AVS Roundup of the Best-Reviewed Flat Panel TVs of 2012 - Page 5

Any buzzing issue?

Zero on my 60ST50. And our watching position is only 7' from the TV. Even when the audio is muted, I hear nothing. Now, if I were to turn everything off in the house and press my ear to the TV, I can hear something faintly, but how often do we do that in real life?

I thought Luno's post was mine, it almost sounded exactly the same!

Just FYI - Pioneer has since sold many of the Kuro's patents to Panasonic, the only other significant television manufacturer that concentrated on plasmas, and many of the latest Panasonic Viera plasma panels utilize the Kuro's technologies.

Thanks, but I was already aware of that. Obviously, there have been roadblocks with regards to those patents and incompatibility with their manufacturing methods, which is not too surprising.

One thing that struck me as odd was that the 50" Kuros were 720P? Is that the way it was cause that's what came up when I was digging around the other day?

The last generation (9G, released in 2008) had full HD across the entire product line (the three 50" panels that encompass that line include the PDP-5020FD, PDP-111FD, and the KRP-500M). There were some prior year releases/generations that were only 720p, but that is before I delved into plasma so I know little about them.

Their desire for profit has turned them away from plasma technology, which can be produced more inexpensively, to LED-LCD and OLED, which command higher prices and higher profits. They hope these higher profits will fill their coffers.

That is fact.

What on earth could this possibly mean? I would hope this is the case for any competent company.

It's what I would coin as the no-sh*t Sherlock response. ;-)

LOL!

Glad I got my 1080p Panny (and helped my brother buy his two) before all the ECO non-sense started.   Fire it up and watch some TV! In daylight non-light control rooms, we keep the brightness turned down ... and people still comment on how great the picture looks.

 

Sad to hear plasma might be going away. Have they finally make a LCD (240hz ?) that can keep up with fast motion (like cable sports) without artifacts?

What he is probably trying to indicate is that with the collapse in plasma and LCD/ LED prices, the LCD's are still commanding something of a premium and therefore the profit per unit is higher. When plasma and LCD were costing $4000 approx with say a $500 differential there is not as much pressure on the cheaper range (plasmas). When the cost are in the 1000-2000 range even a 200 differential becomes important in terms of maximizing return. The stores have a positive incentive to maximise LCD/ LED sales because it does some poor thing to counter the overall price crash and therefore profit crunch (see various suspicions above about stores putting plasmas in bad viewing positions and in technically bad viewing configurations; the less plasmas you sell the more LCD/ LEDs). And the manufacturers are in the same boat.

This is not a no **** Sherlock response but indicates something important about "rational" economic behaviour in situations where unit prices keep going down.

No, his point was filled with a kind of disdain for companies trying to make a profit the best they could.

Further, your point doesn't connect together with this either. It doesn't indicate a thing that hasn't been 1. known nor 2. expected. And in fact, I'll add 3. hoped for (if you own a 401K). You're not making this point, but be clear: companies don't exist to make things easier for consumers. Folks insisting on that belong in the middle of NY in a tent hollering at people in suits and complaining. They exist to make money, which equates to maximizing a profit.

And stores don't float prices around willy-nilly. They are in competition with each other. There hasn't been anything nearly approaching a tacit collusion in this market until the UPP showed up. And if Sony could make their XBR cheaper, they would----it would be a competition crushing product. And the same for the Sharp Elite. They *can't*. And both company divisions are in tough shape: *particularly* Sharp.

Nice review Scott.

I'm glad you asked what it means. Plasma technology can be superior to LCD-LED technology for lower prices, if done right. We've seen it again and again. TV makers have transitioned to LCD-LED technology sets NOT for picture quality reasons, but for reasons of profitability.

Hence, anyone that I know who is shopping for the best deal on the best picture quality on a set (to me, this constitutes the primarily job of a display), I will recommend buy a plasma display.

