VT is a bad performer in a bright room?
My dining room in Pasig is about 500 Lux bright and daylight color. My Pasig bedroom can be made as bright if I turn on all those huge 45W spiral bulbs evenly scattered inside the room plus the lamp shades and the mood lights on the peripheries. My living room in Tokyo is about 400 lux and warm color with the standard Japanese low ceiling - ubod ng liwanag kaya ang pogi tumingin sa mirror - parang yung mirror sa bright department stores. Hehehe
And my VTs perform perfectly satisfactory. Look at my pics dahil laging bukas ang ilaw and the room actually appears dimmer in picture than actual. My rooms are very very very bright by Pinoy standards. hehehe
But I heard the new Samsung flagship is even brighter. That sounds good. But to say that the VT performs badly under bright lights? come to my dining room and you be the judge (that's the only public area in my house in Pasig).
based on a non-pro review from Amazon, looks like Panny is still better than the top of the line Samsung ... unfortunately di na yata magiging available dito ... here's the review -
4.0 out of 5 stars Very Good Picture Quality And Loaded With 'Gee Whiz' Features, April 7, 2013
By
PsychDoc "Psych Doc" (NYC) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Samsung PN51F8500 51-Inch 1080p 600Hz 3D Smart Plasma HDTV (Electronics)
[Edit: 4-28-13] -- VT60 Vs. F8500:
First off I'd like to offer a huge shout-out to the fine guys over at the BB Magnolia next to Roosevelt Field on Long Island. They had these two sets side by side on stands making a direct A/B comparison possible. They were able to sync up The Avengers on DVD so that both sets were playing this with only a 1" -2" second difference between what the two sets were displaying. Actually, that 1" -2" second difference was quite helpful in allowing an assessment of what was playing on one before looking at the other.
First off, the F8500 had somewhat more pure whites than the VT60. That said, neither had anything like the eye searing whites and "pop" of the LED/LCD sets on the adjacent wall so if that is what you're after you're going to need to pass on both of these sets and opt, instead, for an LED/LCD. So the F8500 had more initial visual impact. My wife commented on this when she first saw both sets. After watching for a minute or two the strengths of the VT60 began to emerge. In fact, the longer you watched, the more apparent it was that the VT60 won convincingly in a number of categories. These included color saturation and "depth" (hard to describe this but the closest I can come is that the VT had more of a 3D effect even while displaying 2D material). It also simply blew away the F8500 in resolution of detail in dark scenes. Skin tones where more accurate on the VT and blacks definitely appeared 'blacker.' Neither set was using "torch mode" (i.e. Vivid/Dynamic), so any artificial exaggerations that might have been introduced by these settings were not a factor. Needless to say, neither were professionally calibrated so we were looking at out-of-the-box settings. I was rather surprised to find that red resolution was about a draw with both sets doing a superb job here. In view of the much touted new phosphor that Panny is using I had rather expected that this would be one area in which the VT would bury the F8500. This was not the case. Surprisingly it was in the blues that the VT excelled and completely dominated the F8500. Who whoudda figured?
Anyway, I'm happy to report that my seemingly endless obsession deciding between these two sets has now come to a close and I'm going with the VT. A couple of other factors entered into my ultimate decision. These were that I adore the stand that the VT uses and detest the overly wide stand of the F8500; the VT provides two remotes for their set -- one of which is the cute little touch pad thing, the other of which is a more traditional remote that will allow far easier access to the unit's many feature more easily...the F8500 only offers the (admittedly very sleek and sexy) touch pad remote; the sound system of the VT is almost certain to beat the built-in speakers of the F8500...having owned the F8500 for about a week I can say that the built-in speakers of that unit were, at best, mediocre; finally I am a bit concerned over quality control issues with Samsung and I believe that over the long haul, the VT will prove to be more reliable -- I know that even the finest product can occassionally produce a lemon but I want to keep the odds on my side.
So if you are a casual shopper (thankfully, not many of us here fall into that category) be careful and spend some quality time with both sets before you decide which way to go. First impressions can be deceiving! In view of the fact that I can now see that the VT offers what I believe to be a significant advantage in ultimate PQ I'm lowering my rating of the F8500 by one star -- still a great set but not quite in the same league as the VT60.
