Panasonic PZ80/PZ85 Owners Thread [No Price Talk] - Page 3

Pioneer is great and all, but I can't afford it.

EPP price for the Panny 50in 85U is too good right now, I can get 2 for the price of 1 Pioneer 1080p non-Elite.

I'll be happy with my measly 85U as long as it doesn't have clouding, corner flashlights and backlight banding.

Maybe these new sets from Panny are the reason that Pioneer is bailing out of making their own screens. They are going to have Panny make them for them from now on.

D-Nice knows his stuff, and I'm sure the 9G Pio's will be better (maybe much better) than the 11G Panny's...and Pio "bailing" is pretty complicated. However, Panasonic will outsell Pioneer, plus sell panels to Pioneer, so they've got that.

Anyway, I thought the 700/750u PDP's I saw were really nice, and the px80u I saw was very good (heck, the 77u looked decent), so I will probably order the 50pz85u sight unseen tonight (which I know you probably shouldn't do with an item this pricey!). I don't see how it can be worse than any of the units I mentioned, so it's probably no too much of a gamble.

We all know that each year technology gets better. Higher contrast ratio means better blacks and whites. Features increase. Number of HDMI inputs increase. Color gradations increase to eliminate banding....etc... The Panasonic will be just as a good or continuance of the Kuro...

Chris

I am going to buy the 46pz it's the perfect size for my setup. Plus, it's on heck of a deal.

The 46 is a great size and great price. I've wanted a 50"+ TV for a while, and have the space, so I'm going that route. I would really like a 58", but I just don't want to drop the coin now for one. Hopefully, this will be a bedroom or formal living room TV in a few years when we build a house.

Noob here, but I did own a 700U before it croaked and I slept at a Holiday Inn last night... The TV arrived and I have it set up (but I am using the out of the box settings). (pz85)

It is very bright and the contrast ratio is certainly improved. The contrast improvement is mostly in the brightness of the whites. I did not see any false contouring, phosphor trails, any of that. I am not sure extra shades of gradation will prove necessary.

I believe the blacks are much better than the 700 series.
I watched "The Fountain" on Blu-Ray and I have to say that it was amazing. If I should have waited for 24p I don't see why. I saw no juddering. I think that the blacks are nearly "bezel black." So I guess my conclusions on the contrast is that the pz85 may rival last year's Pio 4280.

SD viewing is generally good. I don't think its any better than the 700 series. The speakers on the 85 are not good. I will need an amplifier immediately. Thankfully I already have one picked out.

I don't understand the problems people have with the aesthetics of the bezel. I think it looks great.

The stand is a little cheaper this year. Its made from a kind of cheap plastic in a piano finish. However its weighted better and I think its less likely to tip. Apparently, so does Panasonic because they did not include a strap.

Now that you have it somewhat "adjusted" in brightness levels, did you have a Kill-a-watt type meter to measure the average power?

Hoping, it is might be a little better. If yes, just icing on the cake. I can get EPP pricing also, the 46in looks like a very good price/performer.

^ Does it have any fans in the back?

Yes, it has 5 fans at the top of the rear panel. Unlike the fans in your computers and DVRs, these don't make any noise. They are large enough they can spin at a slower speed and still move air. They aren't strong fans, just enough to move the air around behind the panel.

My Monster power conditioner tells me it uses:

.7 amps black screen no content on the screen.

1.4-3 amps with content on the screen. The brightness of the scene makes the meter go up or down.

I'm connected via HDMI only. I'm using an 8' HDMI cable with ferrite cores on both ends. The cable was purchased from Monoprice.

In testing, I had no issues (audio or video) with the cable box or DVD player directly connected to the Panny.

Since testing things out, I've reconfigured with 2 shorter 3' cables, the same Monoprice cables with ferrite cores, connecting my DVD and cable box to my Marantz sr8001. The Marantz then feeds the Panny via the 8'. I had a brief moment of recurring audio drop via my receiver but it was corrected with a power off/on. I read some threads that hinted that it's most likely caused by HDMI handshake between the cable box and the Marantz. I powered everything down, powered on the receiver first, then the other devices and the problem was cleared. Thought I'd mention this for other Marantz owners who may think it's the Monoprice cables. This had nothing to do with the Panny. I was also able to pass-thru my HDMI audio to the Panny through my Marantz without any issues.

Yeah, until I saw it in person I thought the speaker area was painted silver, which was a real turn off. Once I saw that it's black and the photos were just showing a sharp highlight it became a non issue.

