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Nark
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Re: LCD Vs Plasma Vs rear pro Vs Normal HDTV

Wed, 06 April 2005 23:29

Rear projections suck.

CRTs are great value, but bulky.

[Edit: I agree with Karl on the point about CRTs. I would buy a CRT before any of the others because they provide great value for money. As long as you have the room to fit a large one in (they're very deep).]

As for LCD vs Plasma, I think it comes down to what size you want. LCD will only go up to a certain size.

Here's an artilce I saved that goes through the pros and cons of LCD and plasma (and also busts some myths along the way). Have fun reading it!

Quote:

Sharpening plasma's image
03/02/05 | 10:25 PM PST
Eric A. Taub

TV makers are defending plasma's honor, even as they roll out more LCD
rivals.
The New York Times

If ever a product evoked lust in the heart, it is a plasma television.
Like radial tires in the 1970s, a big flat plasma set is today's
must-have technology.

But whispers about the plasma set's shortcomings--some old, some
new--have increased recently. Critics have focused on the technology's
warts, comparing its performance unfavorably with that of liquid-crystal
displays, another flat-screen technology.

If the negatives stick, it may mean trouble for LG Electronics,
Panasonic, Philips, Samsung and Sony, all companies that continue to
invest billions of dollars to produce plasma and LCD sets.

To address questions about plasma's image quality, life span, power
consumption and other characteristics, several of these companies have
started campaigns to change public opinion.

"The early versions of plasma had some issues, like product life and
image burn-in," said Jeff Cove, vice president and general manager for
Panasonic's consumer electronics group. "But old news is coloring how
people perceive the product. It was absolutely not affecting the
business, but it could affect it."

Samsung is hearing the whispers as well. "We have significant stakes in
both businesses, and plasma is getting the short shrift," said Jim
Sanduski, vice president for marketing of the company's visual display
products group.

Larry Weber, one of the inventors of plasma technology, said that recent
publicity, right or wrong, about how LCD sets would eventually take over
the large-screen market could only hurt plasma sales. "It makes sense
that plasma companies should speak out," he said.

And so they are. At the Consumer Electronics Show in January in Las
Vegas, Panasonic executives conducted side-by-side demonstrations of the
two technologies, in which criticism of the plasma set's performance was
systematically rebutted.

In casual conversations, the presidents of Panasonic, the world's
top-selling plasma brand, and Samsung, which ranks third, promoted their
strong commitment to plasma, even though no one was actually asking.

The problem is that once a product's reputation falls in a hole, it is
not so easy to get it out. "You hear blatant lies about plasma," said
Danielle Levitas, a senior analyst at IDC, a research firm.

Faced with whispers of plasma's faults on one hand and a vigorous
defense by manufacturers on the other, what is a consumer to do?

A potential flat-screen buyer could look at two sets, side by side, and
decide which one is better: plasma, which has thousands of tiny gas
tubes that light up to create pixels, or LCD, which has a constant light
source and uses the crystals to let varying amounts of light through for
each pixel.

But a video picture that looks great in the showroom may look terrible
at home, or vice versa. "TV's are shipped with the brightness and
contrast maxed out," said Gerard Catapano, manager of testing in the
electronics division for Consumer Reports. "The manufacturers want you
to be wowed by it, so the visual characteristics are peaked."

There are objective ways to compare the performance of LCD and plasma
sets. Here are some of the differences between the two.

Screen size
Plasma sets are not made in sizes smaller than about 37 inches because
it is too difficult to squeeze a large number of plasma pixels into a
smaller screen. Making LCD sets in sizes larger than about 32 inches has
not been economical because factories have not been able to create
several larger viewing panels from one piece of glass.

But new plants, which can produce multiple LCD screens from a single
sheet of glass, are starting to operate. As part of a venture between
Samsung and Sony, a new plant will be able to produce 40-inch LCD sets
in the spring. In October 2006, Sharp will open a plant designed to
produce 45- and 50-inch LCD sets, sizes that plasma offers.

All the new production capability should mean a continuing drop in
prices for LCD sets. A 42-inch LCD set that cost $4,500 last year will
fall to $1,700 by 2008, said Ross Young, president of DisplaySearch, a
company that researches flat panel sets.

Prices for plasma sets should decline as well. Last year a typical
42-inch high-definition model cost about $4,200. By 2008 it should cost
about $1,800, not much more than an LCD of the same size.

"The challenge for plasma is that it has a fairly narrow sweet spot,"
said Greg Gudorf, vice president for television marketing for Sony
Electronics. Above 50 inches, rear-projection sets that use Digital
Light Processing or other technologies can be more attractive to
consumers because they are less expensive without much of a difference
in picture quality, Gudorf said.

