i know is shouldnt with a baby on the way but im really fancying a big tv, ive had my old sony normal def for 6 years now and with doing the living room out i really fancy a new tv, been in a few shop's now and seen a 51" plasma tv

 

i wasnt really looking for a plasma but apperently for anything bigger than 40" plasma is the way to go, im not really sure though

 

what would you reccomend or has anyone got this tv?

 

http://www.google.co.uk/products/catalog?hl=en&cp=17&gs_id=18&xhr=t&q=samsung+ps51d495+review&pq=samsung+ps51d495&safe=off&gs_upl=&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.,cf.osb&biw=1187&bih=549&wrapid=tljp132231765378020&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=shop&cid=17146378119915039929&sa=X&ei=VvfQTpWILI24hAf3_4ivDQ&sqi=2&ved=0CFwQ8wIwAQ

Plasmas are brill mate.

 

I changed my much loved panasonic plasma to a much more expensive HD LCD downstairs last year. Big mistake, after less than 6 months I relegated it to the bedroom and went back to plasma, the picture is so much more natural and smooth, HD channels look less grainy and non HD channels look much better (no edgy lines and fake looking colours) They are normally quite a bit cheaper as well.

 

50" samsungs can be had for a snip at the mo. We even got a 50" 720p samsung for 500 last xmas. They have the 'media play' on them too which is cool, just whack movies on a usb stick and plug it in, they support blue ray rips / mkv's etc too. 720p is also plenty for a 50" screen, the LCD was 1080p and had a much worse picture. They look pretty classy in piano black too imho (although collect dust like it's going out of fashion!). Most blu ray's are 720p upscaled anyway. I think 1080 comes into it's own with projectors and much larger screens (have a projector upstairs and you have to go over 60" to even see any loss in detail with 720).

 

Just be careful with burn in, high contrast and even 15 mins of a static image can make it stick until you've put something else over it to reset the screen.

 

I say go for it, unless you are interested in 3d which tbh is a bit of a flop anyway atm this would be a nice TV that will give you 10's of hours and several years or more of quality viewing for the price mate ;)

I meant 100's of hours lol but seem to have lost the right to edit.

cheers bud, im still gonna have a look around as i am a sony fan, but as you say this look's good and it's dirt cheap for a 51" tv

 

what is plasma burn and how do i avoid it?

i know is shouldnt with a baby on the way but im really fancying a big tv,

 

Do it, Do it now!!!!!! you wont get a chance after!!!!! i only bought my Zed when we found the mrs was with child lol. do it now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

im looking to see if there is any buy now pay later deal's, but they all come with apr now, used to get free till payed off lol

IMHO and that's all this is, get a Samsung LED instead, plasma is too dull, High Def means nothing on a plasma and unless you buy one of the REALLY expensive ones, they die really quickly with things like you've mentioned, plasma burn. We bought a Samsung 46" LED last year and it's awesome, if a little small, the picture is sharp, blue rays are awesome, and it's super slimline and uses less power than a plasma does too. Remember plasma TVs are banned in some countries because of the power usage.

 

oh oh oh AND :D lol :D you can see the LED TV picture from all angles, with a plasma you have to be quite square to it to see the picture properly :D

 

oh oh oh AND :D lol :D you can see the LED TV picture from all angles, with a plasma you have to be quite square to it to see the picture properly :D

 

well that has just ruled out a plasma, it has to sit on an angle for all to see, and to fit in an alcove

 

46" was my initial ideal size till i seen the 51" tv lol

We bought a 51" Samsung tv in Tesco's last week and its great mate.£499 and here's a link

http://direct.tesco.com/q/R.211-2581.aspx

And we can view it from all angles:thumbup:

And we can view it from all angles:thumbup:

 

Must have improved the tech a lot then cos that's one of the things we were concerned about too, so we checked out the visibility from all angles in Currys, that was last February :D

I thought LED+LCD tv's were the top of current formats? Best of both worlds and all that?

 

Disclaimer: I know NOTHING about TV's but quite fancy getting a new one myself - you still have to shovel coal into my tv, it's also deeper than it is wide and has something called a cathode ray tube. The picture is still a lot better than my mates 1300 quid jobby though.

I thought LED+LCD tv's were the top of current formats? Best of both worlds and all that?

 

Disclaimer: I know NOTHING about TV's but quite fancy getting a new one myself - you still have to shovel coal into my tv, it's also deeper than it is wide and has something called a cathode ray tube. The picture is still a lot better than my mates 1300 quid jobby though.

