Panasonic PZ80/PZ85 Calibration Thread (Updated first post) - Page 72

When using jbrady3324's PZ80U ISF settings I noticed the following:

1. If you copy all settings exactly including "SM after" except for ALL-CUT and ALL-DRV, you get pretty good PQ except for noticable red push.

2. If you apply ALL settings using the offset method, you get great PQ with less red push.

3. If you copy all settings exactly including "SM after," setting ALL-CUT and ALL-DRV last, you get excellent PQ with minimal red push and what appears to be a perfect graycale to the eye. It's important to note that when you set ALL-CUT and ALL-DRV exactly to his settings after doing the same for the individual RGB cuts and drives, it changes some of the individual RGB values automatically to better suit your TV. I'm guessing this is some sort of mechanism designed to protect the neutrality of your white balance when individual values stray too far apart/ too far off for your set.

In my PZ80U's SM, I noticed the following items:

Boot ROM
STBY-SET 00*
EMERGENCY ON
CLK MODE 00
CLOCK 048

RM-SET A

SRV-TOOL 00*

*fixed values

I know srv-tool can help you find how long you set has been on, but can it do anything else? What stby-set do and what about the other settings? Do these values vary or are they fixed for all PZ80/PZ85's?

If anyone can answer any portion of the above questions, I'd appreciate it. I have no intention of making any changes and screwing up my set, but I'm curious as to the function of each of these.

Update: STBY-SET simply turns the screen black while the TV is powered on (red light on), pressing the power button afterwards turns it off (with red light off). Think of it as a screen saver while in the SM.

Hey guys, I am ready to jump into my service menu finally. My brother got his 58PZ800U today and we went into his and it looks fantastic!

We used DaMasta's settings and used this tool...

http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?k...I0-q7bPwCOh4Pw

Is there one like this for our PZ80s? Or will this one work?

Unless there's something about this spreadsheet other than computing sums (in hex) then it can be used with a PZ since they have the same set of cut/drive adjustments.

How do I know how many clicks to go in jjs settings without that tool?

Perhaps we're talking about different things. I followed that link and found a spreadsheet that does addition in hex. It has a set of starting values, a column for a user provided signed offset and colum for the hex sum of the those two numbers. Is that what you're referring to?

Right.

So all I need to do is plug in the #s and it will tell me how many clicks right?

What about the non hex additions? Like contrast, sub bright, color, tint, etc.

LBFilmGuy, you posted a few pages back that your tint is at -5 in one post and +5 in another. Which is it?

I did? LOL whoops.

It's +5.

What's the general consensus on the settings Gregg Loewen posted in the owner's thread?


I tried them on my 46PZ85U last night and it did look pretty good. Strangely, 90 is the same number I arrived at when calibrating with AVS HD 709 but having it set that high made me nervous so I went back to my old settings.

Perhaps the issue is that you've not been in the service menu. The settings there only displayed digitally. Just dial in the value that you want.


All numeric service menu settings are displayed in hex.

It seems Gregg has calibrated some number of PZ8x panels as has Tom Huffman. They disagree.

My inclination is believe Tom's numbers since he owns a PZ85 and appears to have spent a great deal of time measuring its characteristics in various modes. However that may be a reflection of my bias towards "proper motivation", that is to say Tom presents a great deal of data to support his conclusions rather than just speaking ex cathedra.

the bottom line....
Disregard Toms settings AND mine...
if you are serious about image fidelity...
Either use THX optimizer, or the BD video basics disc and come to the real correct settings on your own :-)

I have used AVS HD 709 to calibrate my set and, like Gregg, arrived at a picture setting of 90. I read earlier in the thread, though, that it was impossible to get an accurate contrast setting using these methods. Is that accurate, or is 90 safe to use? I noticed none of the other calibration settings posted here use picture settings anywhere near that high.

Contrast should be set as high as possible to give you the most dynamic range.
Panasonic has chosen to set up their displays so you can not clip the signal (make the dynamic range too high). I consider this to be a good design implimentation.

The next consideration would be eye fatigue...is the display so bright as it will cause a headache if watching for an extended period of time.

