Panasonic 11G/12G/13G black levels have seemingly doubled overnight? - Page 57

It is nuts to go messing with a brand new tv's firmware unless you are a Panasonic engineer. This thread makes it sound like every tv does this. I don't believe it. If you are seriously considering editing the firmware instructions in hex before even unboxing the thing bring the TV back and get a different brand/make/model.

What picture setting are you using and could you list the setting here as I'd like to mimic your setup and see what my blacks should look like in a almost completely dark room at nite. I have less than 100 hours(Oct. '09 build) on my 50g10. This is my 1st plasma and I don't have a reference or a memory of what a black image should look like. Currently with the tv off the screen looks way lighter than the bezel and with the plasma on with the side/bottom bars it also does not blend in with the bezel.

I have another problem, if you could call it that or its just how plasmas work but, I've a noticed a couple of times on a real dark/black scene that the blacks had cloudy dark gray patches here and there. Is that normal?

CNET's David Katzmaier was kind enough to reply to my earlier message to him about the Panny black level issue:


Thanks for the heads-up. I've made initial contact with Panasonic about
this problem and will do some digging myself over the next couple of
days to see if I can find out more.

[this is a canned reply sent to others who've also contacted me about
this problem]

I'm just using the Cnet settings. Mine has a slight glow on a no source input as well in a totally black room. The thing is i don't see that slight glow when content is playing.

I only see these patches with inferior material, looks to me like compression artifacts. Even with DVDs PQ is great if they are of high quality.

Same here with about 200 hours I see this glow only when the screen has no input. LA Confidential DVD I watched last night looked amazing on this set with all the dark scenes very detailed in THX mode.

Good to know he has gotten enough e-mails that he already has a canned reply for this issue. But it does seem that it is just a general canned reply where he just inserts a company name into the blank.

I have received the same from him.

He seems like a good guy, I trust he's seriously looking into the issue.

Well, so much for the tech who came to my place.

He just left and he didn't find anything wrong with the tv.

I showed him the gray blacks and told him it was a night and day change from what they were before and he said they looked fine to him.

Even when I turned off the light to show how severe it was, he said it was normal to look that gray with the lights off.

He seemed to know what he was talking about, but in the end, the problem remains.

It doesn't bother me when even a dim light is on in the room, but in a completely dark room, my tv doesn't have blacks, it has grays.

Still a great tv and I wish something could be done about this problem, but I doubt Panasonic will do anything.

No one should get their hopes up.

Edit: He also said that component was better than hdmi because hdmi "bypasses" all the processing and component takes advantage of it. Not sure exactly what he meant by that but it definitely sounded odd.

That is very discouraging.

Yeah I just got a reply from Panasonic:

"Thank you for your inquiry. We regret to hear that you are having difficulties with our product. Due to the issue your are having not being identified as a know issue with the TV there is no solution, however we will forward this information to the appropriate department for review. Thank you for contacting Panasonic."

I hope they are for real.

I wouldn't get hung up on any particular replies or service calls from Panasonic.

This basically boils down to people contacting Panasonic in volume to make them aware of this issue and forwarding it to their engineering department so that they can release a firmware fix.

he sounds like a candidate for an lcd.

I just got off the phone with Panasonic. A technician is going to be coming over friday to look at my G10. I'm not looking forward to it though, because he's probably going to say everything looks normal with the tv.

These two sentences do not go together. He does not know what he's talking about because the comments about component being better than HDMI and why is complete BS.

syed, i can see the tech's POV, all the description of your tv, its very subjective....unfortunately the only way to be 100% is to have a before/after measurement with a meter.

I obviously couldn't do a measurement before the change, but I asked him if there was any kind of test he could do to measure the black levels or light output and he couldn't.


I meant that he generally seemed to be proficient at his job. I was expecting someone who didn't know anything or very little, but aside from that comment about component vs. hdmi, he seemed to have a lot of experience.

At this point, I think I'm past this whole situation. Panasonic will not do anything to address this problem and we shouldn't hope for a fix.

I do most of my viewing in a room with a little lighting and I don't notice the problem. Dark scenes do suffer when the lights are off, but I can learn to live with it.