 

That's what we were told when we bought it yes, latest and greatest etc. and we certainly weren't dissapointed with it. We did buy the blue ray and surround system as well, taking the whole thing to something stupid like £1300, but it's been WELL worth it. I barely ever watch TV, but when I do, I REALLY enjoy it :yes:

IMHO and that's all this is, get a Samsung LED instead, plasma is too dull, High Def means nothing on a plasma and unless you buy one of the REALLY expensive ones, they die really quickly with things like you've mentioned, plasma burn. We bought a Samsung 46" LED last year and it's awesome, if a little small, the picture is sharp, blue rays are awesome, and it's super slimline and uses less power than a plasma does too. Remember plasma TVs are banned in some countries because of the power usage.

 

oh oh oh AND :D lol :D you can see the LED TV picture from all angles, with a plasma you have to be quite square to it to see the picture properly :D

 

IMHO really have to disagree ref the picture quality ;). The samsung uses LG pannels, as do most mainstream electronic companies and they are great, they've been building screens since the start and know what they are doing.

 

I can only speak for our model and my previous panasonic but we can see our plasma clear and the same from all angles. The very position of our TV would mean it would be useless to both sofas if there was a viewing angle issue. I've found it's normally cheap LCD's that get viewing angle problems. The response times and HZ is normally much higer on plasmas to comparible priced LCD's. HD is also a massive difference on our Samsung compared to normal, although it does smooth off lower res imags well, so the comment about making no difference in our case is not true.

 

The problem I have seen with non plasmas is the colours are more fake tbh, there have been so many topics on audio / video forums about it. The level of colours and contrast are so ramped up they 'seem' bright and clearer. If you look at your fire place and living room in real life then look at the default settings for an LCD or LED the screen will be massively brighter, more colourful and thus less natural. People not used to plasmas always mistake them for being more dull when in effect they are much more natural. If I went outside now and looked at my driveway and car it wouldn't be smacking me in the face like a picture on a non-plasma screen. Most threads I have seen discuss the 'perfect' setting for factory bright screens which seems to affect non plasma screens much more.

 

Also Stella just food for though, don't get caught up on the 1080 vs 720 thing. There really is no need for 1080 on anything under a 60", with a 50" screen being about 42" wide, you've still got the best part of two pixels per mm on the screen, the naked eye will strugle to see any difference at even a couple of feet away.

 

The benefit with LCD and now LED is as Hollow stated, the power consumption, the very nature of plasma having to charge the screen to make the picture means it pumps out heat and eats power by comparison. LED is the most economical of the three, is not subjective to burn in like plasmas.

 

I'd seriously recomend going into a shop Stella and demoing a 50" 720 plasma vs LCD or LED. I thnk you will be very surprised with the quality for such a modest price.

 

Ref the burn in if you have a static image on the screen weith higher contrast you will find you get a 'ghost' of the image on the screen. Unless left for 48 hours or something it won't be permenant, you just watch another channel or put some static on and it will reset the screen. This could be considered a down side but as long as you are aware of it you should be fine. They come with a screen saver anyway or 'pixel shift' function to try and minimise this. This is also why some people percieve plasmas to be dull, other than the more natural picture they come from factory with much lower contrast to prevent burn in easily while the screen is new, you will read about this all in the manual. After X amount of hours you can bump the contrast etc up if you want a more non plasma looking picture with less risk.

 

 

Cheers,

 

Cheers,

Oh and also as stated plasma screens are much heavier, this can be a consideration if you have one of these new type houses and are into mounting them on walls.

thanks steve, some great advice there, this is why i asked on here as i knew someone would have some advice, im not gonna jump straight in and i may wait till the sale's after the year but always best to ask advice

 

much appreciated people

 

Allan

IMHO really have to disagree ref the picture quality ;). The samsung uses LG pannels, as do most mainstream electronic companies and they are great, they've been building screens since the start and know what they are doing.

 

I can only speak for our model and my previous panasonic but we can see our plasma clear and the same from all angles. The very position of our TV would mean it would be useless to both sofas if there was a viewing angle issue. I've found it's normally cheap LCD's that get viewing angle problems. The response times and HZ is normally much higer on plasmas to comparible priced LCD's. HD is also a massive difference on our Samsung compared to normal, although it does smooth off lower res imags well, so the comment about making no difference in our case is not true.

