Master Burn-In/IR/Break In Thread Part II: All Posts Here Only - Page 54

I think the purpose of the break-in is to quickly age the phosphors, so I believe that the best setting for that procedure is actually Vivid with brightness & contrast pegged out at 100.

I have heard you DO NOT want to use vivid when breaking in & to turn contrast & brightness to nothing more then 50. What about the sharpness, tint & color settings as well?

Any other insights??

If you're watching the TV normally during the "break-in" phase, you should avoid Vivid mode and have your brightness & contrast at 50 or below (per Panasonic recommendations).

However, the break-in slides are a different matter - you are trying to age the phosphors with a series of full-screen vivid colors, so this process will be accelerated by putting the set in Vivid. For the current gen Panasonics, D-Nice recommends the Vivid setting with Contrast at 100, Brightness at 55, Color at 65 and Tint at 0 for the break-in slides only.

So the distinction here is:
- When running the break-in slides, use the blown-out Vivid settings;
- When viewing normally during the break-in phase, use a different picture mode and keep the brightness & contrast at or below 50

That's my understanding anyway - if someone knows differently, I'm all ears...

Got my panasonic tc-p50s1 delivered today. The picture is awesome. I'm doing the 100 hour or so break-in by just watching regular tv, making sure I change the channel if I see any black bars on the sides or top of the screen. I put the dvd movie "The Wrestler" on, only to find out it had the black bars on the screen, so I immediately ejected the movie. Don't want to take a chance during break-in. I'll watch "The Wrestler" on my other Panasonic tube tv.

I set the settings similar to the way Dave Katzmaier of c-net suggests after break-in, except I turned down the contrast and brightness. After the break-in I think I'll set it to the way Dave Katzmaier sets it.

Dave Katzmaier's suggested settings for tc-p50s1:
picture: cinema
contrast: +55
brightness: +63
color: + 32
tint: 0
sharpness: 0

My break-in settings
picture: cinema
contrast: +50
brightness: +50
color: +32
tint: 0
sharpness: 0

I was reading the forums to finally decide between plasma or LCD. As a person who does not have too much time tweaking things, I ask the question "is plasma picture so much better to warrant all these maintenance work". It sounds like I have to make everything perfect before & after I watch anything just so that the damn tv does not break..... After all, once burn in does occur, the final picture will be MUCH worse that the worst LCD screen...

Is it worth it ?

This is like buying a ferrari which I have to retune EVERY time I drive it rather than driving a Corvette. Is the perf difference really worth it ?

EXACTLY my sentiments. Plasma seems to have soooo many issues......

Here's the deal - you can introduce IR to your plasma, but there are simple steps to take to seriously reduce the chances of it happening, and if you notice it starting to happen, there are simple steps to rectify it.

Pretty much any decent plasma TV will have anti-IR features built into the set - use them. The pixel orbiter feature should be turned on, and I'd suggest setting it to the most aggressive setting - you won't notice the pixels shifting, and it's a good preventative feature. For 4:3 viewing, you should be able to set the black bars to a "light" setting. If you notice some IR after using your TV (you'll need to get close to the screen and look at it in very low light conditions to see if it's starting to happen) the set should have a scrolling white bar feature - run that for several minutes and the IR should disappear. If you have persistent IR that isn't going away and you're still in the early stages of using your TV, running the break-in images slideshow should eventually eliminate it.

It's widely believed that the phosphors in plasma sets are somewhat malleable in the first 100 or so hours of use, and after that they are fairly firmly "broken in", making them very resistant to IR, as well as actually improving the picture quality. This is why there is the suggestion of running break-in slides on the set that cycle through full-screen R/G/B colors and grey scales to age the set. Some people will run these immediately and not watch anything on their set until it's done - you can do that, but it's not a requirement by any means.

If you choose to enjoy your set after you buy it and not do the break-in (or do the break-in procedure in between using your set), just exercise a few restraints - try not to play games that have static images on screen for hours on end; be conscious about watching letterboxed movies or 4:3 TV channels/DVD's - watch them certainly, but you might not want to do marathon watching of several hours in a row. Use the scrolling white bar after any TV use that isn't full-screen moving images. Don't put your picture in "Vivid/torch" mode right out of the box, and keep the contrast and brightness around 50.

