Customer Reviews

Beautiful
Great delivery, easy set up, great picture and sound. I need digital DTV, but I’ve been too busy to look into it.

Where have you been all my life?
This is my first HD TV purchase ever, so I made sure to do my homework. I spent days researching brands, plasmas v. LCDs, 720p v. 1080p resolutions, and 42″ v. 50″ screens. Friends and family kept telling me, “Get a LCD. Get a 1080p.”

The fact is after combing through review after review from consumers and professional critics alike, it became evident that Panasonic is leading the way with plasma technology, and the years-old issues with these TVs (burn-in, heat, glare) are all but resolved. In fact, plasmas offer smoother motion, deeper blacks and wider viewing angles than their LCD rivals.

Screen size and resolution, I found, go hand-in-hand. The rule of thumb: 50″ or less in screen size is not worth the extra $$ for 1080p. The increase in resolution only really becomes appreciable with screen sizes over 50″. Too, one can only truly take advantage of 1080p with a Blu-ray DVD player. HD channels are sent at lower resolutions, though obviously much better than standard 480i.

Armed with this knowledge, I set out to find the best 50″ plasma 720p I could find that fit within my budget. Sony and Pioneer were out. The next tier included Samsung, Toshiba, and Panasonic. The latter won hands down.

Whether I am watching DirectTV HD or my standard DVD player, the picture quality is nothing short of amazing. I love the anti-reflective coating on the screen; works beautifully in our well-lit room and does not mute the colors. It took a minute for my two year-old to get over Scooby-Doo outsizing him, but he’s hooked now.

The one minor complaint I see in other reviews is bass distortion with the speakers. I do not use the “bass boost” function and have not noticed anything but clean sound. In fact, speech, music, and effects sound quite good and balanced. Most will use surround sound for movies anyway, I suspect. The only thing that peeves me is the digital audio out. It only supports 2 channel stereo to a receiver.

In closing, I believe this is the best value you will find for a top quality product in this category. Get one, and you won’t just watch TV, you’ll experience it.

Excellent Product - Great Service
The picture is great, just as good as other plasmas costing twice the money (or LCDs for that matter) that I considered before buying this set. I was a little hesitant about purchasing this online and trusting the thing to arrive in one piece, but the delivery folks were extremely professional. They called ahead and made arrangements with me a few days prior to the TV arriving. Trust me, as anyone who lives in a rural area will attest to, this isn’t always the case. I’m extremely pleased with both the product and the service. One thing to be aware of… I purchased the TV through Amazon even though the price was a little higher (not much considering the free shipping) rather then one of the other 3rd party merchants that sell through Amazon for one reason, the return policy. If you read the fine print, many of these companies offer only manufacturer warranties on returns, meaning if something is wrong you have to go through Panasonic for service. They offer no assistance themselves. Good luck with that. Amazon actually has a full 30 day return policy, if you don’t like the set just return it in the original box with-in a month for a full refund. I’ll pay a few more dollars on an online purchase for that piece of mind. Also as others have pointed out, keep an eye on the advertised price for a month. The week after I purchased it the Amazon advertised price dropped .00 which they refunded once I contacted them. Another reason to stick with Amazon.

Just bought for B00142MUDI,000 - Love It
Just purchased this product at HH Gregg for B00142MUDI,000 and love it. I have a 50″ Sony 1080p LCD and prefer this 720p so much better. The contrasts are amazing! The remote is wonderful and the JUST feature makes the screen size always fit the screen (no annoying black bars beside and above like on the Sony). Would definately recommend to anyone.

Happy. Happy. Happy.
I’ve had this TV for a little over a week and it’s been great. I replaced an HD CRT (Sony 36″ XBR) and was nervous that I wouldn’t see the same picture quality. I chose plasma over LCD b/c I believe it provides a better picture (not so harsh or sterile - more lifelike) and I haven’t been disappointed. DVDs and HD content are stunning, and, surprisingly, the SD content I watch (from Dish Network) ain’t too bad, either.

I decided to save money by going 720p instead of 1080p and, at least until I have a Blu-Ray player, I am 100% satisfied with that decision: the 720p looks just great over a wide variety of sources (Dish, DVD, OTA HD).

The anti-reflective coating works, at least for me in my family room, as promised. In fact, we have a white ottoman about 8 feet from the TV and I noticed I could see its reflection in the bezel *around* the TV (shiny black plastic) but not on the TV itself.

Availability on this TV from Amazon comes and goes - I made sure to buy from them and wasn’t disappointed. The free delivery was professional and on-time and they took it out of the box, plugged it in, made sure it worked, and offered to take the box.

If you buy from Amazon, be sure to keep an eye out on the price for a full 30 days after you buy it. I got mine on 3/31/08 for 96 and it has dropped in price twice since then (now 36). Amazon promptly refunded me both times - the second time within *five* minutes of my request.