Plasma TV love

Author
Discussion

GravelBen

15,755 posts

232 months

Tuesday 21st May
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yes

Another here, still using a 2011ish Panasonic 42" plasma. Still a very smooth and natural picture compared to most modern LED TVs I've seen.

It will eventually die and then I'll probably go OLED, and without the huge bezels of the plasma I'll probably fit a 48" or 50" in the same space. hehe

gregch

325 posts

71 months

Tuesday 21st May
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Yep, Pioneer Kuro 428 is still our main living rm TV, and despite the lack of even FullHD, let alone 4K and whatnot, it still looks exceptional and not planning to change it any time soon.


RSTurboPaul

10,686 posts

260 months

Tuesday 21st May
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Picture on mine still amazes me sometimes and makes me wonder if 4K is even needed, although a massive 4K OLED is on the radar when it dies... lol

Image retention / screen burn always feels a risk when playing games with static HUDs, but regular use of the screen wash thing for a decent amount of time (and hours of normal content each day...) means it is holding up well so far.


We had family round once - 'Why is the picture so dark??' was the comment on a dark scene. Given they run a massive LCD thing with the brightness so high that I have to turn it down 50% to make it look anything approaching a balanced picture, I suggested that it might look dark in dark scenes because it is set-up correctly tongue out lol

TEKNOPUG

19,055 posts

207 months

Tuesday 21st May
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skylarking808 said:
Would still be using my KURO if the HDMI port did not get mangled.
That's an easy fix.


TEKNOPUG

19,055 posts

207 months

Tuesday 21st May
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Viera GT20 now relegated to the bedroom. Had it for 14 years. Worthless now but still works as good as the day I bought it (apart from all the SMART features being redundant) so seems a waste to bin it. HD content still looks great on it, especially sports.

RichFN2

3,464 posts

181 months

Tuesday 21st May
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Panasonic GT50 (I think) still going strong after 12 years, moved to the bedroom when I bought a 4K TV but refuse to get rid of it when it still works.

Picture still looks good with a HD source.

wolfracesonic

7,145 posts

129 months

Wednesday 22nd May
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robt350c said:
Pioneer PDP434 still in use here, bought new in 2004.

Relegated to garage use now as the misses was trying to get it thrown out. Paid £4.5k for it at the time, not binning it!
Paid £4000.00 for mine, same year, u woz robbed m8laugh Went a bit mad as I think it was (one of?) the first flatscreens available with something called a HDMI port, ideal pairing for Sky HD. However there was some sort of handshake issue with Pioneer tv’s at the time so ended up using component leads! Still works fine and gets on with current Sky box’s hdmi.

PhilboSE

4,452 posts

228 months

Wednesday 22nd May
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Still using a 15 year old Z series in my study for PS5.
Still got a VT30 in common use in kids TV/games room.
Scratched around the country to buy the last ever model (VT65?) as the main TV at a second home.

Love the picture on a plasma, also heat the house with them.

Got some other technologies as well which are good (JVC projector, LG OLED, Sony LED) but nothing made the same impact on me as my first Full HD plasma.

Gio G

2,954 posts

211 months

Wednesday 22nd May
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wolfracesonic said:
Paid £4000.00 for mine, same year, u woz robbed m8laugh Went a bit mad as I think it was (one of?) the first flatscreens available with something called a HDMI port, ideal pairing for Sky HD. However there was some sort of handshake issue with Pioneer tv’s at the time so ended up using component leads! Still works fine and gets on with current Sky box’s hdmi.
I had a PDP434 and waited anxiously for HD to arrive! Fortunately was an early adopter of Sky HD and was one the first to have it fitted before the World Cup. Used to switch channels from SD and HD to see the improvement. Them panels were a serious bit of kit and produced lovely picture. They felt they were worth the big price tag. Ended up giving it away to a friend who put it in his gym.

G

21TonyK

11,624 posts

211 months

Thursday 23rd May
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Only took my old panny 42 to the tip a few weeks ago. Been out of use for a year and sat in the corner. Far better than the philips LED that repolaced it, maybe not quite the same standard as the Sony in the lounge which is maybe 4? years old now.

Tried to get shot on gumtree but no biters frown

robt350c

157 posts

130 months

Thursday 23rd May
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Gio G said:
wolfracesonic said:
Paid £4000.00 for mine, same year, u woz robbed m8laugh Went a bit mad as I think it was (one of?) the first flatscreens available with something called a HDMI port, ideal pairing for Sky HD. However there was some sort of handshake issue with Pioneer tv’s at the time so ended up using component leads! Still works fine and gets on with current Sky box’s hdmi.
I had a PDP434 and waited anxiously for HD to arrive! Fortunately was an early adopter of Sky HD and was one the first to have it fitted before the World Cup. Used to switch channels from SD and HD to see the improvement. Them panels were a serious bit of kit and produced lovely picture. They felt they were worth the big price tag. Ended up giving it away to a friend who put it in his gym.

