Panasonic Viera goes full-HD
By Philip Wong, CNET Asia
Oct 10, 2007
SINGAPORE--Call it pure coincidence or a strategic release just days after the Pioneer Kuros launch. Whichever way, Panasonic has finally announced its long overdue consumer 1080p Viera plasmas for Asia. Unveiled yesterday in Singapore, the full-HD lineup comprises three new models including a 65-inch flagship whopper. Also introduced during the event were the Viera TX-37LX75 and TX-32LX77, the former being the Japanese company's first 37-inch LCD TV.
Dressed in classy black, the TH-42PY700, TH-50PY700 and TH-65PY700 represent the pinnacle of its Viera offering with true full-HD compatibility. These made-in-Japan generation-10 panels tout native 1,920 x 1,080-pixel resolution and are equipped with upgraded 16-bit V-real Pro II video processor. Another notable feature among the series is an extended 100,000-hour panel life. This is much higher than the 60,000 industrial standard found on current plasma and LCD TVs.
To further differentiate the TH-65Y700, AVCHD-encoded media is now supported out-of-the-box. An extension of its inbuilt SDHC slot function, this enables direct playback of Panasonic camcorder-recorded videos. What're missing, though, are judder-free 1080p24 input handling and any tangible improvement in contrast performance pegged at 10,000:1. That said, it's worth noting that the TH50PY700 is less than half the price of the equivalent Pioneer PDP-LX508G.
Moving onto the new LCDs, the TX-37LX75 is the successor for the well-received TX-32LX700M. Both are based on the popular In-Plane Switching LCD technology with the new model having a slight edge in terms of a larger 37-inch screen. This makes it suitable for family entertainment in the living room at the tradeoff of the 700-series' 100Hz frame rate-doubling and SDHC slot features. Furthermore, the two LCD TVs still utilize the current V-real engine.