Comments on: Freesat Wins Industry Award

By: Stephen Roberts

Stephen Roberts — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 17:01:56 +0000

I recently attended one of the freesat National Training Roadshows for independant stockists and installers. The freesat team do recognise that HD content is a real issue for consumers and are striving to improve it but but at the end of the day it is down to the broadcasters to improve the amount of HD programmes available not freesat. The freesat platform has the capability to cope with alot more HD content!

By: Steven

Steven — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 18:56:35 +0000

The Pioneer 428XD is about £1,500 . . It ought to be good for that price . . See what you’ve started Mat W . .

I tend not to watch TV in total darkness so the ‘perfect blacks’ on a plasma would be wasted on me . .

By: Mat W

Mat W — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 17:24:52 +0000

The Kuro is a great tv though
give it another 12 months and you will have to spend another 5 grand on a 1400p ultra high def tv!

thats technology for you

By: Al

Al — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 15:10:25 +0000

Denis most recent top brand plasmas ie Pioneer and Panasonic don’t suffer screen burn. I have a Pioneer 428XD Kuro myself and I’ve never even seen screen retention never mind burn despite onscreen logos from tv and from my DVD player – I once forgot and left my Denon 1904 DVD players spash screen on screen for an entire night having stopped a DVD and then forgotten I’d left anything switched on after leaving the room (although auto off did intervene). No image retention temporary or otherwise, whatsoever.

Makers such as Pioneer and Panasonic fit their screens with pixels shift and also auto off if an image is detected static for too long with no movement. The only way I could possibly foresee any kind of burn would be if a screen was used for video gaming for extended periods with a static menu bar and here I would concede that I wouldn’t want to use a plasma for video gaming although some do. However, for anything else, LCD still can’t match the Pioneer plasmas by a long way, and struggles to match the Panasonics although they are getting quite close to the Panasonic range in my opinion.

By: Davei

Davei — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 14:11:12 +0000

For what it’s worth, I tend to agree with Denis – Stick with LCD.

Having said that, the development of flat panel displays (whether LCD, Plasma, or ‘other’) still has a long way to go. Even today, LCD images often still suffer from poor black level, while Plasma often appears ‘coarse’ – and many TVs of both types can suffer unpleasant motion artefacts. Meanwhile, CRT doesn’t suffer from any of these problems, but its prone to geometric distortion (and finding an HD CRT is almost as hard as finding the Holy Grail).

Anyway, having balanced the options (again), I’m now on my second LCD set while I continue to await the necessary improvements.

By: Denis

Denis — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 13:04:07 +0000

Stick with LCD.
Contrary to popular belief, screen burn can still be a problem with Plasma.

By: Al

Al — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 08:02:53 +0000

What looks good in the shop isn’t the same as what looks good when properly calibrated at home as the experts at What HiFi Sound and Vision will tell you. Most LCD’s in a shop environment run ridiculously high amounts of brightness and contrast so as to make plasmas look dull by comparison. However, get them home out of such a bright shop environment and into the home where such ridiculous levels of brightness are uncomfortable to watch, and the stories a different one once the LCD’s been adjusted to watcheable levels (although some LCD’s are good now).

The LCD still hasn’t been invented that betters the Pioneer 428 / 528 XD Kuro . Put on a good disc like House of Flying Daggers and not only is the picture amazingly punchy whilst still retaining natural skin tones and perfect blacks, but it also positively becomes 3D – you can literally see the depth in the forest. With many films its the experience thats the closest to actually being there. I’ve yet to see an LCD that can do that or match the Kuro’s blacks, and I’ve seen a lot of the top tv’s trust me!

By: Mat W

Mat W — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 06:24:32 +0000

Agreed!!

By: Steven

Steven — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 22:13:44 +0000

And just for good measure Mat W . . I think the lates generation LCD’s knock the pants off any Plasma . .

By: Steven

Steven — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 22:12:14 +0000

Thanks for the comments everyone . . It is a worry . . New technology, worse picture quality than in 1995 (maybe)? It’s all about the quantity and money, not quality (of transmission), when it boils down to it. Remember the quality of those bootleged VHS movies where you would see people standing at the end of the film? Perhaps all SD transmissions will all look like that in 2015? Some channels already do .

After that, anything looks HD . .