Is Panasonics Rising Black Levels A Good Enough Reason Not to Buy One? - Page 3

There will be no response from this guy. He has failed to respond to any of his posts. TROLL!

This argument is totally false. Most consumers have no idea about what they're buying. I should know I work at a home theater store. 90% of the people coming in looking at TVs have no clue on what they're looking at and have done zero research on the subject. Unless persuaded otherwise a customer will buy whatever looks better in the store, which is the worst possible way to pick out a TV. Hell, most people coming in cringe when I mention plasmas because they think plasmas still burn in and/or leak gas that might kill their kids.

People have no idea projection TVs need to have their bulbs changed and most of them get upset when they eventually find out. And bulbs are not cheap to replace either. Most people would rather put that money towards buying a new TV.

Panasonic screwed up this year, I'll agree with that. But claiming that they should've advertised this issue is ridiculous. Especially since most people will never even notice this because they left their plasmas on VIVID mode and killed it long before black levels started rising.

I am a panny owner as well, and all I am saying is that I feel this is an issue. I highly doubt this was "designed" to do this on purpose. Rather this is panasonic's way of avoiding claims. No other plasma display has this issue. When the prime selling point of these displays is their black level, how can you say this is a non-issue. I am not outraged, but I am upset. Panasonic has always been a brand that I have bought with faith. This move makes me skeptical about the future of their integrity.

I am not saying they should have advertised this issue. I am saying they didn't know about it, and now that the problem has surfaced, they are claiming it as a design feature.

We keep going back and forth about the knowledge of the "average" consumer. The same people that are upset that their PJ bulb needs replacing are the same people that will never notice this issue. These are not the consumers I am talking about. I am talking about people who actually research to get the best display for their money. These are the people who think $300.00 to get brand new performance out of their PJ is a smokin deal. These are the people who bought these displays "because" of their incredible black levels.

We can go on and on about this. I have always been an avid Panasonic supporter. I just think this is a major hit to their integrity, which is still much higher than most other brands, bus disappointing nontheless.

Where abouts in the Falls do you go? I'm in St. Kitts so the border is 20 minutes away. Have you ever had any warranty issues bringing over the border?
I get cost on Panasonic equipment, but it's still nowhere near as good as the US prices.

I have a degree in electronics and the is one thing I don't understand:
If the rising black is caused by an increased bias voltage to the pixels, why is that irreversible?

Having not been privy to discussions during the R&D of these units, I don't know if Panasonic is lying or not. It could be, as it seems these days lying after the fact by a large corporation is not that uncommon.

I won't disagree that it is an issue. I simply personally believe that cost/value/performance on these units is still above average, and I'm a pretty discriminating owner. Plasma has come a long way from the earlier days. If I had a novice friend who asked me, "What 42" TV would you buy..??" I would not hesitate to recommend a Panasonic plasma.

Lastly, as I mentioned previously, if you take a Panasonic 42" model with the issue, let's say will 1500 hours on it... set it next to a comparable price 42" LED/LCD unit. Forget you know there is an issue and pretend you are an average consumer. You'll pick the Panny. Integrity or not, they still make a darn good TV.

Well put

Based on what I have read, it is my understanding that it could be reversed, simply by removing the over-achieving voltage bias (the same way that if a car's performance takes a hit because the engine computer cripples the fuel injector, if the computer is corrected the performance should return - assuming that no physical damage has taken place). The problem is that Panasonic will not fess up to the issue, and so they will do nothing to fix "what is not broken" in the first place. Or, given my recent track record, I could be completely wrong.

In deference to D-Nice and the other guru's here, I think it comes down to this:

Panasonic, left to it's own decision making, will do nothing. If the lawsuit goes in Panasonic's favor, they will do nothing. If the lawsuit goes against Panasonic, they will take whatever path most benefits their pocket books (if it would cost them more to fix the issue then pay any penalty imposed by the judge, then they will pay the penalty, and do nothing). They will only fix the issue if it is cheaper than the alternative... of which I am not hopeful. The days when consumer interest was a concern to major corporations is long since past.

I guess we should see a firmware hack at some point (besides resetting the number of hours in the service menu).

Pioneer got out of the game 2 years ago. In that time the Kuro technology would have become cheaper and in theory so would the TVs.

Panels in general have gone down in cost. It's realistic assume that Pioneer was still manufacturing, a 2010 Kuro could have cost around $2K-2.5K which is about the same for current higher-end TVs.

I am in total agreement with you on the panny plasma over LED/LCD, but that's kind of an apples to sauerkraut comparison, don't you think?

My apples just have a few more worm holes in them now.

I go the last 50" Panny plasma at Sears Summit Mall, Niagara Falls, NY. I brought along a blu-ray player and a couple blu-rays with me from Canada and took the plasma out of the box and tested it in the store before I left with it. (Yeah it may seem a bit over the top for some but I wasn't going to be taking it through customs, driving back to Toronto and then find out it had dead pixels or, worse, didn't even turn on).

I haven't had any problems with it yet. I don't know what you mean by 'warranty issues'.

