It's official. I see a rainbow-like effect on every plasma. - Page 23

It's strange how it is nearly always Panasonlc or Pioneer plasma owners who report these trails etc. I have a LG 50" plasma and don't see anything...even when watching black 'n' white. So I don't know if it's my TV or my eyes or both? Must be reasonably common as I've even seen youtube videos on this.

It's either your eyes or your source material.
I specifically tested a LG (as well as a Hitachi & Samsung) for the trails at a store over a year ago when I found out about them on my previous Panasonic & the ones on the LG were twice as bad.

Man that sucks. I love B&W movies and flashes would absolutely destroy them. We need a science/tech periodical to do a study on this phenomenon, especially because of how it apparently fades over time... I bet it would be very interesting.

I messed about with the colour controls after I posted my other message and have managed to lessen the trails quite a bit. I dropped the contrast and the green... its helped enough that its changing my mind about returning the Pioneer.

Its a tough one; LCDs have a lot of minuses and I really don't want to go back to my old CRT...

Decisions, decisions. Its helped that some people have reported that it seems to lessen over time (although not everyone agrees with that).

I don't think messing with the green would help, though lowering the contrast certaintly will.

After more monkeying around, I'm going to agree with that. Of course, lowering the contrast kind of defeats the purpose of the whole thing...

A recent patent by Pioneer suggests they can tweak the materials inside the individual colored phosphor subpixels to change the time delay for discharge. It sure sounded like they were addressing the color seperation problem but after reading the entire patent it seems more like they are adjusting the color reproduction (whiter whites.....)

"In addition, for the phosphor layer of the PDP according to the present invention, the red phosphor layer, the green phosphor layer and the blue phosphor layer respectively include different amounts of the secondary electron emission material determined in accordance with the electrification properties of the phosphor materials respectively used for forming the red, green and blue phosphor layers, such that the amounts of electrification of the red, green and blue phosphor layers are adjusted to be approximately equal to each other. Because of this adjustment, the discharge voltages in the red, green and blue unit light emission areas become approximately equal to each other so as to start the discharge approximately at the same time. In consequence, an increase in discharge voltage margin is achieved, thus achieving clearer white display.

Specifically, the discharge voltage required for initiating a discharge in the green discharge cell in which the green phosphor layer is formed is higher than those in the red discharge cell and the blue discharge cell. Accordingly, the discharge in the green discharge cell occurs slightly later than the discharge in the red and blue discharge cells. For this delay, even if the sustain discharge is initiated simultaneously in the red, green and blue discharge cells for a white display, the discharge intensity in the green discharge cell is reduced due to the time difference in discharge occurrence in the red, green and blue discharge cells, resulting in a magenta display instead of a white display."

I think you'll get used to it. They were much more noticeable when I first bought a plasma. Now a year and two plasmas later, I don't see them anymore unless I'm looking for them.

People say this about DLPs as well. I've had my a DLP projector with a 5x wheel for two or so years now, and I still see rainbows just as often as I did on day one. (I only kept it as it was so cheap)

I know the causes for phosphor lag are different, but if you see them even when you're not looking for them, they're not going to go away over time.

This is incorrect. I saw rainbows(without looking) when I first bought my plasma and it went away after two days.

Everyone's brain is wired differently. Some will always see the issue and some will not. I'm living proof.

w

You got used to them, they didn't disappear. The image separation will still be there, you just don't notice it now.

If you don't see them anymore what's the difference?

w

The difference is that just because you got used to them after some time, it doesn't mean that someone else will.

If the problem disappeared over time, it wouldn't be an issue for anyone.

Like I said:

Wow! I just found this thread. I purchased a 9G Pioneer 6020 a couple weeks ago and I immediately started experiencing this issue. I even described it as "greenish rainbow" to my dealer even before finding this thread. I see it mostly in high contrast scenes. For example, during Battlestar Galactica in HD, there are many scenes of space and darkness with high contrast, this is when it is the worse, almost unwatchable for me, gives me eye pain and headaches after a while. On day-time scenes or sports such as baseball for example, it's still noticable, but not as bad.