I still love my G10, I just wish the blacks could have stayed the way they were. A gradual change would have been better, it's just disappointing that it happened so suddenly.

actually when you do a calibration the software (eg HCFR) records the black levels inc at zero input. so that way you get a record of your TV's black levels

Again, he sounds like a guy who works a lot on standard CRT TVs or handles problems like a ground fault or bad solder connection, etc. I.e. obvious physical problems. He doesn't sound like a very sophisticated tech in terms of understanding color, MLLs, etc. based on his comments on component and HDMI (that's something that even a kid working in Best Buy should know, and certainly someone who is a certified tech working as a contractor for Panasonic should know.) I would have expected at least a response, to your question on measuring the black levels, of "yes, you can do that with a light meter or colorimeter and the appropriate softrware, but I don't have those with me."

A good response back to a tech that says that is "if you can't measure it, how can you judge whether it has changed and whether there is a problem relative to what it should be?"

While it isn't the most upfront approach, if we have to deal with these clueless techs, perhaps the best method would be to take measurements people have done and posted on here and present them to the tech and say "OK, here's the measured levels before and now. As you can see, the levels have doubled, and while it may be difficult to tell the difference now since you didn't see it before the change, I can assure you that this doubling of the light level, which is basically a drop by half in the depth and "darkness" of the blacks, which is what Panasonic bragged about and why I bought the TV, is extremely noticable. The contrast and overall picture quality has suffered as a result of this increase - see, the numbers are right here."

I always tell the people who work for me in my labs, the advantage we have over the marketing and sales guys is that we generate data, and we don't have to argue opinion, we can show data. If you show data - here's the MLL at 100 hours, here's what it is now - the tech has no valid argument.

Of course, if you can't get a measurement yourself (although you can buy a decent meter for not much money and use HCFR for free to get your own measurements) it's not truthful to use someone else's data, but I can see doing that to deal with clueless techs who are trying to avoid doing anything (they aren't being the most high integrity people either.)

By the way, in the category of "misery loves company" - here's a thread (one of a couple) in which Samsung owners are complaining of black levels suddenly rising:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1216428

Oh sh!t. It's spreading!

I knew this was not going to be a potential issue in just Panny plasmas. Someone said it earlier I think maybe on this thread, but maybe this is way Panasonic includes a black level light and dark setting in the user mode

And as was stated in responce to that post, the light and dark settings have ZERO effect on the black level of the display. The only thing it does is change the shadow details, Dark crushes them into Oblivion and is completely useless.

European models don't even have that feature, yet eu models have black level issue.

I guess we could all buy another brand new G10 from Best Buy or any store we can return it to, and put them side by side in a dark room for the tech to see!
Then return the new G10!

I have been talking with a pretty high level engineer technician at panasonic that is fully aware of certain forums with this issue and he has stated that they are aware and working on this issue. I am about to call him back and explain what certain people have explained in this thread. It actually helped knowing someone at panasonic to get me to the right people. If anyone wants to chime in and have me ask the engineer something, please do.. thanks. I will be calling in 15 mins.

I don't know if you've already spoken to him, but if not could you ask if it would be harmful to keep resetting the clock to prevent the rise happening, as a temporary fix?

I am the phone right now with them. They want people to call in to build a case for individuals with this problem with all 12g panels. They are fully aware of the black level increase and are currently working on a solution. This comes from a high level plasma engineer. I just mentioned all the forums discussing this issue plus the CNET emails. They are working on firmware fix now and will call me directly when something is done or can be done. It was kinda funny as I was on a conference call with 3 engineers questioning me about what people were stating the problem was. Well i guess the complaining worked. I hope all this helps and if you have any questions please ask.

Hey Orta, they could not tell me a time frame but from what they stated it will be for all 2009 panasonic plasmas. They have called me almost 4 times to get information and I explained everything on here. Just now I had a conference call with 3 guys and they seemed to be very confident in a fix. BUt thats not saying there will be one. If there is, they wil call me.

Is this an early April Fools gag ? hahaha

If not, are these engineers Japan based ?

Was the bug likely still there in the 13G models ... ??