Better than 2009's Samsung edge lit LED LCD's...just not enough to eliminate a few issues/flaws

I've owned this television for a few weeks now and I've been putting it through a battery of tests using a variety of different sources and room lighting conditions. To get right to the point I am returning it -- it will be picked up this week -- and waiting for either the UNC8000 precision dimming edge lit led set or perhaps either the XBR-HX900 or XBR-LX900 from Sony. The C7000 is a good TV. It compares favorably -- if not signficantly so -- to any of the edge lit led lcd's that Samsung released in 2009. However it doesn't hold a candle to the UNB8500 that was released late in 2009. It is also outperformed by Vizio's latest (552) the Sony XBR 8 and even LG's LH 90 gives it a run for it's money and outperforms it in a few important areas. Essentially the performance of the C7000 is either matched or exceeded by multiple televisions that cost significantly less. If you are not a videophile and do not concentrate on picture performance in a completely darkened room I'm sure this television will suit you just fine. However if you are a videophile and/or picture performance in a completely darkened room and accurate reproduction of theater film viewing is very important to you this television is not for you. This TV exhibits many of the same problems that plagued Samsung's 2009 series of edge lit led's -- namely a lot of light shining through from the corners top and bottom and sides of the picture while viewing in a darkened room -- and does not perform the way you would hope for a television that costs this much. Samsung did improve upon the fluctuating back light problems of last years edge lit led's. This television does not have a fluctuating back light problem at all. However I must come back to the issue of light shining through from the edges of the screen. It's a big concern for anybody who wants to reproduce a natural theater experience and view films the way they were meant to be seen. You simply cannot recreate that experience with this television. When you view a film -- or any other content -- in a completely darkened room it is impossible not to notice the light shining in from the edges. That is a huge problem for a lot of us. I will say that when you are viewing a film in a bright room this television is an outstanding performer. It is also an excellent performer for viewing sporting events animated features and other lively bright content in a brightly lit room. Of course most of us do not wish to pay $3300 to only be completely happy with our televisions when we are watching them in a brightly lit room. The light shining in from the edges also creates the potential to create a lot of problems with 3D viewing once we have sufficient 3D content available. Imagine trying to immerse yourself in a 3D viewing experience and not be able to focus on the 3D atmosphere due to the fact that there is light shining into the viewing area. I just don't see it working. It seems that it would be a major obstacle in viewing 3D content. Imagine going to see Avatar in 3D or IMAX 3D and having light shining into all of the edges of the film. There's just no way that it wouldn't distract you and take away from your viewing experience. I foresee this being a huge problem for 3D viewing once we have the content. I will discuss some of the positives of this television because I don't want anyone to think it's a bad television. I would have really given it 2.5 starts out of 5 but Amazon doesn't allow for a half star so I went with 3 because the positives probably do outweigh the negatives on this TV. The color accuracy is what we have all came to expect from Samsung which is to say it's flawless. The black level is outstanding -- if not up to par with the local dimming led sets such as the 8500 and the XBR8 or the Pioneer Kuro 151 plasma -- and does not have the fluctuating backlight problem. The black level is definitely better than last years edge lit led sets. The video processing and motion resolution is beyond reproach. It appears that this particular feature is probably comparable the 8500 which is the only lcd in history to be able to resolve all 1080 moving lines. It will be interesting to see if this television can do that once the reviews come out and the video processing has been tested. This television handles 24fps content perfectly and reproduces the proper cadence of film based content. It is definitely a good television it just has some major flaws and is outperformed by a few sets that cost over $1000 less. The potential for 3D viewing problems definitely exists and Samsung needs to find a way to cure the problem of having light shine in from the edges of the screen.More detail ...