I've been in the service menu on my brothers' 58PZ800U. He plugged in the factory SM settings, then the guys' he wanted (damasta's), and then the tool told him exactly how many clicks to go to get there.

You are telling me to just find a value I want blindly? That makes no sense to me.

I asked about the other things like contrast because they are not on that tool that I posted.

No, I'm saying e.g. the default is 80, you want +12 so the result is 8C. You "click" volume-up until it says 8C. That would normally be 12 "clicks" but not if you hold it down or whatever. The correct end result is to have 8C however you get there.

I've attached an image which is rotated. Sorry about that.

My display has unpleasant artifacts above 90, performs poorly given high stimulus fields with Picture above 80 and produces ~40fL at 60. So like most folks here I keep picture below 70 (below 60 in a dark room).

However I don't think I'd use the word unsafe to describe 90.

K so basically just click through until I find 8C or whatever...right?

Since we are talking about how high picture can go, what would the lower limit be for an light output like 35-foot lamberts as mentioned on the THX optimizer web page (in a dark room with no lights on)? My goal is to set the level just high enough for such a light output (I'm currently at a setting of 50 in cinema mode).

Also, does screen size (like my 42 inch vs. a 50 inch or 46 inch) have an impact on the setting?

I can only speak for my PZ85. It produces ~32fL at Picture 54 (Cinema/Warm). I'm not sure what your last question means. Unit-to-unit variance means you can't reliable copy any settings from one set to another and expect the same output. One can hope for similar output from similar settings but then hope springs eternal. If you mean is the total output in candelas dependent on screen size then yes it is but fL have dimensions of area so that value is independent of screen size.

Thanks for clarifying between candelas and fL, I was wondering which did what. That being said if anyone with a PZ80 can chime in, it would be appreciated. I know copying settings is not reliable, but approximate values can still help since most sets have the same ballpark figures.

"2) Through measurements it appears that the luma values for this disk might be slightly different than those used in the Digital Video Essentials HD Basics Blu-ray - see these measurements for further information. In use it appears this may change the second decimal point reported for gamma in measurements when compared to using Digital Video Essentials as a reference."

This is a quote for the AVS Calibration Disc. Anyone know if this matters or if it has been resolved?

1) People discuss the merits of 2.2 versus 2.5 a much larger delta
2) If you can get a consistent gamma from 10-100 that varies by only .05 you're fortunate.

Not sure what this means, but is this an advantage or disadvantage of the AVS Calibration Disc?

I understood the second part about gamma readings and that's good to know.

I discovered what the auto adjust feature for contrast in the SM does. For my SD Dish Network box (S-Video connection), the YMax value fluctuates (as opposed to nothing being there like on my HDMI PS3/Xbox 360 HD Source) and when you hold down ok for 3 sec the value turns red and then adjusts to another value based on average YMax readings (so I think). Sometimes it shows "NG" first, but sooner or later it finds a value between 200 and 250. It seems to work quite well for a low-quality source like this one, but may take a few tries to get an ideal result and some patience is required since it can be slow at times to adjust (when "NG" is displayed).

Also, it seems when I'm in the SM any user menu changes don't appear. For example, in standard mode I set contrast to 79 but it appears to be at 50 (the default) temporarily while in the SM with Standard selected.

I'm not sure if this also works for component video, but mostly likely does for composite video (S-Video is the best my SAT box can do).

I was saying that people have discussions about what's the right display gamma. They don't agree about a difference of .3, you're talking about a difference ~.05. It's insignificant in the face of all the other errors in your display chain.

The only reason I brought up the quote was since it was listed under "Known Issues" and that's why I thought it might be significant. However, I'm glad that it's not since this makes the disc a great tool for the cost of a blank DVD-R.

On that note, it's impressive that my PS3 plays this DVD as a Blu-ray Disc with true 1080p resolution since the format is mp4/AVC.

Do you mean you made a disk from the MP4 file instead of the AVCHD file?

Actually, I followed the PS3 example which is AVCHD; I was saying that MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 is one format. I'm guessing from what you said the MP4 file is not same format as that then.