 

The problem I have seen with non plasmas is the colours are more fake tbh, there have been so many topics on audio / video forums about it. The level of colours and contrast are so ramped up they 'seem' bright and clearer. If you look at your fire place and living room in real life then look at the default settings for an LCD or LED the screen will be massively brighter, more colourful and thus less natural. People not used to plasmas always mistake them for being more dull when in effect they are much more natural. If I went outside now and looked at my driveway and car it wouldn't be smacking me in the face like a picture on a non-plasma screen. Most threads I have seen discuss the 'perfect' setting for factory bright screens which seems to affect non plasma screens much more.

 

Also Stella just food for though, don't get caught up on the 1080 vs 720 thing. There really is no need for 1080 on anything under a 60", with a 50" screen being about 42" wide, you've still got the best part of two pixels per mm on the screen, the naked eye will strugle to see any difference at even a couple of feet away.

 

The benefit with LCD and now LED is as Hollow stated, the power consumption, the very nature of plasma having to charge the screen to make the picture means it pumps out heat and eats power by comparison. LED is the most economical of the three, is not subjective to burn in like plasmas.

 

I'd seriously recomend going into a shop Stella and demoing a 50" 720 plasma vs LCD or LED. I thnk you will be very surprised with the quality for such a modest price.

 

Ref the burn in if you have a static image on the screen weith higher contrast you will find you get a 'ghost' of the image on the screen. Unless left for 48 hours or something it won't be permenant, you just watch another channel or put some static on and it will reset the screen. This could be considered a down side but as long as you are aware of it you should be fine. They come with a screen saver anyway or 'pixel shift' function to try and minimise this. This is also why some people percieve plasmas to be dull, other than the more natural picture they come from factory with much lower contrast to prevent burn in easily while the screen is new, you will read about this all in the manual. After X amount of hours you can bump the contrast etc up if you want a more non plasma looking picture with less risk.

 

 

Cheers,

 

Cheers,

 

Whilst I'll agree that you may see plasma being more natural of a picture, I disagree on the quality aspect of what I want from a TV. If I wanted my TV to reflect life, I wouldn't have one, because I can look at my fireplace or my driveway for that :D I want my TV to show all the over-accentuated stuff in the latest Star Trek film or all the awesome graphics in Iron Man 2 or Thor :D Also, one of the first things we said when we sat down to watch the LED, was that it made it look like we were watching a "back-stage" type of thing and not a multi-million dollar movie. The people are much clearer, the surroundings are properly in focus, etc. etc. I don't want to start a war on this so I'll leave it there and echo what you've said about going into the store to check them out, I wouldn't have bought a plasma vs the LED we bought if you'd paid me half of it back tbh :D

 

EDIT: Important point I've just realised I meant to mention, the Samsung TV's do NOT use LG Panels, they are Samsungs own LED technology, which they invented and they use similar tech in their AMOLED mobile phone screens :D

Edited November 26, 201114 yr by HollowPoint

thanks steve, some great advice there, this is why i asked on here as i knew someone would have some advice, im not gonna jump straight in and i may wait till the sale's after the year but always best to ask advice

 

much appreciated people

 

Allan

 

You're welcome mate. But ultimately it would be a boring world if we all thought and liked the same, I just hated the LCD experience by comparison and found it to be a 'faker' looking picture if that makes sense even after tweaking.

 

I've looked at the newer LED's in shops, without doing a side by side comparison I coudln't say, but for me I love the clarity, colours and overall picture on our plasma compared to other stuff I have seen, and they are also amazingly priced, lucky for me :)

Whilst I'll agree that you may see plasma being more natural of a picture, I disagree on the quality aspect of what I want from a TV. If I wanted my TV to reflect life, I wouldn't have one, because I can look at my fireplace or my driveway for that :D I want my TV to show all the over-accentuated stuff in the latest Star Trek film or all the awesome graphics in Iron Man 2 or Thor :D Also, one of the first things we said when we sat down to watch the LED, was that it made it look like we were watching a "back-stage" type of thing and not a multi-million dollar movie. The people are much clearer, the surroundings are properly in focus, etc. etc. I don't want to start a war on this so I'll leave it there and echo what you've said about going into the store to check them out, I wouldn't have bought a plasma vs the LED we bought if you'd paid me half of it back tbh :D

 

EDIT: Important point I've just realised I meant to mention, the Samsung TV's do NOT use LG Panels, they are Samsungs own LED technology, which they invented and they use similar tech in their AMOLED mobile phone screens :D

 

Yup each to their own mate :) It's what you like that counts TBH.