I thought I was the only one until I found this thread. My wife doesn't see it and has no idea what I'm talking about.

Add me to the list. I just bought a Samsung 42" plasma and on high contrast scenes I see a rainbow effect. Still, I'd rather that than an LCD.

Ah, I see rainbows too!

This is a Panasonic th-46pz8e. Its not very bad though. I also photographed the tv (by doing a sweeping motion during exposure) on a paused screen and its clear there is a rainbow-effect, even on static screens which surprised me. I hate DLP for example. I can live with this, though. I knew about plasma green flashes, but I had no recollection of them being there all the time (ie. on static imagery) so I was a bit surprised.

I've actually read this thread abt. a year ago, but forgot about it! =)


Anyway, I am super-happy with my plasma. 1080p is other-wordly.

Big Buck Bunny is actually the best 1080p I can play atm, bit weak CPU.

It is pretty funny why im here. I just got a 50px80u....my first plasma....today. After watching for a while I swore a couple rainbows caught my eye when something solid white was against something dark. I just ignored it thinking no way. Then I ran the anti-IR scrolling white bar and holy crap...RAINBOWS! I ran in here to google plasma rainbow effect because I had never heard of it. Guess Im one of the Chosen Ones.

Hi there!
I'm a new 42px80 owner and i xperience eyestrains while watching at my tv. I also get those eyestrains while watching at DLP projectors (although i don't see the rainbow)...
Is there any chance not to notice rainbow effect but to have eyestrains cause of the plasma tv?
Can anyone have eyestrains just by using the plasma tv as a pc desktop?

There are plenty of possible reasons why you get eye strain. You may be seeing flicker, may be adjusting to the bigger size (more eye movement) or may be getting strain from the high contrast. I doubt you are getting strain from rainbows that you don't even see.

Cheers

Well after years of not being able to see this color seperation I'm now exceedingly efficient at seeing it. Now that I'm able to see it and not just theorize it's cause, I can agree that it definitley looks like there are two seperate artifacts.

1 - retinal persistence (plainbows)

2 - phospor decay (green/yellow flashing)


I also would like to suggest that inherent problem threads like this one might be better served as a private thread. I say this because if this thread never existed, I would have never ever noticed the color seperation.

Ignorance is bliss.........

Could you explain better what retinal resistance is?

If you have never read about that and never have noticed the color separation, wouldnt it be better for your eyes?

Hmm... this thread is funny... Seriously, the phosphor decay issue is the main deal breaker for me. It was something I noticed the first time I played video games on a plasma (Wii -> component -> LG 42" 720p plasma) back in '06. On top of that, the Kuro displays are among the best exhibitors of this problem. If the plasma tech didn't have this glaring issue, I'd be the happy owner of a PRO-111FD.

+1 to ignorance is bliss.... except I noticed this issue before seeing this thread...

Perhaps plasma TVs mfgs will finally be able to address this problem within the next couple of years (maybe the year after 1080p plasmas can acheive 1080 lines of motion resolution)?

I could write a long explanation on how these two artifacts happen and how to see them better but I would rather not because when you understand what is going on it makes it easier to see. If you want I can PM you.

I'd like to stay in the dark for now thanks...

Well the thing that annoyes me on my plasma is that some spots on the screen seem like small stars, like changing colour for a moment....

Recently I've been doing some physiological experiments on myself. Couple interesting things to share:

1 - I can reproduce the plainbow effect (retinal persistence) on my LCDs and CRTs but it takes a lot more effort.

2 - My perception of flicker on plasma displays can be reduced to zero by having ~ 2-3 beers. For some reason "beer goggles" works for plasma as well

Ok, that second point made me laugh.

needs to be the other way, I didnt see this thread, just googled it, before I bought my Pioneer 5020 and I am seeing rainbows

thought maybe I was going crazy while watching my new tv guess I am not alone. Not sure what to do, tempted to return it but I love the tv and already sold my LCD. Not rainbows on my lcd at least.

I think I noticed some trails on Star Wars, as the Tie fighters were swooping around the Millienium Falcon. I guess bright fast moving object on a black background is the most likely method of showing it?

That would be one scenario where the effect is easily observed.