Blows LCD away

This pannasonic G25 is amazing. Clear Crisp Picture. Colors are amazing unlike an LCD. You never would know the difference unless you saw a plasma. Unfortunatly plasmas got a bad rap years ago and people shy away from them. This model (as do others including samsung) have built in image retention elimination devices. Follow the break in for the first 100 hours and you have nothing to worry about. The sound levels arent bad you probably have a surround system anyways so it dont matter. This picture gets better and better as it breaks in. All store demos are pretty crappy and usually the plasmas are off to the side. If stores used a good setup and dialed in the sets its unbelievable how many they would sell but most people drift to the big bright LCD or LED. This tv is bright and colors are unmatched. Hockey games and fast paced sports are crap on lcd but on plasma when the hockey players stop you can see every sliver of ice fly through the air. Plasmas are less money and better picture the an lcd why buy an lcd? I looked at the samsung however they have a realllly bad rep for buzzing. Get it dial in your settings and you too will be blown away.



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Stunning TV and good sound

About me: First HDTV but I am an Electrical/Software Engineer so I have a high level of technical ability with a low expectations. I have been micro analysing which TV to buy for far to long. I attended CES in 2009 and 2010 and have seen all of the new TV that are coming out (probably why I kept waiting so long). This is the perception from which this review was written.



I received this TV yesterday and watched it for most of the evening. Very good picture! I was considering the LG55lh40 but after viewing the Samsung LN55B650 side by side with the LG at Best Buy my wife and I realized there was little competition. We had the tech at best buy let us mess with the settings for around half an hour (starting with the auto-calibration from LG) but just couldn't get it to look right compared with the Samsung. I was rather upset as I have read numerous great reviews about the LG and it was a considerably cheaper price. Logging into Amazon I noticed the LN55C650 was on sale for $1620 (even cheaper than last years B series) but had no reviews so I was a little nervous to order it. Hindsight is 20/20 and I definitely made the right choice. The picture is very clear and has that crisp look that Samsung is famous for.



My surround sound system will not be delivered until today so I was stuck using the built in speakers last night. I was very impressed with the sound this thing could pump out. I varied the sound between 25 and 50 (out of 100) and it was more than loud enough and filled the room nicely. This is by no means comparable to a nice sound system but compared to any other TV I have heard it is definitely up there in sound capabilities.



Looks wise I think this is much better looking than last years B650. I didn't care for the red touch of color that surrounded the whole TV. This model only seems to have the red at the bottom center and it adds a really nice accent without being overpowering like I felt last years were. This is just a personal opinion.





Cons:

The 120HZ feature which was heavily complained about in the LN55B650 still has problems. The first thing I did when I got the TV was watch The Dark Knight BD (1080P) on my PS3 using a V1.3 Cat2 HDMI cable. I thought something was wrong with the TV as it was doing very strange things with background motion but after turning the 120HZ feature off the picture cleaned up perfectly and I no longer notice any problems while watching it. I tried all of the different 120HZ modes and they all had the same problem. That said I turned it back on while watching HDTV (720p obviously) and it seems very clean with the 120HZ.



It is 2010 and they still can't put a wireless radio built into the television? I find this to be ridiculous that you have to purchase a separate module in order to get wireless. My router is very far away from my TV and it will be expensive to have network cables added.



I will update this if I notice any other issues.More detail ...

Not Only Excellent For The Money But Excellent Period.

I had tried to buy the previous "B" model at close-out prices but I missed the boat. Thought I might be outta luck until the "C" version started showing up a day or so afterward and it turned out to be basically the same TV just about 25lbs lighter - only 2 people needed to wall mount - I was down with that and $[...] bucks still didn't seem too bad. I had already researched for some time and Plasma was it for me. The Panny G-10 had a similarly good picture too and although it offers much to consider I liked the Sammy's picture just a bit more but you may want to check it out as well. I received the set with zero problems or issues: no dead pixels or any buzzing whines or anything amiss at all. Outta the box the picture was quite good and showed me good resolution performance even with SD cable with no video noise issues (although initially I did find it necessary to use the 3 supplied ferrite choke magnets that snap onto the power cord. These not only eliminated the several horizontal noise bands in the picture but cleaned up the resolution on the overall picture with no downside - an easy fix that totally nixed the problem for me).



