from "the person in charge of ordering stuff." I feel pretty confident it will be in by 6/20.

As for dimensions on the PX500U that someone asked about, it is:
113.8 cm (44.8 in.) wide X 73.0 cm (28.74 in.) high X 9.8 cm (3.86 in.)

This does not include either of the available stands. Also, in the illustration it appears to have something towards the bottom that appears slightly wider than 9.8cm that could possibly be part of the stand.

I am going to buy my first plamsa in August, should I get the Panasonic TH-42PX50U 42" Flat Panel HD-Ready Plasma TV or wait until I can get the 42" 500U? Also, I will need the panny side speakers as I will not be getting an a/v reciever for this unit. What is the model number of the suggested side speakers? Lastly, anyone have a link for the either the manual or exact dimensions on the 42" 500U or the TH-42PX50U 42? Thanks Phil

It really depends on what you need out of your pdp! The px500's will have several features that the px50's don't currently have. For example, a better sound system that includes four slim side speakers and two woofers built in below the display, a tv guide for your cable card, PIP, PC/SD card slots, PC input connection and an optical digital audio output. And IMHO the biggest factor is how the px500 looks. All these perks will cost you a few hundred more though. So if you need these features w/ your current setup or just want 'em for possible future upgrades to your system, I suggest the px500. If not, the 50's sounds like a great alternative! Hope this helps!

Found a site that measures the 42px500 @:
44.8" W
28.74" H
5.43" D
Weight: 88.18 lbs.

And the px50 @:
Height 27.6 inches
Width 42.0 inches
Depth 3.8 inches
Weight: 76.06 lbs

I agree with mscappa, the looks are what tipped me in its favor, but also I am hoping the sound it great. I've gotten spoiled by a 34" CRT that has a built in subwoofer and awesome sound. I know that people will argue the sound isn't a big deal due to surround sound systems. But, I will tell you that 99% of the time we watch without surround sound and the speaker performance is important.

It really depends on what you need out of your pdp! The px500's will have several features that the px50's don't currently have. For example . . . . . an optical digital audio output. And IMHO the biggest factor is how the px500 looks.

Actually the PX50 does have Optical Digital Output (i'm using mine). And i like the look of the PX50 a little better than the PX500 myself although neither are all that great looking especially with the speakers now being on the bottom which makes the TV taller and narrower.

The big question is will the U.S. version of the PX500U have the ability to stretch or zoom Hi Def signals to get rid of the pillarbox bars on upconverted digital 4:3 programming on the HD channels? Knowing Panasonic, it probaby will not. I think it would be a big selling point to a lot of people (like myself). The new JVC XA display has this ability and i seriously considered buying it, but it was over a grand more than the Panny.

Regarding stretch and zoom hi-def on the 50u.....I was playing with my H10 D*TV receiver and set the resolution options at "native" and "all resolutions." I could stretch and zoom the high def signal all I wanted. You don't need to do it through the TV if your box does it. Anyway it doesn't interest me much. I set the box back to 1080i and watch everything in full. I even prefer ESPNHD upconverted to 1080i vs. the native 720. SD quality just doesn't matter much to me. And with the glorious pic quality of the 50u, I watch HD now almost exclusively. Ya, ya, I'm a fanboy. You 500u guys are gonna love the TV. Ignore the pic controversy and just trust me, hehe.

Regarding sound, I send the optical audio from my H10 straight to my Dolby Digital receiver.

It's perfectly fine to talk about the shortcomings of a display. Just try not to suggest that owners who are happy with their set are simply fanboys who are willing to put up with crappy displays because of some wow factor. This goes for all products, not just Panasonic.

I'm pretty happy with my 42PX, and even though i've dialed out 98% of my particular set's "green push" problem i wish i didn't have to work so hard to get it looking as good as it will get. But most yellow stuff looks yellow enough now so it's a minor annoyance at most, and only shows up on a few scenes. I'm more annoyed at the lack of certain features like Variable Audio Output and HD Zoom/Stretch and separate QAM and ATSC tuners and PC input etc.

I doubt there is a perfect display for everybody, but these new decontented Panasonics do kinda leave themselves open for more criticism but i betcha we can find faults and shortcomings on virtually every brand and model of display on the market. What it boiled down to with me is that it has a fantastic picture for the price and to get all the features i wanted would cost me at least another grand or two and it just wasn't worth the extra cost.


Speaking of gripes about my PX50, I have a few.

I want another HDMI input.

The channel changes when going from one format (i.e. from 720p to 1080i) take way too long. I suspect that both the TV and the HD DVR are to blame.
SD channels can look really crappy sometimes.

Yeah one can never have enough inputs, and Panasonic cheaped out a bit here compared to their competition. The channel change contortions and delay happen on other brands of plasmas as well so that's more of a format change issue. My SA8000HD changes channels fast - it's the TV that is slowing the process. My 32" HD Panny tube TV does the exact same thing as my new plasma so i'm used to it.

Almost all of my SD channels look good to excellent - and the few that don't look good are not broadcast in good quality in the first place. I never watch QVC but it looks almost DVD quality, Speedchannel looks fantastic too. All my local networks have very good SD PQ.


