Official Panasonic 2011 TC-PxxVT30 Series Thread Discussion Thread [No Price Talk] - Page 180

Every day the panel gets better and better. I have not yet spent the money on a calibration but I think this time I will. I think there is tremendous potential locked in this panel waiting to be freed. I just watched Super 8 the other night and had one of the best cinematic experiences in a long time. Every scene, every color, every shade, every hue, every motion contributed to a an experience of being immersed in the film. I have Dish Also for HDTV which is fantastic. The superlatives abound. Although my heart was set on Panasonic I did explore other brands but there is no question in my mind that no set currently on the market can sit in the same room. BTW, just for the fun of it watched Imax Under The Sea in 3-D last night, simply awesome.

Congrats on the great V-day gift!!

I bought it thru Amazon and delivered by CEVA. Amazing service, the product was handled professionally and no issues thus far.

Check for banged up or ripped/torn box. Have the delivery guys open the box and inspect the screen for cracks or spider webbing. Other than that, not much you can see visually.

Amazon is great with returns and exchanges. I've been buying large items from them for the last 8 years and never had an issue.

Don't worry and enjoy your set!!

Go to costco.com and purchase a 3 year square trade warranty through Costco for $99.99, that is by far the best way to get the best price on a extended warranty for a TV.

I would add to that a flashlight. Use the flashlight from a sharp angle shinning across the screen. There are small cracks that you can's see any other way.The idea is to light any possible cracks from the side while you examine the screen from the side.

Wondering what the experts are using for color settings, etc. in THX mode? Overall THX looks the most pleasing/accurate. Fleshtones might look slightly greenish? Any thoughts on small tweaks to give better fleshtones. The suggested settings on CNET look better on THX. Thanks

I can't seem to get my set to connect to my Wifi. I have the bongle connected and it picks up the signal, but can't connect. Any ideas? Thanks

Do you mean .002? 20 seems high? I guess im reading it wrong.
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The tv defaults the password to all caps, you have to hit one of the colored buttons to change that when in there. Then if you need to access your PC you have to allow the tv in your PC's network.

I used THX for months. But then finally tried out D-Nice's settings (no, I did not use the prep slides) and prefer them to THX. Since D-Nice's settings are in Custom, you can easily switch between THX and Custom to see which you prefer. Try it out.

Looked at Inception and it is nowhere as sever as NbNW. I wonder if it has anything to do with NbNW shot in VistaVision. May be that particular color palette is more sensitive to the 96hz red and green interlacing tint.

Anyone have similar experiences based on bleow??????

Thanks for the additional feedback. I agree that the VT30 is definitely a significant step above all the rest. A lot say the Sammy 8000 is very close but to me it has more of an LCD image rather than a dimensional filmlike image that the VT30 has. In any event, it is the bench mark plasma IMHO. Super 8 is an awesome movie. I own it and agree it is one of the best transfers I've seen on blu-ray. Sounds like we both got lucky with getting a display that is totally problem free. It almost seems like there are more posts on the 65" over the 55". Maybe because Panasonic just sells more of the larger size but makes me wonder if there aren't some problems the 65" has that aren't present on the 55".

Keep enjoying your VT30!

ZaneZ

I had a few questions for you VT owners, some background first.

I have 110 hours on 65VT30 now in my log where I write down the times I turn the TV on and watch it. I'm using custom settings with contrast and brightness down at 40 and color at 35 and sharpness at 0. At the 80 hour mark, I turned contrast and brightness up to 45. I chose to NOT run slides and just watch a variety of content from TV off-the-air to blu-ray and DVD at full screen.

Since I hit the 100 hour mark, I checked the EPROM I have, turns out that my July build has the current 84.46. I got mine at Best Buy, so guess it's true, they took care of that.

Oh yeah, I will need to try some black and white material, I want to see if I can see these green color blobs you guys are talking about. So far, I haven't seen any indication.

I am having a lot of faith in you guys who are saying this TV calibrates well and produces an excellent image. I say that because at the current settings, the image looks dark. I have a Pioneer PRO-1130 plasma in the next room that was replaced by the VT30 when the Pioneer's HDMI inputs both died. I can currently stand in the hall and rotate my head and see both TVs and compare the image. The Pioneer was never professionally calibrated. I have used the settings that D-Nice shared back in 2006-2007 and has a great image! The VT30 looks like I'm watching with sunglasses on compared to the Pioneer. But I know as I put in hours on this set with the settings lowered to break it in, I am happy to accept this.

I've played the Aliens blu ray with the lower settings and the image is indeed great! The larger size and 1080 image was great! So I hope once I put in another 100 hours and try D-Nice's settings, the VT30 will look better then my Pioneer.

BTW, I've tried the THX default setting and thought it was equally dark and dull. Vivid looked awful! I won't watch in Vivid mode. I am using my Pioneer as the benchmark. That TV's image pops with good color and brightness and contrast. Granted it wasn't calibrated, just using D-Nice settings.