Resolution
To keep plasma prices down, some manufacturers have been selling what
they call enhanced definition sets rather than true high-definition
models. Each receives a high-definition television signal, but the
enhanced definition model has fewer pixels, and thus lower resolution.

But even most high-definition plasma sets have a lower resolution than
an LCD set. The image may look as sharp, however, depending on distance
from the set. From an average viewing distance of 10 feet, Weber said,
the eye cannot distinguish pixels that are smaller than about a
millimeter. So making them smaller to squeeze more into a given area
will not necessarily improve the picture quality. At 10 feet, a 42-inch
high-definition plasma display has an adequate resolution, Weber said.

But as with high-powered cars, people want performance whether they need
it or not. So some people opt for the higher resolution numbers of LCD
sets, even if it is hard to tell the difference.

Contrast
To look good, a television image needs to display a true white and a
deep black. Manufacturers claim plasma displays have a contrast ratio of
3,000 to 1, while LCD specifications are lower, around 800 to 1.

But numbers do not tell the entire story. In brightly lighted rooms, LCD
panels will appear to have much higher contrast; room light hitting a
plasma set bounces off the screen's phosphors. As a result, its blacks
will appear to be gray and muddied. Less light is reflected off an LCD
screen because of its polarizers and color filters.

The situation will be reversed when the lights are off. Without any
ambient room light, the plasma set's picture contrast looks to be equal
or better than the LCDs.

To create black in a plasma set, Weber points out, the gas discharge
activity in the pixels is decreased. But in an LCD set, black is created
by blocking light. And liquid crystals have a difficult time blocking
light at all angles.

Some believe there is little difference between LCD and plasma sets once
the lights are down. "In a dimly lit room, LCD and plasma TV's perform
equally well," Catapano of Consumer Reports said.

Color reproduction
Plasma sets can display a wider range, or gamut, of colors, than L.C.D
sets. But that gap will soon narrow. Sony recently announced the Qualia
005, an LCD set that uses light-emitting diodes rather than a
fluorescent backlight, raising the LCD color gamut above that of
plasma's.

But this new LCD technology is still very expensive: when introduced in
the spring, the 46-inch Qualia model will sell for $12,000. Samsung will
introduce a 40-inch LED-based LCD set for $9,000, a premium of $5,000
compared with its standard model. "But prices for this technology should
come down pretty quickly," Sanduski said. Brightness
Plasma creates a brighter pixel by increasing the charge applied to the
gas. When very bright scenes are displayed, the electrical charge is
lowered to prevent the display from overheating; but this also cuts
overall brightness.

An LCD screen, with its constant backlight, may be perceived by some
people as producing livelier images.

"The LCD image seems punchier than the plasma," Catapano said.

Burn-in and panel life
LCD monitors are not subject to burn-in, or the tendency of static
images to leave a ghostlike image on the screen. And while LCD backlight
bulbs can be replaced, when a plasma set's image decreases sufficiently,
it is time to buy a new set.

Plasma's advocates say the burn-in problem is gone. And while early
plasma displays lasted about 10,000 hours before the panel's brightness
decreased by half, today's sets have a brightness half-life of about
60,000 hours.

Some manufacturers like Panasonic incorporate technology to reduce
plasma burn-in by slightly shifting the image. And manufacturers caution
users that the first 100 hours are especially critical to avoiding image
burn-in.

Power consumption
Plasma sets are said to use considerably more power than similarly sized
LCD models. But Weber argues that because LCD panels have a constant
backlight, while plasma uses power only when a pixel is lighted, power
consumption is almost the same.

But not everyone agrees. When Consumer Reports tested power consumption,
it found that a 30-inch LCD consumed 133.5 watts, while a 42-inch plasma
used 346.5 watts.

Some of the difference is attributable to the larger size of the plasma
set, Catapano said. But not most of it. "A plasma TV has three power
supplies for one set. That's pretty significant," he said.

When the novelty ends
So, who wins? Judging picture quality is not like keeping score at a
ballgame.

Gudorf of Sony says brightness, contrast, color and viewing angle must
be examined in concert. "If you focus on just one without examining the
others, you won't be happy," he said.

Whether one buys a plasma or an LCD set, the novelty of having either
will eventually wear off. "At first, you're enamored with it, and after
a while you see the imperfections," Catapano said.

Entire contents, Copyright © 2005 The New York Times. All rights
reserved.

Copyright © 1995-2005 CNET Networks, Inc. All rights reserved.

[Updated on: Wed, 06 April 2005 23:31]

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