Am I the only one who wanted to eat the sandwich?

LOL....I was looking at the sandwich also...it looked pretty good.

Can anybody who has one of these sets comment on effectiveness the AI Sound feature?

Does it help to equalize volume output and minimize volume spikes when changing between channels like it is supposed to?

I suppose that if it is working properly, then you really shouldn't notice it at all though...

I think that is a fair assessment. I am not using the internal speakers but the volume through my old crappy receiver is the same on every channel. I think it is working well.

feds, thanks for the pics. Guess the factory is all sold out on the 42". Mine still not shipping till April

Do you use an external cable box to feed your Panny and then pass the signal through to your receiver? Otherwise, I can't see how AI would affect the sound coming out of the receiver.

When I directly connected my cable box to my Panny, AI had no effect on my sound. I re-read the manual and it didn't provide much clarity. It states it'll equalize channel volume and external inputs. I assume that means between a DVD player, VCR, or cablebox feeding the Panny. It doesn't say if AI would balance channel volume only when using the Panny's tuner of if it would balance the external cable box volume as well. It also doesn't say if it balance volume that is output by the Panny. I'll have to play around with this feature some more.

My cable is fed directly to the display through coax without use of a cable box. The sound is then output through the audio out to the receiver. It didn't occur to me before you mentioned it, but I suppose the cable company probably does the volume balancing. Doh! I misunderstood the purpose of this feature.

Incidentally, the owner's manual claims that only Viera linked receivers will be capable of interpreting the audio out from the panel in any mode other than stereo. Have you found this to be the case? In other words, will I be able to watch hd-content from cable in surround without a cable box? I know you are using a cable box, but do you have any educated guesses?

I haven't tried feeding the Panny HDMI and then running video/audio to my receiver. I noticed there aren't any HDMI outputs on the TV but there is a toslink/optical digital audio output. I suppose one could connect their receiver via optical with success. I'll give it a try tonight if I have time.

The Panasonic units have a scrolling white bar as a screen saver . Can I use this as a break-in screen during the first 100 hours?

I think Panasonic said not to use this feature too much because it wears out the phosphors much quicker than regular content viewing.

Thanks. I think you are right. The Samsung models have the same feature and I found the information here:
http://samsungplasmatvfaq.com/index...._in_my_unit.3F

First time HDTV buyer here. Those pics posted above show a lot of glare from the glossy screen. Do you guys all sit in dark rooms with no lights on? I don't think I could stand seeing window glare, or even a lamp light through my screen while I'm watching TV. Maybe I should snag the TH-50PZ77u instead. I really have no room to go above 46", so that's why I thought this year's plasma would be perfect.

Back to the drawing board.

You're correct, it does have glare when powered off. I watch TV with lights on.


Comparison to my computer's LCD screen:

-Powered off, my computer's LCD screen looks matte black without reflections.

-Powered off, the Panny shows some reflections but less than my CRT TV that is sitting on the floor next to it.

Well, I e-mailed them & directly asked basically the same question as I did here, and that is the response they came back with.

I don't mean to make a huge issue out of it, but they could do a much better job of explaining these features & exactly how they operate. At this point, it sounds to me like the AI feature *should* handle volume equalization for all instances, and the Auto Volume feature somehow applies to external devices only.

Unless of course you are using an OTA antenna with the built-in tuner, every source of input would be considered "external" --- including digital cable boxes hooked up via HDMI. Or at least that's the way to sounds to me, and perhaps more importantly, that is the way it seemed to function on the PX75U set that I briefly had. No matter how I adjusted those features on that set, I had large volume spikes with it.
FWIW, I had a Samsung LCD sitting right next to the Panasonic for a few days, and the volume leveler on that set seemed to work fine with the cable box - as it does on several LG & even Insigna brand sets.

So, this is really a trivial issue when you get right down to it - after all, PQ is what really matters and I would imagine that is the primary reason people would buy these (panasonic) TVs in the first place.
Still, these features should be available on mid line products such as these, and they ought to work the way they are supposed to.
Maybe I was doing something wrong, and if so I want to know what that might be, because I like to know what I'm paying for and I want to know what to expect before I purchase another one of these TVs, which is the reason why I bring it up in this thread since I am most interested in one of these new PZ80 or PZ85 models.

Let me know if this works for you....

feds27, you're the best!

thank you.

THanks for the info.

So are you saying that their are no reflections with your lights when the TV is powered on?