 

I just don't want Stella thinking because the pannel is priced at 500 it's no good, as it couldn't be further from the truth IMO, I love them :)

I've been looking at getting a new TV as well, quite fancying a Samsung D5520 the 40" model, its enough for me. I have an old 32" sony which has been fine but is only 720p, it was my tv in my room when I was living at home but now ive got my own place I need something to go in the lounge properly. Its not a huge room, 13'x14' or so, so I dont want to go any bigger than 40" or so.

 

The samsung, as far as I can tell, offers the best kit for the least price. Not 3d or anytihng like that, but it has freeview HD, 4 hdmi and is of course 1080p and LED backlit (total con saying its an LED tv as it just isnt!) but it seems each MFR is as bad as each other. Ive found one at John Lewis for £528 with a 5 year warranty. Cant really go wrong with that I dont think... Just havnt brought my self to click the "buy" button. Dam boiler getting replaced in a week so just need to watch a cash a little! Credit card looks appealing though!

Whilst I'll agree that you may see plasma being more natural of a picture, I disagree on the quality aspect of what I want from a TV. If I wanted my TV to reflect life, I wouldn't have one, because I can look at my fireplace or my driveway for that :D I want my TV to show all the over-accentuated stuff in the latest Star Trek film or all the awesome graphics in Iron Man 2 or Thor :D Also, one of the first things we said when we sat down to watch the LED, was that it made it look like we were watching a "back-stage" type of thing and not a multi-million dollar movie. The people are much clearer, the surroundings are properly in focus, etc. etc. I don't want to start a war on this so I'll leave it there and echo what you've said about going into the store to check them out, I wouldn't have bought a plasma vs the LED we bought if you'd paid me half of it back tbh :D

 

EDIT: Important point I've just realised I meant to mention, the Samsung TV's do NOT use LG Panels, they are Samsungs own LED technology, which they invented and they use similar tech in their AMOLED mobile phone screens :D

 

Aye, I meant the plasma screens, in the back of the manual it says the LG part no :) LED's and LCD's I have no idea on the part used. Sorry I can't edit, so always have to post lots lol.

Yeah agreed, he needs to get everyones opinion, which is why he posted up :D This forum is definitely good for opinions :D

 

One other thing I just picked out though, 1080p no point? We have a Samsung LCD 40" which is 720p and the 46" LED which is 1080 and the different is INSANE! I get the feeling you might be comparing these things by figures on paper, hz values etc. because to the naked eye, the plasmas always look blurry to me and remind me of my hotel room when I'm in the states (USA TV is CRAP!!!!) where the LED is like crystal clear, as I mentioned before, real life is outside, clarity is in an LED TV :D

 

Aye, I meant the plasma screens, in the back of the manual it says the LG part no LED's and LCD's I have no idea on the part used. Sorry I can't edit, so always have to post lots lol.

 

Ah, that makes much more sense :D

If it's of any use, you get a free 5 year Warranty at Costco

Yeah agreed, he needs to get everyones opinion, which is why he posted up :D This forum is definitely good for opinions :D

 

One other thing I just picked out though, 1080p no point? We have a Samsung LCD 40" which is 720p and the 46" LED which is 1080 and the different is INSANE! I get the feeling you might be comparing these things by figures on paper, hz values etc. because to the naked eye, the plasmas always look blurry to me and remind me of my hotel room when I'm in the states (USA TV is CRAP!!!!) where the LED is like crystal clear, as I mentioned before, real life is outside, clarity is in an LED TV :D

 

 

 

Ah, that makes much more sense :D

 

:)

 

Again I'm just going by what I have seen. I've got a 1080 LG prjector in the games room, and although you'll never get the contrast ratio or brightness of a TV pannel, in 720p I can't notice and grainyness or difference in quality or detail in either mode unless I go over 60" as I've had a play. That said projectors are a whole different kettle of fish

 

I've got a lot of blu rays though, and most say 720p, so imho 1080 on these is just trying to fill in the blanks, I don't think it can add detail that isn't their.

 

Anyways I will shut up now :)

:)

 

 

Anyways I will shut up now :)

 

ROFL me too I promise, once I've said that ........ 1080p and 720p refer directly to the resolution, I won't go into it, but 1080p uses more "pixels" than 720p does, in the same overall space, allowing for a sharper picture. There are other things involved, but that's the basics.

ROFL me too I promise, once I've said that ........ 1080p and 720p refer directly to the resolution, I won't go into it, but 1080p uses more "pixels" than 720p does, in the same overall space, allowing for a sharper picture. There are other things involved, but that's the basics.

 

;)