Things to remember when you import are:

1. You will pay 8% NY State tax and no, Canadian Customs will not give you back the NY State tax that you paid when you cross the border. You can contact the NY State tax office and they do have a downloadable form that you can use to attempt to get the tax back and they don't guarantee that you will. I haven't tried it
2. Since these units are made in NAFTA countries (Mexico or US), you will pay only 13% GST + PST to bring them to Canada - no other duties.
3. Make sure you get the serial number of the unit put on the Canada Customs invoice. They don't normally do this but I realized last time that it's hard to prove that you brought the item in otherwise, because they usually just list the general product category and duties on the invoice and nothing else. (In fact they never even asked to see my retail invoice or go to my car to see the unit when I brought it over). This is important if you want to return the unit to the US for warranty service as they might want to charge you the duties again when you bring it back but you only have to pay duty on the value of the repair itself, not the entire unit. But, if you cannot prove you brought the unit in before and paid the appropriate duties on it then you will be charged duties on the entire value of the unit. You don't want to double pay.
4. You will not get Canadian warranty service and will have to return the unit to the US in order to get it repaired. This is done easily enough by taking it to Niagara Falls, NY yourself and shipping it from there or just shipping it from Canada and paying a carrier to do the paperwork (at which time you'll need to provide copies showing you paid duty when it came in originally). I don't see warranty as a big issue, especially if you tested it in the US first before bringing it over. Non-mechanical electronics products seldom have problems. But, yes, it's a bit more of a hassle that you cannot return it to Panasonic Canada for repair. I thought it was worth the $500 savings CDN on a 50" ($855 CDN landed with all taxes) to not have a Canadian warranty. For the 65" I am going to be buying soon, the unit is about 55% of the US price right now, or over $2,000!

I hope this provides you with detailed enough info on the situation!

I don't know.

The problem is that some are reluctant to buy from a company that engages in bait and switch. I am not a techie, I may not notice the difference in a rising level, and I am certainly not a Panny basher. I own a Panny RPT, plasma, dvd/vcr recorder, and telephone set. There is no way that engineering a rising black level while touting superior black levels and benefiting from favorable pre-rise testing is ethical.

Thank-you

D-Nice

Based on past years, is there any info on the next years sets at CEDIA in September or any other shows prior to 2011 CES?

You had mentioned a roadmap that Panasonic had - any update expected to that?

I too am waiting and hoping 2011 brings at least Kuro level performance to Panasonic.

Wait till you find out your car's mpg will drop a few tenth as valve deposits build up.

AFAIK the CENT guy clearly stated that "since 2005, my main TV at home has been a Panasonic TH-50PHD8UK plasma, and I've never noticed a change in its black level performance."

I can also confirm that my TH-50PF10UK hasn't changed since I bought it right after its 2008 launch (before Christmas.)

So your answer is to look for a Panasonic Professional Plasma - it's better anyway though it will cost 2-3x more...

I've had a 50" G10 for about 3 months now. I'm pretty sure I just hit the 500 hour mark since image retention become significantly noticeable at night (I would estimated 400-600 if not for the IR increase). Just loading a game from the PS3 dashboard leaves faint white impressions on the blank input as the game loads. It is starting to really bug me. I play a lot of PS3, roughly 95% of my TV usage. I avoid IR by using transparent or no menus when possible (Makes Demon Souls much harder) and rarely playing a single game for more than 1-2 hours. Though, I have noticed nothing when watching TV or Blue-Ray (although I do that rarely). Hope this helps.

Absolutely, thanks for taking the time!

Those ghost images you're seeing on a blank input screen is not image retention. Now if you can see those same images on a white or light colored screen while watching actual content then that is IR. The blank input stuff is normal and still happens on my 5-year-old PX50U, but it's not there when i'm actually watching TV or DVD. All plasma TVs do this, it's normal and harmless. There are numerous threads about it.

Hasn't this problem only been happening since 2006? Post-2005 professional models might not be immune.

Well, i'm kinda in the same situation on buying a new TV. Like said here: no tele is perfect and all of them have flaws. I mean the LG PK550 is a plasma I like but then: the glare and reflection you get made me decide NOT to buy it. Same for the Sammy, those plasma's have issues as well I don't like like the buzzing/reflection. The panny G20 has the floating/rising black issues, that sucks as well. But then again:


QFT for real ! unfortunately

Now, i'm waiting to see some 46"G20 pop up somewhere

I will be the first to admit that I didn't read the previous posts in this thread, but I will say that my 54G10 finally went through the change just today. To be honest I stayed on the sidelines since I thought my TV still looked pretty good. I was sure I already went though the change since I had my TV since November. But today, I noticed, and I really mean I noticed. It went from a dark blackish gray to a completely light shade of gray. Not to mention for the first time the IR is really bad. My 4 year old Samsung LCD is now officially blacker than my Plasma. All I have to say is I would never ever buy a Panasonic again. They have officially lost me as a customer for life.

I don't think that's a fair comparison since consumer electronics generally don't utilize gasoline engines.

What models did this start happening with? Have a 50px60 since new and not a problem here.

Then odds are you will always have some lights on so the MLL issue will NOT be noticed in that environment.

If you don't have a dark room, it will not be an issue.

If you do have a dark room, it will be an issue.

(Just my understanding of what all I have read here )


My understanding is that if the model is made by Panasonic (within a certain model year range) then it is one of the models that

To the OP, not to me. Although I don't recommend anything over the S-models(G-series at the most) until Panasonic gets things sorted out. In the end, Panasonic still gives you a good bang for the buck.

-Megan-

So in a normal viewing situation (i.e. a normal room with normal lighting), is this really an issue? Or is it only super noticeable in dark theater rooms?