But tweaking the picture a bit is where this set shines the most. When researching I came across a site that offered a list of picture control settings for the "B" version. Since this is really the same panel I factored it into my buying decision accordingly. Especially since the settings were said to be obtained with a Sencore color analyzer (about a $10000 pro device for calibrating video displays and is the sort of thing used by the Imaging Science Foundation - ISF. They at least did pioneer and continue to legitimize the video calibration practice but more to the point it WASN'T done by any of the more lame imitators that have since cropped up (like Geek Squad Spyder and others) whom I feel exist to separate you from your money (at about $300 a calibration) while hardly giving you a better picture adjustment than you can get on your own with a $25 calibration DVD).



What this means to us is that the results of what I'm taking to be the equivalent of a $300 (legit) picture calibration for this particular set anyway have already been posted on the web for free - not an inconsequential consideration for anyone interested. I'm posting those numbers here for those who are:



White Balance Settings:

Red-Offset: 22

Green-Offset: 25

Blue-Offset: 12



Red-Gain: 33

Green-Gain: 25

Blue-Gain: 33



Picture Settings:

Picture Mode: Movie

Color Temp: Warm 2

Brightness: 56

Contrast: 90

Cell Light 8

Color: 53

Tint: G35/R65

Sharpness: 10

Black Tone: Off

Dynamic Contrast: Off

Gamma: 0

Colorspace: Auto

Flesh Tone: Off

Edge Enhancement: Off

Digital NR: Auto

HDMI Black Level: Low

Film Mode: Auto



When I tried these settings I noticed a very organic natural-looking picture one that offered me a few surprizes. This set happens to be inherently capable of showing a more-than-generous amount of color saturation without problem. I personally prefer a picture that's just slightly undersaturated if anything (but I expect this set will accomodate anyone's taste on that score if yours are different than mine). With all this what I found was that even when slightly undersaturated and I felt the picture was indeed realistic-looking whenever an unusually colorful object was displayed (like a particularly vivid piece of clothing or a brightly flourescent color - like some NASCAR colors for example) this TV displayed BOTH the less intense colors of the more mundane objects and the most decidedly vivid ones equally well in the same scene AT THE SAME TIME - never subduing the most vivid colors even when the overall color level looked 'properly' undersaturated to me on the more everyday objects. Nor was it unnaturally emphasizing them for that matter. The result was a TV that on any good HiDef cable feed regularly showed me a surprisingly wide (yet natural-looking) "dynamic range" of color intensity in the images. I could just about feel as if the TV itself were getting out of the way and showing me clearly (and more truthfully than I've seen in my home before) just what the camera saw. Very nice and as I say surprizingly convincing (and this with simply 1080i and 720p cable feeds - a Blu-ray player is definitely next!). This set after my preferred adjustments didn't make all the colors look too subdued like some plasmas I've seen have ended up doing nor all the colors too vivid like some LCD's. I felt like it walked the line beautifully - not merely a good compromise but it seemed truly the best of both in this regard. Black levels were great and with excellent detail - no complaints.



In the end I did opt to deviate from the settings above but only with respect to overall contrast/brightness and color level settings everything else was the same. This gave me an appreciable gain in contrast that suits me and my family's tastes in our well lighted daytime living room. Plasma is usually not as vivid in the contrast department as most LCD's or LED's but in the mid-price range ($1000-$1500 retail) it's a small price for me to pay for a picture that I feel (with adjustment) is otherwise decidedly sharper clearer more life-like and dimensional than anything else for the money. I haven't felt that any comparative lack of overall contrast has resulted in any buyer's remorse for me at all as no such notion has yet remotely entered my head anytime I've watched it.



I'll add that in my experience with LCD's vs. Plasmas Plasmas kill LCD's and LED's when it comes to motion - at least in the sets in this price range. Up over about $2000 and differences between the panel types start to get quite a bit smaller to me. But just before I settled on this Sammy I went to Wally World and dragged home a Vierra LCD mainly to see if 'taming down' an LCD picture to suit my tastes could possibly be better than trying to 'pump up' a Plasma. In this case a huge waste of time! What I saw was a 120-Hz LCD on sale at just under a 1000 bucks that just couldn't do motion very well at ALL. I popped in a SD DVD of Lawrence of Arabia and it looked like it was shot "live-to-video" perfectly goofy. I also found out just how bad a 5-ms response time can look on a 47" set. The 120Hz feature DID work as advertised and made fast motion MUCH better than without but any slow-speed pan or movement caused a nearly instantaneous defocusing of the area of motion until the motion stopped and the blurred area was able to snap back into focus. When watching a head shot of someone speaking for example their face would perceptably blur in the areas of facial movement while the face of another person in the scene next to them (not talking) remained in sharp focus - too disconcerting. And too much of a disconnect to the experience to NOT want to look at a person while they were talking(!). Plasma (600Hz or no) inherently has no such motion problems that require the consumer to spend money on to overcome. If that wasn't enough (and believe me for me it was) the somewhat artificial vividness to the picture proved at least on this LCD to be something I could never quite tame no matter what the settings.



For me to pass muster a flat panel must make no major blunders in the 4 most important performance areas of color contrast resolution and motion. To me this Sammy does all of that and at a very nice price - I don't know how I can do much better than that especially without another free video calibration. In fact the only Plasma that I'm confident could beat it hands down is the discontinued-but-still-available Pioneer Kuro 50" plasma. But then it should it retailed for a mere $4500 when new. But a few months ago it could be had on the web for only 1600 bucks. It's just that at the time I didn't have the scratch. Now the remaining ones if you can find 'em were the last time I looked hovering around $3000. Oh well I'll tell you one thing though; this machine at this price has certainly eased my pain...;) I know this isn't 3D or more colors than RGB or anything but I'm more than content now to wait all that out. Til the next round this will do me just fine!More detail ...

Panasonic TC-P50S2 Review by Plasma TV Buying Guide

1080p HD Picture Quality: The picture presentation of the from the 50S2 is still very bright and with the improved black levels much improved. Black levels are deep and strong with an HD signal input through HDMI. While not the best we've seen lately they lose the dark gray haziness that the S2 can display with a 480i signal. Color is plenty saturated and dark shadow detail remains excellent.



Picture Presentation from 480i signals: We always test every TV with a 480i resolution. It is a great test of a TVs upconversion and processing chip sets. The signal may be likened to what you would see with your normal digital cable or satellite signal.The TC-P50S2 series plasma contains the new an updated version of the NEO PDP (i.e. plasma screen) from Panasonic. This is the same screen used in some of the higher end Panasonic series which should make this model a good value if picture quality is your primary objective. We find the picture quality overall improved from the prior S1 series. The drives do a little better job of eliminating motion artifacts than the S1 series did. Color rendition is still with black levels being the primary progress area of the S2 series delivering more depth and solidity. As was the case on the S1 series brightness is a strength of the these newer Panasonic plasma models.



Calibration Notes: Overall calibration to D6500K was very easy with this TV. Though there are no white balance adjustments available on the menu without entering the service menu the 50S2 calibrated so close to D65 from the start that it would have improved the TV inappreciably. We started our calibration from the custom setting in the Warm 2 color temperature position. The S2 series TV does not contain the THX picture setting option. Follow the following settings to calibrate to a nearly perfect D65. These picture settings are best viewed in a controlled light environment fairly dark room:



Picture Mode: Custom

Color Temp: Warm2

Brightness: +74

Contrast: +75

Color: +45

Tint: -2

Sharpness: +15

Color Mgmt: OFF

x.v.Color: OFF

C.A.T.S.: OFF

Video NR: Weak

Block NR: Off

Misquito NR: Off

Black Level: Light

3:2 Pulldown: Off

HD Size: 2



Black Level/Contrast: Black levels were an area that the S1 series needed a makeover on. They got it with this S2 series. These are not going to be the best black levels we see this year and we dont anticipate them coming close to some of the Samsung plasma black levels. However Panasonic has brought black levels back into welcomed focus. Final ANSI contrast measurement was 1261:1 which is a nice improvement over last year but far from what we want. One of the TVs greatest strengths lies in its white brightness which measured an average luminance of 31.50. This result nears LCD TVs in brightness and points to Panasonic's desire to compete with LCD TVs in this area.



Dark Shadow Detail: Partly due to the high brightness of this plasma dark shadow detail is excellent. Panasonic plasma TVs have long been a favorite of ours in this important area.



Color Rendition/Color Accuracy: Color rendition is much more saturated with HD content. The TV excels with HD content and is much more subdued in presentation with lower signals. Colors can seem a little weak and hazy at times with lower end signals. I will give them the thumbs up on reality however.



Features: One of the key feature differences of the S2 series with the G20 series of plasma by Panasonic is the absense of The Viera Cast feature set which enables online content via a web interface. As a result there is also no Ethernet port. The included Viera Link feature allows the user to control other Viera link capable outboard equipment. Viera Image viewer is the Panasonic compatible technology which enables use of SD memory card viewing via the SD card slot.The S2 has discrete picture settings for each input as well as Panasonic's new "600 Hz" specification for blur reduction.



This TV is Energy Star compliant due to an energy saver feature option. Power consumption for the S2 has been reduced from the S1. This is one of the main feature differences aside from improved black levels. Panasonic started improving efficiency in their plasma TVs in 2007 and have improved it 400% with this S2 model. They are now close enough to LCDs in energy efficiency that is should not matter.



To see the overall ratings and full review of this TV head over to Plasma TV Buying Guide

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One of the best 720p Plasmas

Samsung and Panny's are 1a & 1b when it comes to plasmas. You really can't go wrong either way they both offer exceptional value in their 720p sets. And obviously if you are checking this TV out value and price are a big deal to you (me too!). So why did did I go with this set over a Panny? It just happened to be cheaper at the time of purchase I would have went either way.



I could go into the big 720p vs 1080p debate and take up a whole page. I am sure you've read many reviews already making the case for each. But the truth is you wouldn't be looking at this TV if price didn't matter. I am not calling you poor!! You just have some reason why you don't want to pony up for 1080p that's cool me too. The PN50C430 does exactly what it was meant to a great picture for a great price. As for burn in/image retention just don't leave something static on there for hours and you'll be fine. If you get image retention just watch some TV and it will go away. Don't use the scrolling or white features it's better to exercise the pixels with TV to get rid of image retention.



Ok first the PN50C430 vs. the PN50C450 model. These are basically the same TV. The 450 model has 1 more HDMI port and Touch of Color (a little red/maroon stripe of color on the bezel of the TV). That's it. I went with the 430 because I didn't like the red TOC. I wish it would have had that extra HDMI port but there are solutions for that. I also own the 2008 PN50A450 model. It has a nice silver stripe on the bezel which looks better than both of the 2010 models. Anyway now with the quick pro's and con's summary.



Pro's:

Great picture for cheap! HD looks very good.

Good colors and tones realistic

Nice looking (would like to have the silver stripe though!)

Much thinner than the 2008 model

More power efficient than the 2008 model

Lighter than the 2008 model (+/- 20 lbs!)

Good warranty

Basic menus but enough to customize picture nicely

Not a surround system by any means but decent sound for a flat panel





Con's:

No swivel stand the 2008 model has it and it's great :(

Remote it's cheap but serviceable. You could always buy a better one though.

Hookups it's manageable but it should have had 2 more HDMI ports and it doesn't have VGA

Buzzing but it's not really noticeable unless right up next to the TV or with no sound on

SD picture is ok it's crisp enough but a little dark even with AVS Forum recommended settings















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Excellent TV!

Purchased from Amazon. White glove delivery was seamless. They unpacked the set attached the swivel stand placed it on the media console and hooked it up to the cablebox. All I had to do was supervise. Now let's talk about the 55LD650 itself.



Picture Quality. Considering there are no reviews out yet I considered it somewhat of a gamble to purchase this new LG model (which according to the sticker was built in February of this year). But after watching HD programing for a few hours my concerns evaporated. The picture quality is impressive. This is my first LCD. I've always been a plasma guy and have two Pannys so I had my concerns. Howver after watching Monsters vs Aliens I definitely have no complaints about the PQ. The images on the 55 inch screen popped beautifully. So much so that my kids even asked if it was in 3D!



Off-Angle Viewing. Viewing the TV from various angles (even extreme ones) I can confirm that this set did not have any noticeable degradation in picture quality from off-angle viewing(unlike some Sonys I looked at). Very impressive.



Glare. This was the main reason I sought out an LCD set since the TV resides in a very bright room with two sides of floor-to-ceiling windows. This eliminated the plasma option (though we first tried a Sammy plasma and aside from the mirror-like glare we couldn't handle the loud buzzing noise it made). While there's some glare on this TV when it's not on there was nothing noticeable on the matte sceen when watching programs.



All in all I'm very pleased with 55ld650 thus far.More detail ...

Startling clarity detail and color

Had my Samsung UN55B8000 TV a couple of weeks now. It has more than lived up to the hype. Hooked it up and put on a blu-ray disk. Even the delivery guy's jaw dropped and he's delivered/set up hundreds of TVs.



TV is only inch and half thick and only weighs 60 pounds or so.



In fact it is sometimes almost too good. When viewing people on HD you can see every little mole scar wrinkle stray hair makeup five o'clock shadow makeup line etc. I'm sitting here watching the news and I can clearly see tiny pieces of lint on the guy's black suit. I'm guessing the talking heads of tomorrow are all going to have to have much better complexions.



If you like to tweak your TV this one provides a lot of different controls. There are already some websites that will give you what they consider good tweaks to maximize the pic. You can also look for the B7000 tweaks. Looks pretty darn fantastic right out of the box so if you aren't a techie don't worry about it.



Sounds..not particularly good or bad but I don't want TV speakers taking up space anyway. If you are going to spend this kind of money for a TV you should be using your stereo system.



Some reviewers were complaining about the number of inputs. Again how many is enough. I run my PS3 XBOX360 IPOD and the Dish box through my Denon and so I only use one HDMI.



You can plug it into the internet. No set-up just plug it in. First thing it did was download 12 updates to itself. Have no idea what they did but ...didn't cause any problems. It automatically loads up some of Yahoo's widgets. Fun to try but...not something I have really gone back and used much. Also has some built in content...recipes artwork etc. that I haven't bothered to look at.



You can plug in USB drives and view content directly off the drive.



I long ago got rid of my roof antenna. I bought a little Turk indoor antenna and plugged that in so I can pop over into over-the-air signals and watch TV. It will automatically search and find the on-air channels. It even downloads some kind of TV guide from the internet for the channels it finds.



I also wanted to see if there was any signal degradation from Dish. I haven't noticed the HD degradation with Dish that I had with Comcast. The way Comcast packed the HD signals you could see a real difference between OTA and the packed pics.



Samsung also provides software which allows you to use your PC as a server. Then you can display your pics music etc on the TV. Took a little playing around but was easy compared to some of the others I've tried to use.



I've played games with both my PS3 and the XBOX360. No problems. No pixelating. Did not bother to change TV over to game mode. I haven't fooled around with the 240Hz function. I just leave it on standard.



I'm sure there are other features I haven't tried. With the ability to update itself over the internet I have no doubt they will teach it even more amazing tricks.



I've set up my Harmony 880 Pro to control all my devices including the IPOD. IPOD menu/info will display (through my Denon) on the TV.



All of the above features are great but the main thing is... the picture is just absolutely mind-blowing wonderful.



So fantastic TV. I am VERY happy with it. Obviously I highly recommend it.



((Now I'm watching Wall-E in HD and it is pretty amazing.))





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