G
So glad I bought the Pioneer rather than the Panasonic at the time which didn't have HDMI. It's future proofed it right up to today, with it now hooked up to a fire stick. As you say build quality is top notch and it shows in the weight of the thing as well!

Chris Type R

8,087 posts

251 months

Thursday 23rd May
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I have a 42" Panasonic and a 50" LG which are both spare, but I can't bring myself to throw them away - so they've become anchors. I use the latter for occasional gaming. If anyone is looking for some plasma pleasure near Stevenage....

GravelBen

15,755 posts

232 months

Friday 24th May
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PhilboSE said:
Love the picture on a plasma, also heat the house with them.
Funny enough I actually checked the power consumption of mine with a smart plug a while ago, it was nowhere near as bad as the internet had led me to believe... see thread here: https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...

Speckle

3,455 posts

218 months

Friday 24th May
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I still had one until very recently. It had 3D capability and was an absolutely superb TV whilst it was in use but, for the last 5 years, its been gathering dust as a spare set so, I recycled it when I bought my latest one.

dobly

1,217 posts

161 months

Friday 24th May
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We have a 15 year old Pioneer 50” KRP - the one with the seperate media box - in our music / cinema room. Our everyday TV watching is on a 6 year old 4K Panasonic LCD.

blueg33

36,467 posts

226 months

Friday 24th May
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Just listen to you lot of early adopters and advocates of the latest tech.

I have a Panasonic CRT. none of this plasma or new fangled LED nonsense smile

rottenegg

Original Poster:

505 posts

65 months

Friday 24th May
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Lol, CRT, love it!

Glad to see others are still enjoying their plasmas biggrin

I forgot about the Panasonics, they were superb as well. I got my 50" Kuro cheap off ebay in 2012 because the seller was a super picky movie watcher and said it had the famous red tinge problem on dark scenes, but I never noticed it myself. At least he was honest! He upgrade to a Viera smile

Plasmas don't seem to have the same issues with fast moving scenes that some LED/OLEDs have, and less 'blooming' for want of a better description.

Shame Pioneer stopped making TVs. Mine was built in 2009 and it's still working perfectly to this day. I don't reckon OLEDs will last that long. Apart from CD DJ rigs, I don't really know what else they make anymore, if anything?

Someone mentioned a 'live TV broadcast' effect with some modern TVs. Does anyone remember the Philips Pixel Plus CRT? Another superb TV back in the day! That also had the same live broadcast effect. Strange at first, but kind of cool when you get used to it.

rodericb

6,833 posts

128 months

Wednesday 29th May
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I have a 65" Panasonic VT60. It's the main telly.

Clockwork Cupcake

75,061 posts

274 months

Wednesday 29th May
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I absolutely loved my Panasonic 42" plasma, which was still going strong after 20-odd years. Been telling myself that when it died I would get an OLED but a month or so ago I finally decided that I was probably going to die before it did.

So I bought an LG 4K OLED to replace it. One of the older G2 models on special offer from John Lewis which included fitting, installation, and taking your old telly away.

It felt a shame to let my working plasma go like that, but at 35kg there was no way I could lift it myself so this was the only viable solution. frown

PurpleTurtle

7,142 posts

146 months

Wednesday 29th May
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I've got a Pioneer PDP-4270XD that I bought from John Lewis back in 2004 off the back of some strong online reviews. Paid about £2k for it at the time - I had been waiting for plasmas to come down to that price point.

At the time I had a mate who researched Plasmas in far too much detail (had a spreadsheet!) and was convinced they would all go bang within 5yrs, so I elected for the John Lewis 5yr warranty. It's still going strong in its 20th year with heavy use, picture still brilliant, cannot fault it, it has been the most reliable tech purchase I've ever made.

At the start of the energy crisis I had a bit of a wobble that it might be using too much electricity but it shows a negligible* draw on the smart meter so I decided to keep it until it dies. I am however genuinely hopeful of getting a quarter of a century of use out of it. Only minor drawback is only one HDMI input but I've navigated round that with a cheap splitter from Amazon.

  • Note that 'negligible' is relative - I have a wife who will leave the gas on all day for the shower she needed six hours ago because she 'forgot' she'd moved it from timed to on rolleyes