If you exercise these cautions, after the first 100 or so hours of use you should be able to fully enjoy your TV.

And yes, the picture quality difference is well worth any hassle in breaking it in.

That answers my question, Thanks

Although the other question I have I seen you metioned staying away from watching 4:3 w/ plasma. We currently have regular dish which I believe displays in 4:3 right? Also will we have the black bars on both sides of the screen, and what can we do to not experience image burn-in?

I'm not sure that you have avoid watching 4:3 completely - if your TV can change the black bar settings for 4:3 viewing to "bright" or "light" or something similar, that should reduce risk of IR. I would think if you don't watch several hours in a row of 4:3 signals you'd be OK - just mix up your viewing some while the TV is still breaking in, and if you watch something with static images that are onscreen for a while (like 4:3 side bars) it's probably a good idea to use an anti-IR function like the scrolling white bars on the Panasonics (I would guess that Samsung has somethign similar).

Me personally, I'm not a big TV watcher other than sports. I mostly watch HD channels, so I only see 4:3 bars during commercials (and those are way too short to worry about).

I think it it would be more like buying a BMW instead of a mini-van which would some how be more expensive. If you need to carry 7 people and have kids than you cannot get a BMW. Just like if you need to watch a ton of 4:3 television or use your TV as a computer monitor. Its not like buying some insane car that requires daily work. Its would be like buying a car that you cannot do specific things with. If you need to do those things you should buy another car.

If that is not worth the price/performance trade-off than you need to buy an LCD. If you are watching in a very bright room and/or watch a lot of 4:3 tv, or want to use a plasma as a computer monitor, than maybe you need to consider getting a LCD.

Plasmas can take abuse. It is just a few things that are over the top and cause problems.


I would take the trade-off of being careful in the first few hundred hours and not watching 4:3 in original aspect ratio rather than paying twice as much or getting a tv with motion blur and mediocre black levels. It will really not effect my viewing at all after the first few hundred hours.

Is break-in the first 100 hours or the first few hundred hours?

I find all the hand wringing about this to be pretty amusing. I got my set, a Panasonic PX5077U, a year and a half ago. Set the contrast below 50% for the first week and a half, then after that turned it up and haven't looked back. Never ran a break in DVD or slides. Yes, I have the side bars for 4:3 content set to gray in the set and on my DirecTV reciever, but beyond that I take no other special measures. I watch a lot of sports with scoreboards and tickers, play Xbox 360, and watch shows in 4:3 and movies in letterbox. The TV is fine. No burn in and perfect uniformity. I will see an outline of something occasionally but they're not very noticeable and none has ever persisted more than a minute or two before disappearing.

For the typical user the small risk of burn in or uneven wear is no reason to choose LCD, where you're dealing with the high probability of poor uniformity, flash lighting, banding, clouding, and off-angle picture quality degradation. There are other good reasons to go with LCD but IMO this isn't one of them.

jeff

Where can I purchase a Break in disk? I have the Samsung 2500 Bluy ray player.

Go to pg 1 of this thread and go to the very first post by williamr.

Click "download break" in dvd.

The first post on this pg is by evangelo2. On the very bottom of this post, click on "my homepage - download plasma break in dvd...

Click on "buy now". You can order it for $6.50.

do you know how long to get one???
Bill

Much of my anxiety has just been relieved. I just now discovered that channels with the black bars can be removed by pushing the "format" button on the panasonic remote and choosing the options of full, just, h-fill, and zoom while the black bars are present on the channel. The bars can also be removed from dvd movies with these different modes. I did not know this and much of my worry about plasma was that I thought I would just have to deal with the black bars and hope I don't get burn-in.

I'm just assuming to leave it on "full" if there are no black bars?

If there's black bars during the full screen, the manual recommends "just" for normal viewing. Is "just" the way to go if the full screen has black bars?

Or is "h-fill" or "zoom" the way to go?