I hope this makes sense to you.

Incorrect. My point was twofold - decrying that inferior display technologies have acheived market primacy purely for profit reasons, AND that the cycle of margin compression on LCD-LEDs is not as advanced as it is on PDPs.

Your points are both carts before the horse. First, You don't achieve "market primacy" purely for profit reasons----there need to be product reasons that people will buy something first. And you're also assuming that PDP's are superior in all areas when they aren't. People are sold on LCD's because of 1. brightness, and 2. the IR/BI boogeyman (real or imagined) that exists within the plasma world.

Your 2nd point similarly exhibits a backwards understanding of economics because any margin pressure within the PDP world didn't form in a vacuum. It would only happen *because* they are having a hard time selling them. If the demand for them was out of control huge, then the end-price could go up.

In response to Vinnie, your initial statement was this:
...which warranted a "no-@#$% Sherlock" because of COURSE a company moves to what produces a profit. And what produces a better profit is what sells. All you said is company X can't sell apples so they're switching to selling more oranges. So what?

I thought plasma's unpopularity and Pioneer's exit in particular was due to the high price of manufacturing excellent p.q.
Now that plasma actually cost less the unpopularity is due to low price of excellent p.q? Can't be both.
Anti-plasma retailers continue to conspire against plasma with overhead lighting?
Do retailers really have an interest in not selling one of their products. It's what they do.
I don't think it has to be this complicated. Bright, sharp displays are popular.

Correct. And Displays that don't leave burn ins on them as well are popular. NEITHER of those have to do with the cost of developing the panel----the best of the best 2012 (VT50) still has brightness issues and reviews complaining of IR/BI (author carefully tries and fails to side step the "plasma doesn't suffer from this" avsforum debacle again). Besides, the point is that you must start with what the demand is for. THAT determines whether or not a profit can be maintained. If the end price is too high, then people won't want it, of course. But the lower profit margins for plasma have to do with the fact that there just are not enough people wanting them first.

I agree that profit is not the end all of why LCD outsells plasma, but it goes deeper than that. and profit is the primary motivating factor. But that's pretty much a given for any product. One major reason that LCD's sell so much better and why many companies have championed the LCD technology is it's ability to manufacture tons and tons of product in the under 50" range. Plasma has abandoned the 42" market and now is largely aiming at the 55", 60" and 65" buyers. In that category they are less expensive then most of their LED competitions high end models. Marketing also plays a huge role in the dominance of LCD in that Samsung advertised the LED TV and falsely intimated that LED was in itself a new technology which of course it is not. In my experience fully 75% of customers still believe that false hood. Even many sales people propagate this misinformation. Sadly most of them actually believe it. Company X didn't switch from selling apples to selling oranges because they couldn't sell apples, they switched because there are many more varieties of oranges than apples, hence a bigger market. Especially if you create a new market like LED.

Even that statement isn't quite right. Be clear here: profit follows what happens with demand. Not the other way around. It's can be confusing, because price is part of what determines demand (the demand for a $12,000 display is low for instance). But get the causality in the right direction.


No. None of that would matter at all if people wanted plasma over LCD dramatically. You can imagine all kinds of things that could you manufacture tons and tons of: if it doesn't start with meeting what the people want, then you're making the wrong thing.


Yes, that is regrettable. And irritating.




No that's saying precisely the same thing. A company needs to survive. If people are buying one or the other, (apple or orange), and they're buying far more oranges, then they'll switch to oranges.

^^^I sell tvs. I can't tell you how many times a customer's been really impressed with the picture quality and price equation on a particular set and been fully ready to pull the trigger until they notice it's a plasma. Then they run in fear because a neighbor's hairdresser's mechanic bought a cheapy Maxent or Haier 7 years ago and had a crappy experience with it. The fact that Panasonic plasmas consistently have the least problems of any flat panel according to Consumer Reports reliability surveys means nothing to them. Then there's the plain fact that the average buyer wants the brightest, thinnest set with the most whiz-bang smart features despite the fact that a $90 Roku box will outperform any smart tv for internet functionality. They'll rave about how thin and bright their new set is and not notice the horrendous flashllighting and clouding because their room is lit up like Death Valley at high noon in July and they're running the set in Dynamic mode. They may notice the speakers aren't very good and come in and buy a $90 sound bar.