[Edit: 4-11-13] -- After a great deal of soul searching and review scouring (as well as some degree of buyers remorse, I'll admit) I've decided to pass on this set and wait, instead, for the Panasonic VT60 series. It's not that the F8500 is a bad set, it's more that the Panny offers everything that this set does and then some at a similar price point. Two factors were of primary influence to me in my ultimate decision making. First, the weird verical viewing angle issue on this set is more disconcerting than I had originally realized. If standing and looking down at the set from even a 25 degree angle, the screen almost blacks out. However, probably the most important factor that influenced me to wait for the Panny was the audio quality. I use my TV without external speakers and this appears to be an area where the Panny shines. The F8500 speakers are, at best, just OK. So, for those of you reading this, please understand that I'm not knocking the F8500 at all -- I am just think that the Panny may offer the least little bit more for a similar price. If the Panny were $1000 more I'd very happily remain with the F8500. I am lowering my rating to 4 stars because I think the VT60 is slightly better and represents what a five star review should
[Edit: 4-7-13] -- Major problem discovered. The set has a faint horozontal band across the screen about 2" from the top. The band is only about a 1mm thick and is more apparent in scenes with orange and blue than darker colors. It's completely absent if the top of the screen is black but it's enough that it's got to be fixed or this bad boy is going back pronto! I'll update as things progress.
I've had this fine set for three days now and I thought I'd share some provisional impressions. Just as you'd imagine, the picture quality (PQ) is just stunning with deeply saturated colors and inky blacks. I've never seen whites that are so white (a pet peeve of mine so this is a very nice finding). The unit itself is quite pretty aesthetically and is beautifully constructed, coming very well packed in it's rather large box. For those of you considering ordering it on the internet and having it shipped, have no fear. Setup is quite easy and connection is a snap with an HDMI cable. Be aware, though, that the HDMI inputs are along the left side of the TV (as you face the set) and are very close to the edge so it will be wise to buy and HDMI cable that has an angled, pivoting head. Otherwise the cable itself is likely to stick out from behind the unit once it's connected. The supplied remote is a thing of beauty. Small, brushed metal and easy to use. It is a bit of a pain to access all the set's fetures through the ouch pad, however, and I wish they had supplied a traditional remote in addition to this one for easier day-to-day use as the competing Panasonic VT60 does. The set even comes with something they call an "IR blaster" that plugs into the back of the set and runs to another component you may want to control with the TV's remote. You place the little box at the end of the IR blaster in front of that other component and program the TV to recognize that component and, voila, your supplied remote now controls that box too. Pretty neat. The set comes with four pairs of active 3D glasses which is very nice in view of the fact that the competing Panasonics come with none (Edit: this was in the VT50...the VT60, which is the F8500's current competition does supply two sets of active 3-D glasses with its units). Each pair of glasses would probably cost you about $30-50 each so there's a 'savings' these of at least $120. Again, nice touch Samsung. The glasses use a supplied button battery and have a tiny on-off button on the top of them. Sadly, there's no LED or other way to confirm that they're on or off so if you use them I'd suggest you take the battery out after each use and put them back in their plastic case or else you're likely to burn out the battery. I tried the glasses with the preinstalled app called "Discovering 3D" and the 3D feature works nicely. I'm not a huge fan of 3D so I doubt I'll be using it much in the future but it's nice to know it's there.
There are features galore on this set. Sadly, most of them are what I'd call 'gee whiz' features that you'll probably play with for a while after getting the set, show off to friends and family and then rarely, if ever use again. Hand gestures and voice control are two that come to mind. Very cool but really of limited real world, day-to-day use IMO. I was surprised (and not too happy) to note that this set has a shocking degree of vertical axis dimming. I thought all plasmas had virtually unlimited viewing angles, both vertically and horozontally. Not so this set. Please understand that there is no dimming when transitioning from left to right, which is far more relevant in real world use as people are going to be seated across the horozontal plane while watching. However, when you walk up to the set (if it's on a TV stand or table) you'll notice a shocking amount of dimming as you get close to the set. From a seated position, with your head at virtually the same height as the TV, this is not a problem at all but for those of you who like to mount your TV to the wall high up you may want to be aware of this before you determine how high up on the wall you plan on mounting it. For me, this proved to be a deal breaker as it was apparent every time you got up from the couch and was extremely distracting. Whatever filter they're using that causes this is way too aggressively implemented. Perhaps the primary reason I ultimately decided to return the set (that and the mediocre sound from the built-in speakers).
You'll want to play around with the picture settings to get it just the way you like and be sure to turn off the awful "Eco" circuit immediately if you keep the picture in "standard mode" (this is the best mode for overall viewing) as the default for this mode is Eco 'on.' This circuit will adjust the picture brightness to the room's ambient light. It's much like the circuit almost all smart phones have to conserve battery power but it's calibrated too agressively and cuts brightness too much in almost all environments in this TV. The sound quality from the built in speakers is decent at best and the set can be used without a HT set-up though you'll probably want one if you expect any real audio quality. If you listen to a lot of music or movies with a large dynamic range you'll probably want to invest in a good HT set-up but for general viewing the built-in speakers are marginally acceptable.
Anyway, these are some fairly initial imresssions/observations. If I learn anything more I'll update this as necessary. Hope this helps.