This is my very first hd tv so I'm very new at this.

Not sure. I would imagine you would get it within a week with standard shipping. Or you could go 1st or 2nd day air, but it could be a lot more expensive.

thanks...ordered mine last week but haven't gotten any confirmation or email it went through other than the paypal being accepted...thanks again,
Bill

If you want to fill the screen during your first hundred hours or so, go for it - after that though, enjoy your TV and don't cheat yourself out of seeing the entire movie when watching content that is letterboxed.

I just got a new Samsung PN42B450 and Im very new to the Plasma TV's. When I run this Burn in DVD, Do I lower any of my settings? Right now I'm just using the default Movie Setting...

Actually, when running the break in images you want to go with a Vivid or Torch setting (whatever is the most saturated & vivid) as this maximizes the breaking in of the display. THIS IS ONLY WHEN PLAYING THE BREAK-IN IMAGES.

If you also watch normal content during your break-in phase, you'll want to keep the picture toned down while watching anything other than the break-in images. I know with Panasonic, they suggest you keep your brightness & contrast settings at 50 or below for the first 100 or so hours of use.

After the set is broken in, use whatever settings you like the best; I'd guess there are probably some suggested settings in a Samsung thread related to your set...

arrived with today's mail (Break In Disc)...so about 6 days from payment, New York to Chicago...
Bill

Like the setting with the Highest Brightness and Contrast? My settings are Dynamic, Standard and Movie

I would suspect Dynamic with the contrast and brightness turned up.

Don't quote me on this, as I'm not a Samsung expert - this is just based off of the suggested settings that have been posted for breaking in Panasonics. I'd suggest searching the Plasma forums for a thread on your model Samsung and see if there's more specific info for your TV...

Ya I tried to but the only info states settings for optimal picture quality and when they mention break in, they only mention the amount of hours

I'd guess that if you run these slides for 100 hours, it probably doesn't matter a whole lot what the picture settings are. But based off the theory of what the slides are supposed to do (age each phosphor evenly by running a spectrum of Red, Green, Blue and greyscale images), the process will probably be accelerated if you have the set in a very vivid picture mode with the pictures bright and saturated.

Again, that's just my guess based off of what I've read on these forums - there are certainly more experienced members here that should be able to give you the scoop. Is there a thread for your model? If so, you might ask in that thread what others have done to break in their sets...

Well Ill just run the Burn In DVD with my settings at contrast 50% and Brightness at 50% with dynamic contrast off. Thanks for you helpful info thanks. It was amazingly appreciated!

I just got my Samsung P63 B590 plasma today.

Put in Iron Man BD, and I have thin horizontal black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. The other viewmodes either have 4:3 bars, or still have the top bars.

There is a Zoom 1 and Zoom 2 mode, but they are greyed out.

Anybody know how to unlock those on samsungs?

Have I missed something in this theory?

If we can assume that real burn in is due to differential phosphor/pixel aging in a plasma, and that temporary image retention is caused by a different process entirely. Likely static/residual charges in the pixels themselves. Then the following should be true for current plasma displays:

Rated panel life =
100,000 hours to 50% brightness

50,000 hours to 75% brightness

25,000 hours to 87.5% brightness

12,500 hours to 93.75% brightness

6,250 hours to 96.87% brightness

My interpretation is that it would take approximately 260 days (6250/24hrs) of a static, unorbited, image on a black screen to achieve a 3% drop in the brightness for those pixels. If this is anywhere near correct, this would seem to make the idea of actual, permanent, burn in, highly unlikely, if not impossible, with any normal usage of a plasma display.

I got my Panasonic TC-P42G10 a few days ago and am now 10 hours into the break-in with SD card & slideshow. The question I have is...I went and set the settings according to what D-Nice recommended under picture settings for the G10's however I cannot change the 3D Y/C Filter because it is greyed out?? Why is this and does it matter to have it on or off during break in?

Also I noticed it appears that I have one dead or stuck pixel, is there any way to get it unstuck? It seems to not show on all the colors. And is it something I should be concerned about?