TV mfgs. ignore these people at their peril, that's why showrooms are full of led lit lcds and plasmas are disappearing.

Yes. In fact I was careful to say "real or imagined" for this very reason. The problems exist in the minds of the technologists as WELL as the folks who barely know how to plug in a toaster.



.................................{sound of screeching brakes, a collision, and a hubcap rolling idly and then wobling to a stop}. This is where we part company. It's simply not the case that Panasonic plasmas (any model) are immune to burn-in / image-retention, even when prepped properly. People here will insist that they've never had a problem with it. And never-the-less, people here with experience with them will have a problem with it.

Kind of an endless back and forth gumbling in this place.

The built-in streaming thing is truly an irritation for most people currently. I fully understand the reasons for them doing this, but it's still as if the TV companies completely forgot what it is they're good at and tried to pretend to be systems programers or something. Getting a large collection of disparately designed applications to run reliably is best left to people who do nothing BUT that for a living.

The decision between PDP = IR and LED does not = IR is not as simple as that.

Observe. Apple is struggling with a QC issue with LED-backlit IPS displays manufactured by LG for their top-of-the-line retina Macbook Pro. The realities of display limitations are more nuanced than your response would suggest. Below are just two links that address his problem.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4610115?start=0&tstart=0

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1422669

Apple's overpriced hardware getting undermined by LG (Sorry, rogo). That gives me a twisted satisfaction.

Steve, great stuff as usual.

Vinnie, I'm not offended. But the funny thing is, the Retina Macbook Pro 13" model is actually a bargain. It's not overpriced at all. They are starting at $1300 at 3rd-party retailers at the moment, which is the same price as the much-less-capable Chromebook Pixel.

I'm sorry, but what is all this? We're talking about what the public perceives to be true. Those "nuances" you're talking about just do not matter in the least. You were emphatically declaring PDP to be a superior technology (or words to that effect). As far as "PDP=IR" side off this goes, among my responses I was clear to indicate this to be "real or imagined":

Well, sure you do! If TV manufacturers see two technology options - Option A and Option B, let's call them - they'll usually go for the one that makes them more money. That's Econ 101, my friend. LCD-LEDs are pushed by everyone in the chain: TV makers, distribution centers and warehouses who love that they can fit more of these thinner TVs in a cubic foot of space, retailers who don't have to rely solely on markup on cables, surge protectors and protection plans to stay afloat in an increasingly cutthroat retail space, etc. These things are cyclical. It's happened with CRT TVs and RP TVs. It will happen sooner than later to PDP TVs, and it will happen to LCD-LED TVs as OLED TVs come down in price.

I am certainly not. On another site, I've been involved just today in a conversation about a Panasonic GT50 plasma exhibiting dithering. The poster asking the question was concerned that his PDP was damaged. I assured him that dithering is an artifact (limitation) inherent in PDP technology.

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=17064579#post17064579

There's nothing wrong with my understanding of margin compression on TVs. When I say that margin pressure on PDPs was more advanced than LCD-LEDs, I mean that, because they were out on the market first, they'd gone through their cycle of commanding a premium price (as large-scale OLED TVs are beginning to now), to the peak period where they had prices that mere mortals could afford (where LCD-LEDs are now), then they hit the level of being a commodity (where they are now). This happened this way because of different development and market cycles.
Edited by [Irishman] - 3/29/13 at 3:08pm

That Pixel IS a head-scratcher, isn't it? I mean, who is that thing made for?? Eric Schmidt?