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4.0 stars
"Panny barely beats Sammy"
Pros: Perfect color and ease of use
Cons: Average contrast and black level
Summary: I compared the classy Panasonic TH-42PZ85U with the curvaceous Samsung LN-T4065F in the comfort of my home. Far from the maddening crowd and terrible lighting found in your typical big store we have a better chance of objectivity. After carefully calibrating both units with a Digital Video Essentials DVD and then adjusting to taste with typical material, it was a hard call to say which set was better. Under normal conditions, they were both awesome. I expected no less after reading reviews on CNET, Consumer Reports and elsewhere.
The Sammy LCD had amazingly perfect color and all my video sources worked great without any effort. Unfortunately, the backlight was a bit too noticeable in dark scenes and changed with the angle of view. If you're picky watching something dark like Alien or the new Battlestar Galactica series, you don't want to see the picture change as you move a foot or two along the couch. As a photographer used to analyzing the technical quality of images on a CRT display, I was annoyed. The Samsung HDTV was fine with normal brightness material like broadcast DTV.
The Panny plasma looked great from any angle and was 1.6" larger for the same $1400. Unfortunately, there were still compromises. I believe the best system is the one where the right compromises have been made, so let's see where this goes.
The first issue with the Panny was a soft SD picture from our oldie but goodie DVD player (Pioneer DV-563A). I used a high quality 50' component video cable, same as with the Sammy. The issue showed up right away as a slight horizontal smearing of the Pioneer logo in the screen saver. Also, the Panny couldn't display my Home Theater PC (connected using a DVI to HDMI adaptor and a high quality 50' HDMI cable). In contrast, the Sammy "just worked" with all this stuff, despite the long cable runs required by my wife. "Honey, go ahead and buy a new TV, but please hide all the gear in the armoire and route the cables where I can't see them." Yea right, let's rearrange the entire living room and try out six colors of paint while were at it. That is another story for another time. Be sure what you know what you are getting into with a seemingly simple home theater upgrade!
What really drove me nuts was the Panny OTA ATSC tuner would say there was no signal when the PC was turned on. ***!? This is 2008 and HDMI is not exactly a new spec. Also, we have line of sight to the San Francisco Sutro Tower broadcast location only three miles away from our rooftop antenna.
I discovered I could only get the PC to show up if I used my Mac laptop first, than switched the HDMI cable. Shame on Panasonic for such cheap input section electronics. Korea is giving a schooling to the US and Japan electronics makers (think LG vs. Motorola cell phones). For professional installers or those who value usability over cost, this could be a deal breaker. Ultimately, image quality was the deciding factor so I needed to solve these specific problems without spending too much more. This was the perfect justification to buy a nice new DVD player with HDMI (Oppo DV-980H) to avoid the analog input issues and put off Blu-ray a bit longer. Also, I moved the HTPC so a shorter HDMI cable could be used (both a high quality 10' and a mediocre 15' cable worked perfectly). Everything looked great and worked fine. Yay, I can keep the Panny.
Your mileage may vary. Maybe you want your PC text to be super sharp and maybe you can get this 2007 model Sammy real cheap now. Another great 1080p HDTV that might be cheap now is the 2007 Panasonic TH-42PX700U. I just saw one at Costco for $1300. Plasmas are more shatter resistant than LCD's, too. If you worry about burn in, you really need to get out more. See http://www.stubhub.com/ for starters.
One final point is an LCD will use a lot less power than a plasma. I measured the Panny at about 300W while the Sammy came in at about 100W with both calibrated to the same brightness. If you only watch a few movies or occasionally start up iTunes, who cares? But if you watch a lot of TV, this could make a difference of about $100 a year.
Good hunting.
Samsung LN-T4065F:
