4 responses so far ↓

• 1 Han

  I purchased this TV back in March and have been holding off on the review until the TV was properly broken in (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1128487 — the first parargraph in the first post is the procedure) then calibrated to my liking. I must say I have been very pleased with the time I have spent with it. I was a bit worried when I read the CNET review about the color inaccuracy, but I think mine looks great. The picture is crystal clear and motion is smooth. Blu-Rays on the PS3 look awesome. While watching all the dark scenes in Spiderman 3, I can easily make out the details in the shadows and black clothing. This set really handles black well. I also have no complaints looking at flesh tones and whites. All the colors are vibrant and look spot on.

  My primary TV is a Sharp Aquos I purchased 3 years ago, and this set blows it away for half the price I spent on the Sharp. I think that people are really pushing the G10 series and that is fine, but for $200 less, this 50S1 looks fantastic and I have no regrets that I purchased this set. My only suggestion would be to check out the above link and spend the time to properly break-in the set. It is not very difficult. All the phosphors break-in evenly and you only need to calibrate once. Trust me, this set looked a TON better after the 100 hour break-in period.

  The sound and remote are passable, but not terrible. I think most people have surround sound now anyway. These are the only 2 things not fantastic about this TV.

• 2 Quine

  I’ve been using the S1 for almost a month now and absolutely love it. It has a beautiful, realistic picture that is perfect for video gaming and Blurays. It may not have quite the ‘pop’ of an LCD, but I much prefer the look of a plasma with it’s improved accuracy and uniform picture. I’m coming from a 34″ Sony XBR970 - which itself is a very accurate set - but this Panasonic has made me a convert. It’s plasma from here on out (or as long as they keep making them I suppose).

  Of course one of my concerns before purchasing this set was burn in. I do a large amount of gaming and letterboxed movie watching, and I didn’t want to have to be constantly worrying about damaging my set. Well, I’ve been gaming on this thing since day 1 - many of which have static HUDs - and I have yet to see even the mere hint of image retention. Same goes for letterboxes, they leave absolutely no lingering image. I play 360 and PS3 on the Game picture setting and movies on Cinema - both of which have their contrast set around 80.

  Regardless, I have been running break-in images while I’m not using the set. I’d say it’s getting on average about 15 hours of use a day for the past few weeks. Not necessarily because I’m worried about image retention any more, but more as a stress test - because I figure if anything is going to break down it’ll be in the beginning. I’d also like it broke in for proper calibration as well.

  The blacks are very black - but not pure black. There’s a bit of brightness still there, but it’s more than acceptable. In my opinion still better than any LCD I’ve seen, and even more important more uniform.

  The remote is pretty awful, so maybe plan on replacing that with a Harmony or something.

  SD signals are what they are - SD. They tend to look a little worse on this plasma than they did before on the Sony, but I think a large part of that is just because of the bigger screen. Flaws and static are more readily apparent at 50″.

  I’m no videophile, so personally I’m not seeing any sort of green push. Sometimes I *think* I see it, but I can’t totally convince myself it’s not just the source - because 99% of the time the picture looks great. I’m still looking to get it professionally calibrated down the road though, so I’ll be curious to see what difference that makes.

• 3 Joplin

  This tv uses Panasonic’s 12th generation panel called Neo-PDP. What that means is that the picture is exceptionally bright and saturated, and that the tv draws 40% less power than last years models. That means that power consumption is now on par with many LCD’s in this size range.

  I purchased this TV after 6 months of searching and couldn’t be happier. In a brightly lit room, the picture is bright and vivid. Watching movies in the dark, the blacks are so black. It’s unreal, I’ve never seen blacks this dark. To get blacks as good on a comparable lcd, you would need an lcd tv with local dimming — and to get that you’ll pay 3 times as much. The native contrast ratio is 40,000:1. That’s native contrast! You won’t find many lcd’s that have this native contrast ratio. The dynamic contrast ratio is 1 million:1.

  The viewing angles are exceptional. From the extreme right or left, the colors are just as vivid and beautiful as they are from the center seated position. This is not true of many lcd’s where the colors tend to shift as you move to the extremes.

  Another good thing about plasma tvs is the complete lack of motion blur. When a scene pans quickly in a movie or during sports, you could get some blurring with an lcd. To get an lcd without motion blur, you’ll need a 2ms panel and 240Hz processing. LCD’s also tend to do some processing that some say makes motion unnatural (for example, Samsung uses Auto Motion Plus `AMP’).

  The LCD’s I was considering had reports of clouding and flash lighting. I was considering the Samsung Luxia LED backlit models or the Samsung B-Series LCD’s that use traditional CCFL backlighting, but after reading many reviews, it just didn’t make sense to take the risk that I might get a set that had problems.

  I’m very particular about my displays. I can’t rave enough about this TV. Knowing how good it is now, I should have picked up the 54″ model of this tv. Or even the upcoming 58″ or 65″ models. You will not be disappointed by this television.

  When checking out tvs in a store, remember that most lcd’s are set with blindingly high backlights. Most plasmas will appear dim when compared against such an lcd. But in reality, this tv is exceedingly bright. And in the stores, the blacks don’t impress but when you see it at home, you will know how inky black they really are.

  In the end, it’s up to you. Do the research like on AVSForum. You will see that many experts who know about good picture quality. They frequently recommend Panasonic plasma sets. And if you make that decision, the Panasonic S1 is an excellent choice.

  Amazon is a great place to buy with an excellent return policy. The pilot delivery service was ok. But they do not set up your tv, unbox it, or help you put it on a stand so plan accordingly. They also gave me an 8 hour delivery window which sucks.

  Good luck.

• 4 Cash

  Short and sweet, It is simply the best quality TV that I have ever owned !!

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