The table-top stand sticks out too far (4 inches) in the back, meaning that the gap between the TV and the wall is a bit too large.

This bothered me at first because i wanted to shove the TV all the way up against the wall but i realize the stand needs to have a deep enough footprint that the panel be stable. Luckily it extends a lot less rearward than it does frontward, and since the cables stick straight out of the back this 4" rear depth serves to give the cables plenty of room to bend downward and also ensures that the back of the panel is not placed too close to the wall and allows for proper cooling. I don't know how suitable this thing would be for wall-hanging what with the cables sticking straight out like that.

I've considered carving a suitable notch in the backside of the stand to give the cables a clear path so they aren't pinched between the stand and the wall, and this will allow me to move it almost an inch closer to the wall.

Regarding stretch and zoom hi-def on the 50u.....I was playing with my H10 D*TV receiver and set the resolution options at "native" and "all resolutions." I could stretch and zoom the high def signal all I wanted. You don't need to do it through the TV if your box does it. Anyway it doesn't interest me much.


While it's true that most STBs will allow you to stretch or zoom HD signals, i'd much prefer using the TV's "JUST" mode if it were available as it looks much better than the STB's FULL or ZOOM mode.


I set the box back to 1080i and watch everything in full. I even prefer ESPNHD upconverted to 1080i vs. the native 720. SD quality just doesn't matter much to me. And with the glorious pic quality of the 50u, I watch HD now almost exclusively.

Unfortunately for me, Speedchannel and local/network/cable news programming is not in HD or even in widescreen for that matter. Most of the programming on the network HD channels and ESPN-HD is still pillarboxed upconverted 4:3 so it would be nice if the TV's JUST mode were available here. Different owners have different setups and different needs, and as such will have different complaints or disappointments.

If your TVs tuner doesn't render a better picture than SciAtl's prior generation 8000 series STB... it sounds like there are other problems with your set-up which are not related to the tuner(s). Like any other network... data communications is as robust as the weakest link.

I get a really good signal from my cable company. A Tech once told me that their digital converter boxes (and DVRs) make better use of this signal than the cable tuner in my TV when i had them out here for a DVR problem last year. He checked the signal at the TV and DVR and said it's perfect. The neighborhood is all fiber-optic right up to the pole behind my house, then from there it's a single run of one-year-old RG6 cable going straight into my living room to a good cable-company-supplied 4-output splitter behind my TV table. From the splitter i'm using four short screw-on RG6 patch cables to the SA8000, SA8000HD, TV's RF input, and one of the VCRs. I've tried all different combinations of connection methods and interchanged cables but it always looks better through the DVRs than directly into the TVs tuner (which looks a little grainy by comparison). I get the same results with my 32" HD-ready Panny tube TV and my 15" Sharp LCD TV in the bedroom too - these TVs simply look better when the signal is routed through my DVR or bedroom's Explorer 2000 cable converter. It's not a huge difference, but is quite noticeable.

I would check out webmd to see if someone can tell you how to open your brain's service menu. See if you can cut back the tint on the optic center of your brain.

Scott

This whole thing is obvious. You guys are clearly eating too chlorophyll – you know, broccoli, asparagus, peas, etc. You need to eat more yellow squash.

Seriously, though, I wonder, maybe, the problem is that never in my life have I seen true yellow, I am now seeing it for the first time, and I think it is something else – like greenish yellow. My whole reality has been changed...

Really seriously, though, as I watch more HD and less SD, two things jump out.

First, this problem is much more serious on SD, but then again, I can now see that there is no color fidelity at all on SD, so (IMHO) it is entirely the signal. I don’t want to be crude, but the S can only stand for one word ...

Second, on HD, there’s no green tint, just a really outspoken neon green that jumps out of the screen when you least expect it, grabs everyone by the ears, shakes their head around, and then just dissipates – like laughing gas.

I just wish I could see the M&M commercial on HD.

Regards, Michael

I'm pretty happy with my 42PX, and even though i've dialed out 98% of my particular set's "green push" problem i wish i didn't have to work so hard to get it looking as good as it will get. But most yellow stuff looks yellow enough now so it's a minor annoyance at most, and only shows up on a few scenes. I'm more annoyed at the lack of certain features like Variable Audio Output and HD Zoom/Stretch and separate QAM and ATSC tuners and PC input etc.



The green push issue works almost like a pixel issue. You can go a long time without noticing that a pixel is bad but once you do you can't take your eyes off it. And what brought our attention to it in the first place is the neon-green controversy which turned out to be a false issue. If a neon-green appears, you can be pretty confident is supposed to be there. Thenceforward, we have obsessed over green. To the point of not even considering other colors. Like red, which pushes too, IMO. It does so without affecting fleshtones which seems odd. Anyway, I'm a believer in the idea of letting the Panny be Panny. In other words, don't try to dail out green too much because you might end up feeding another issue. Right now my color picture settings are almost nulled back to default (color -1, tint -2). They wanted their picture to look a certain way and have succeeded in producing a very fetching picture.

The green push issue works almost like a pixel issue. You can go a long time without noticing that a pixel is bad but once you do you can't take your eyes off it. And what brought our attention to it in the first place is the neon-green controversy which turned out to be a false issue. If a neon-green appears, you can be pretty confident is supposed to be there. Thenceforward, we have obsessed over green. To the point of not even considering other colors. Like red, which pushes too, IMO. It does so without affecting fleshtones which seems odd. Anyway, I'm a believer in the idea of letting the Panny be Panny. In other words, don't try to dail out green too much because you might end up feeding another issue. Right now my color picture settings are almost nulled back to default (color -1, tint -2). They wanted their picture to look a certain way and have succeeded in producing a very fetching picture.IMO... your observations are "right on." The more acquainted I become with my 50PX50U... the better it performs. For anyone using an external STB... give the CableCARD a try... I've been using the CableCARD since Saturday and my PDPs renderings are spectacular. I've managed to obtain that Panasonic "Wow!" factor... The colors are "dead-on" with absolutely no evidence of "green-push" or for lack of a better acronym... the reported PDP-RBE.

My current settings:

Picture Mode: Standard
Picture: +17
Brightness: -3
Color: 0
Tint: 0
Sharpness: +15
Color Temp: Normal
Color Management: On
Video NR: Off
3D Y/C Filter: On
Color Matrix: SD/HD (auto adjusts with signal)
MPEG NR: Off
Black Level: Light/Dark (auto adjusts with signal)

It turns out your cable provider has a 'dirty little secret' which is, the tuner's in their STBs (and whatever those boxes do before the signal reaches your PDP) are inferior compared to the internal electronics used to build your $2500 - $5000 [MSRP] Panasonic display. Like anything else with the 'bleeding' edge of HIGH technology... one has to accept the trade-offs/limitations which accompany the connection options and equipment used to build a Home Entertainment System.

I've used both the SA8000HD-DVR & the SA8300HD-DVR on & off during the past (3) years and understand the options/convenience features these devices provide. Perhaps it's time to integrate both CableCARD & DVR in order to achieve the ultimate home entertainment experience. ;)

I'm surprised you have color management 'on' optivity. Are you going through a psychedelic phase? ;)

I'm surprised you have color management 'on' optivity. Are you going through a psychedelic phase? ;) No... those days ended about 30 years ago... :eek:

and, I don't wear 'rose-colored' glasses either.

I'm surprised you have color management 'on' optivity. Are you going through a psychedelic phase? ;)


I was going to ask the same question! Everyone seems to think it's better off? Just curious to hear what you've found in perfecting your picture!

I was going to ask the same question! Everyone seems to think it's better off? Just curious to hear what you've found in perfecting your picture!I believe many of these settings may play a more or less significant role based upon the input being used. Adjustments to settings like Color Management and Color Matrix SD/HD (480i/480p) seem to have a bigger impact when using the PDPs component inputs rather than for HDMI or CableCARD.

"Color Matrix: SD/HD (auto adjusts with signal)"

Since I don't own this particular series of plasma, the following is my theory on the green push issue! I have seen this same issue on some older Hitachi sets, and this was how we solved the problem. Good Luck


If you are using a cable box that is set to upscale SD to 1080i or 720p you must manually change the color matrix in the TV's menu to SD when watching an SD channel. If you don't the TV will think it is receiving an HD broadcast and will auto select the HD color matrix which WILL give SD programs a strong green tint. Even if you are using the set's internal tuner or your
cable box is set for native output; you still may want to manually select SD color matrix. I hope this helps!

Larry

I'm sure that the PQ is more accurate without any STB, but I can't give up the awesome functionality of my HD-DVR. So I'll have to take convenience over a little degradation in PQ at this point.

Although, my HD PQ is so good that it's hard to imagine something being better. SD PQ, on the other hand, could use some help, depending a lot on the channel and the source.

I'm sure that the PQ is more accurate without any STB, but I can't give up the awesome functionality of my HD-DVR. So I'll have to take convenience over a little degradation in PQ at this point.To paraphrase one of my recent posts:

"Like anything else with the 'bleeding' edge of HIGH technology... one has to accept the trade-offs/limitations which accompany the connection options and equipment used to build a Home Entertainment System.

I've used both the SA8000HD-DVR & the SA8300HD-DVR on & off during the past (3) years and understand the options/convenience features these devices provide. Perhaps it's time to integrate both CableCARD & DVR in order to achieve the ultimate home entertainment experience."

For the extra $1.75/mo. why not at least try a CableCARD and then share your observations?

optivity,
I'm with you on this one. I use a cablecard with my Pioneer 5050 and I get a much better picture than my old SA 8300. There is just more depth to the picture with the cablecard. I personally think there is some D/A conversion going on in the SA 8300 even if you use the HDMI connection and passthrough feature of the SA 8300. Do I miss the guide, ppv or on-demand features from TWC??? Nope.

I've been trying to get a cablecard that actually WORKS in my 42PX. The cableguy has been out with two of them and no dice. When he was installing the second one he mention that the DVR with HDMI connection gives the best signal then second is cablecard. I have a hard time believing that, what could be better than a direct connection? I think he was trying to sell me