So I hope my set will respond well to adjustment when the time comes. A professional calibration is not out of the question.

Hi there

nobody answered so here it is

there is a buried system setting in which you can choose to keep the USB ports powered while the TV is off. change that one and you will be able to charge the 3D glasses while off

VT30 OR D8000. my 9 yr old sony bit the dust and I'll be purchasing tomorrow. i watch alot of sports but regular tv and movies too. I went thru a long d7000/d8000 calibration thread and was wondering for the average joe, can you also calibrate on the panny as you can on the sammy ( haven't looked for any specific thread for it) I'm trying to get a great tv and i've read some quality issues on both, with that said, if there is a smoking deal at BB, for instance, on the d8000 vs the vt30 is it really a flip of the coin? should i ask to see build dates and specific FW on each? thx

also, can I buy the 3 yr sq trade warranty at costco on either of these if I purchase somewhere else and costco doesn't carry either of these in stores?

Yes you can still purchase the warranty, another AVS member suggested it when I asked my question a few posts up. You can find it on the Costco website, in fact one of the reviews state they purchased the tv online but still went through costco. It is also half the price of what you would pay through any online source for the warranty. Correct me if i am wrong, but I believe that you have a 60 day window after the t is purchased to purchase the warranty. Hope this helps!

thanks. what did you end up getting?

No problems on my set with NbNW. I'm running this using the DNice settings from a Panasonic 310 (1080p), using a high quality direct HDMI cable (Blue Jeans Cable).

Also, watched this classic movie in B & W with nary a problem:



Are you running your BRP directly to the TV? If not, is the AV receiver's video processing off? Have you tried another HDMI cable?

12 Angry Men?

Bingo!

Fantastic movie. Now I may have to re-watch it tonight.

So my new 65vt30 has one bright cell in the lower left. It's mostly red and can't be seen from my couch. Any chance it will go away on it's own? Think I should return to amazon over that? No other defects so I would suppose it won't get any worse?

There are a lot of people who wouldn't return a display for one stuck pixel. It's sounds like it's stuck so there is a chance that it will correct itself. If you were just under warranty it wouldn't be covered.

Received my P65VT30 last week and have since used about 12.5 hours...all TV filled frame, with mostly a Custom Setting of Contrast 65, Brightness 60, Color 50 be cause quite frankly the Standard setting looks lie the image is seen thru sunglasses...or for photogs...2 stops under exposed.
Over the past couple days have learned here about Dnice slides for breaking in....With my hours and settings, is it to late to consider using the Dnice technique?
Thanks for any advice...and great forum!

A lot of people in this forum have made the same mistake and have gone ahead and did the prep work and D-Nices setup with good results. You can't hurt anything so if you want to try it go for it.

I did mine by the book and can't see how this TV could get any better!

Bummer. Just attempted to take delivery of my 65VT30 from Amazon (shipped via Home Direct FYI), and upon getting the packaging materials out of the way, the screen was spider-webbed in the upper left hand corner.

Refused delivery obviously (even though the delivery guy suggested he leave it and I deal with the place of purchase ).

I'm glad I had waited to get this through Amazon. Already have the replacement in the channels with an ETA of next Friday. As bummed and upset as I am in general, you can't fault any part of that customer service. Let's just hope for better luck on Round #2.

Quick question -- does anyone know if there's a way change the OSD timeout or turn off the OSD altogether on the VT30? I'm trying to calibrate my Australian VT30 which doesn't seem to support DDC, and it's an incredible pain having the adjustment bar time out back to the full-screen menu after a few seconds before the meter has finished reading! Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Do you guys with content with black bars? I've only had mine for a few days so obviously I'm a bit careful and not using it.

Got the STAR WARS BR box for example, do not want to watch it in zoom since it looks bad and heads get cut off etc. Kinda annoying that you can't get the picture to stretch without zooming.So I'll have to wait before I watch it.

So, how do you guys go about it? Reading these forums has made me really concerned, almost as if I want to forget all the crap I've read so I just can enjoy my tv after 100 hours or so.

I also game A LOT, will be interesting to see what will happen. Usually play for about 3-4 hours. Will not do this in the beginning obviously, still.

Most movies have black bars on the top and bottom, and I have had no problems or image retention despite watching them. Just vary your viewing habits (I also watch 16:9 TV shows).

Hey Kevin thanks! I had to set the option HDMI CONTROL to be set to "ON"....AND the most important one....I had to UNDELETE the input source labeled "TV"! That way, I could switch to TV to view VieraCast and voila...I can now see AND hear the beeps and also play Pandora. Though I have 4 ways to listen and see the GUI of Pandora:

1. Panasonic VT30 TV
2. Oppo BDP-93 Blu-ray player
3. DIRECTV HD HR24 DVR
4. Marantz SR7005 AVR

I'd say the TV, Blu-ray player, and Satellite DVR offer the best displays of the Pandora gui.