Official Philips 50PF9731D/37 discussion

I bought the largest and latest Philips 50" plasma with surround (2 side and top) ambilight based on its specs, features and limited customer reviews. I did not find extensive discussion on it. So owners of this model or whoever interested in it can discuss it here.

I had it for only 1 day but I had gone through most of it's features. It's my 3rd 50" plasma. I had used two 50" Vizio in the last 1.5 years. So I used exactly same DVD, HD DVD, Satelite and OTA feed to see different screens, and even the programs are same or very similar. My impression is the picture quality of the 50PF9731D is decent but inferrior than that of the cheap new face of Vizio. It's less crispy and a little fuzzy. On fast moving objects and bright object under shadow I can see some mosaic dots or small block. I believe the DCDi technology by Faroudja used on Vizio made the difference. This does bother me (because my pic was downgraded after channing to a new tv), but not very much.

What bugs me is the settings are very high when the pics look really good. e.g. the contrast has to be at 85 and brightness has to be 65 and others are also high. You name it. For a new plasm it shouldn't be that way. If I set them below 50 the picture is way dark and the unnatural and unacceptible. It's well know that if you set the settings too high the tv is wearing faster. For the Vizio I had set the contrast and brightness around 40-45 and the pic still looks good. The Vizio claims its life to be 60000 hours. Philips never say anything about this. I am not sure if Philips has special technology to maintain its plasma at good state if the contras and brightness and other settings have to be set that high.

Most user-unfriendly and stupid remote ever by Philips. If you poll 100 hundred owner majority will hate this remote. I can safely bet I can give out my unit free to anybody if the result is contrary.

I initially had a problem on my unit. When using HDMI 1 input, on the left side of the panel there is one strip about half inch is not filled with picture. I had tried feed from Satelite box and DVD players and it shows always. And I switched both feeds to HDMI 2 and the problem was gone. The problem is with the HDMI 1 connection for sure. It's just like when you use CRT monitor you have to the settings to shift the screen to the left to make it fill in the full screen. it's odd for a plasma tv. Finally I found out that I had to use the cursor to shift it. I don't know if any other plasma has the same issue. My previous two plasma don't.

The good part is its ambilight. Surround with 2 sides and top. You can turn it on and off and set at different mode. I watched the TV at night and it's really nice. I hope all TVs have this feature.

So overall I am really not impressed with Philips 9731D. Maybe I just have a bad unit. I will find out. So for owner please post your experience. I have to decide if I want to keep it.

If I set contrast or brightness below 50 on the 9731D it's too dark. Acceptabel level is about 60. With my old Vizio I could even set them at around 35 and it still looks good. I am not expecting it last 20 years. As long as it has the good picture for 10 years that's more than good enough. I bet most people will upgrade their units in 10 years. BTW, where did you know it's 60000 hour life for philips plasma? I want to know the officially confirmed statement by Philips. Yes the 9731 and 9631 must be same on most parts.

tonight I will completely tweak it with Digital Video caliberation disk and see how it will be.

Scmedic, are those gained by caliberation or by your personal eye experience? Since the whole caliberation process takes long hours I should initially set Dynamic Contrast and Active Control at some level that they won't interfere with the caliberation.

Tonight I saw another occurence of unfilled strips on sides even I had "solved" the problem with cursor at noon. When turned it on to watch NBA at ESPN HD. The right side had the strip unfilled. SO I used the cursor to move it again.To my surprise, both sides had strips unfilled. What I could do? I waited. A few minutes later it filled them automatically. But later it happened again on two sides. So it's on and off. I was focusing on the game so I did not change channel to see if it happened to other channels. I will monitor this.

Tonight I noticed it has electronic buzz on the back. If I muted the sound and sit at 12 feet away I can clearly hear it. If I turn on the sound it's a none issue. Wife is not happy with the noise and its (ugly, she said) appearnce. Even she noticed its picture quality is inferior than our old Vizio 50" plasma.

I was using Dish Satelite HD package and never had problem like this when using other plasma. It was set to use widescreen.

My wife does not like the appearance of my old Vizio but at least I can insist its picture is great. For the 9731D she hates the appearance more and also found its pic inferior. What I can say? She want me to buy the old model 7220A in silver color with two speakers on side.

Summary of picture quality issues with the 50PF9731D/37

1. It seems adjacent pixels are interfering each other or something else exists between pixels. If I look at the screen at close distance I can see this. It's not straight neat vertical and horizontal lines on which the pixels are located. Instead it's blurred rough lines and the overall picture is not crispy but blurred. On my old unit each individual pixel is neatly displayed as tiny dot and all pixels on display formed neat thin vertical and horizontal lines and no interference exists at all. That makes big difference on the picture quality. I think the DCdi technology by Faroudja on the Vizio made the difference.

2. I don't know how to call it correctly so just call it ghost curtain on the screen. Ideally you see the picture but nothing else no matter it's a still picture of moving one. On my screen it's like there is a very thin see-through plastic or glass type curtain with visible painting on it. When the real picture moves the curtain does not so I can see something there. It's like the legit picture layer is moving but the ghost curtain stay. It's definitely not the glass or dust on it. It's some kind of picture display. This type of issue should not happen no matter what setting is on. I had tried almost all kinds of setting and this issue is always there.

3. Occasionally I could see mosaic blocks or strips. This type of issue happened to all display one time or the other. But on the 9731D it seemed to happen more often. I watched same program or even the exact same thing saved on DVR. I believe it's the picture processing on the unit is not with very high quality.

4. The contrast and brightness have to be set nearly 60 to get acceptable picture. Below 50 it's too dark. Given its 10000:1 and 1500 rating this definitely should not be the case. My old units have 10000:1 and 1000 rating and I only need to set them at around 40 to get acceptable picture. The good about the 9731D is its color. It looks richer than my old unit but sometimes it's a little unnatural.

Some of the issues may have to with my eyes. My eyes are more sensitive than most people. E.g. most people's CRT monitor flicker severely to me and they even don't notice the flicker. After they set the refresh rate higher they don't see difference but I do. All display flicker and people won't see it. If you use a camcorder videotape the monitor then and playback you will see it.

It's not just because of my eyes. I don't see the same issue on my old Vizios. And my wife has normal eyes and even she noticed the issues I reported.

vpr80, the bezel is glossy black. I really don't know how many people like that and why most manufacturers like to use that. It deflact too much light and causes distraction.

PhilipsPhanatic, I will keep all 9731 post here. I post there because very few people visit and post here. I also want to post here to keep this alive and hope it can grow as more people will have this model. Strangely the 9631 model is 100 more expensive than the 9731 in local store.

Xbox 360 can be attached to the side input via the composite cable in Yellow/Red/White. Do Xbox and 360 use same cable? The one cable for 360 has both sets together.

That's right. The side input is just for some convenient connecting activities. Composite is the worst connection.