Official Panasonic 2011 TC-PxxST30 Thread [No Price Talk] - Page 12

.002 and stable would be excellent.
.004 and stable would be very good.

We should know the answer a year from now

- Rich

Some posters here seem to to in need of sackcloth and ashes. They are in mourning or worse. It is only a TV and I'm sure that there are many of us out here who will enjoy the various models when they are released.
The average Joe-The-Plumber couldn't care less about infinite blacks, deep black or black black when they are watching News, movies, sports or whatever.
I am yet to hear anyone saying that he can differentiate blackness when he is caught up in a scene let's say from Fast and Furious or even Pirates of the Caribbean,
Geeesshhh!!!!!! Get a life ppl. Better yet, get a good Tv and watch it.

You do realize you are posting in an audio visual forum right?

Rofl

I don't think anyone here is Joe the plumber


I see it more as a device for displaying art.

would you go with a gt25 50 inch or a st30 50 inch for about $150 more? Just wondering how they would measure up against each other?

Actually, we knew of the '10 Panasonic first documented rise, and an estimate of the second rise, after ~5.5 mos.; ~25 April to 7 Oct.

Doubt it; the GT30 will likely have a better MLL; and the VT30 likely better yet.

Bump.

I'm wondering the same thing. Mostly more about the 3D gaming. Anyone done any on these sets yet?

I saw the ST30 at Best Buy today. Both a 50" and a 42". It looked absolutely FANTASTIC under the lights. The filter was as good as any plasma I've seen, even better than the VT20 and VT25 they had out on the show floor. The screen looked as black as an LCD, not a hint of the washed out look that plagues many plasmas.

The design was pretty good, but I don't think it looks as sleek as the GT and VT30. I'm just annoyed Panasonic limited the blacks to .008 fL instead of .004. It's a great set otherwise and at a hard to beat price.

That's good news, you are pretty critical so it says a lot. Do we really know that GT30 is .004? I don't know that we actually know that yet.

Nope.


From CNET:

"Confirmed: the only picture quality difference between the ST30 series ($1,499 @ 50 inches) and GT30 series ($1,899 @ 50 inches) is the presence of THX."

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-...=featuredStory

According to Panasonic engineers:

ST30 = .008
GT30 = .004
VT30 = .002

If that is the honest, sustained black level then I would say it's a solid improvement that they stopped pulling gimmicks with the black levels. If it's just the starting point and it's still going to double or triple, then it's lame.

Direct quote from Panny engineer please?

Last time that HDGuru link proved nothing either.

"HD Guru spoke with a Panasonic engineer regarding black levels of its new 2011 series. We were told the 2011 ST series models has black that are at the same level of the 2010 G series which came in .008 ft lamberts. The new GT30 models have a black level that the same as the 2010 VT series, which we measured at .004 ft lamberts. The new VT30 models, due to ship this May, will have levels about half of the 2010 VT series, which should put them up against the minimum sensitivity with accuracy of our Konica-Minolta LS100 light meter and into legendary Kuro levels."

Obviously you can choose not to believe him, but that seems about as much insight we will get from Panasonic engineering without having a direct audio recording of the conversations that were had.

We have conflicting data points.
D-Nice also says that they are the same panel.
Unless there is a software difference...

- Rich

Yeah, it's really strange. Over on HDJ, avjunkie said the only difference between ST and GT was THX and all 3D models were the same panel. D-Nice was saying the same thing.

Avjunkie saw no difference in black level between the GT30 and VT25, so the natural conclusion was that both ST30 and GT30 would have .004 black level.

Then Chad reviews the ST30 and gets some really high measurement, and he confirms that the VT25 had darker looking blacks. Then we get Panny engineers saying the ST30 has .008 black level. And now we get D-Nice confirming that measurement.

So far nothing suggests that the GT30 won't have a .004 black level, but initially it really did seem like the ST30 would have the same exact MLL, not twice as high. That kind of sours the 2011 lineup quite a bit, because otherwise it is very sweet. Great AR filters, much sleeker designs, no floating blacks, and allegedly no rising blacks either.

Actually, everything suggests that it won't have a .004 mll.

Panasonic told Cnet...
Same panel....

My interpretation as well.
Perhaps they set the black-level the stable level, which, I think, is a better approach.

- Rich

Do you think VT30 will also be .008? Same panel after all.

It's funny that you believe the information CNET received (did they talk to engineers?) without "direct quotes", but brush aside the information from hdguru.

But doesn't firmware and drivers also contribute to the black level performance? If i understand things correctly, better electronics can make the same panel perform better. If so, it's possible that the GT30 can indeed attain better black levels with different electronics.

Here is my take. We have no measurements on the GT30 and we do not know the circuitry or software driving the panel. It might be the same black levels or maybe not. It does seem a bit silly to idly speculate without any tests on performance out yet. We haven't even seen a GT30 manual to confirm the same options on it compares to the ST30. Personally, I am wothholding judgement until I see more solid info than a rep said this or a rep said that.

On a side note did anyone else notice that Best Buy have a 55GT30 listed on their site as a GT31? No 50 inch though. Are they not carrying the 50?

Exactly. Just like the 50c8000 needed a firmware update to fix the black level.

So was the bottom line that Panasonic's larger models would only be in 55" and 65" versions? No chance of any other sizes later in the year? Sorry for the dumb question, but was just wondering. I really wish they hadn't axed the "58..

But the Panny Haters in this thread have told us how the GT30 will perform when it gets released next month and are only here to stir up trouble We (and they) need to wait for real world black level testing from reputable known sources.


Yeah it looks like they've weaseled their way around their own price match policy again like they did last year with the G20 and VT20. Someone over at HDJ said the 55GT31 will come with two pair of glasses.

Panny haters? Stir up trouble?

They are the same panel. The GT30 isn't going to magically give much better blacks. If you want to believe it will then fine, but don't call people haters and wanting to stir trouble, we are only using common sense. Same panel = same blacks.

The fact that CNEt was told by Panasonic the same thing reinforces this.

HDGuru is a unreliable site anyways. Saying the meter Chad was using isn't reliable is a joke.

I wouldn't lose much sleep over two pairs of glasses, but I really only need 50 inches. Well more accurately, my wife only wants 50 inches.

Would different boards and/or software be magic?

Because we know Panasonic has a history of lowering blacks in software updates...