LG PQ60 vs Panasonic C10/X10
Now, This thread started somewhere and is moving towards somewhere else.
Anyway I will put my observations here till I buy that exotic TV Iam looking for.
Went to bangalore last weekend to visit my friend and we went to the E-Zone in Indira Nagar 100 ft road to purchase a mobile for him. As with my experience with ezone, he did not have the mobile I was looking for on stock. :indifferent14:
But when I asked whether they have plasmas on display, He said they have LG and Panasonic on display on the first floor.
hyeah: Wasted no time and went to the first floor.
There were LG PQ30, PQ60 and Panasonic C10, x10 and lots of other plasmas all were in display. :yahoo: Wonder of wonders! No salesman around in first floor
2PM on a sunday! There were 2 other guys looking at the LCDs. They really have a good collection of LCDs and plasmas.
Now for the comparison itself.
In short PQ30 & PQ60 had same PQ. Also, C10 & X10 had same PQ.
The PQ30 and C10 were displayed one below another for comparison. Below are my observations.
Colours/Black level :
ONLY on side by side comparison, I could notice that the PQ30 falls short in 'actual' colour reproduction. The 'blue'/'green' seem a bit prominent in the PQ30/60. Does that make the picture look bad? Depends!
Pictures like sea, beach, island, lake (anything blue) looks gorgeous in the LG. The C10 seems to portray the 'exact' colours and so falls short when it comes to 'sexyness' of the scenaries. But this is a good indication that the panasonic will do better in 'most' cases.
Green cannot be anymore sexier than it was from the LG in the price range. it could be because of the prominent blue. The Football HD video was full of life in the LG due to gorgeous green.
Red -> This where the panasonic 'shines' literally. I would ask you to do this test as the benchmark. Ask the sales man to display something red. (they usually have a video which has baloons in different colours which they dont demo in LCD but only on LED). The red is really 'RED' in the panasonic plasma. LG plasma had a colour deviation but you cannot notice it if you see it alone. (Same goes for non-blue related colours like 'DARK BROWN'. Pana is better.)
Comparitively, the LCDs only produced dark maroons.
I mean how hard is it to reproduce one of the basic colours? 'RED'? Is'nt it one of the 3 colours in RGB? Why do they screw up with this? Only one particular sony LCD model I saw there seem to have sorted this 'RED' issue as good as plasmas. Anyway you have to see to believe. Try it out next time when you are in showroom.
So, LG has this red deficiency in all modes. But is not noticible in absence of panasonic. If I keep the LG as benchmark and view the panasonic from there, It WOULD seem like the panasonic had a prominent 'Golden'/'light brown' haze. (Jus for comparison, not the case)
Screens with dominent shades of Blue, Green, Yellow, White, Ornage, Violet, Silver etc will look better on the LG.
Screens with dominent shades of Black, Brown, Gold, Red, Majenta etc will look better on the Panasonic.
Black is good in both LG and Panasonic. Infact, in some scenes where the faces appear blue in the dark scenes (moon light), LG had an upper hand. The trailers with complete black and flash of lightning etc, appear noticiable better in the panasonic. No doubt. There is also another reason for LG appearing better in spite of red/black deficiency. It is the brightness of the LG panel. I will come to it in a while.
White also looks great on LG than the panasonic. This could also be attributed to the 'blue' prominance. (The effect is similar to using robin liquid blue for white shirts..
)
Contrast :
I have often read that black level and contrast are one and the same. Atleast directly proportional. My observations says me a different story.
Panasonic while having better black levels, does not have as good contrast as the LG. I do not know how to explain this.
The green football ground appear so much sexy for a reason. Each and every grass was visible in the LG on a casual look. In the panasonic, you have to look more carefully. There is definetely a loss in detail in panasonic. I don't know if this can be attributed to contrast. Also, LG is more bright, that could be the reason.
Brightness :
LG all the way. Panasonic fall short by quite a margin. The PQ30/60 approaches LCD in brightness IMO. This is directly visible to naked eye.
When switched off, while the LG looks like a 'mirror' literally and panasonic is a bit less reflective, switching on, we get a different picture altogether. The LG seems to throw a better picture in the 'not so dark' room. It is noticiably brighter.
Image Retention:
One of the stupidest idea that can come to a plasma salesman is displaying half of the screen in more brightness than the other half. This was exactly what was happening in the showroom!
The LG PQ30/60 in display was showing half the screen in XD mode and the other half in non-XD mode to show viewers how sexy XD is! Infact, if anything, it looked like they degraded the quality of non-XD side. It had a grey haze. It also had 'XD' and 'NORMAL' displayed on the screen for what seems like a month the TV was on display.
I couldn't stand it and called the sales person from below and tried to use this mode only when necessary as it would make the piece useless if the image retains. He talked about anti-IR technologies built in. I asked him to bring back the TV to 'normal' mode so that I can see it. He willing did and sure there was 'no' IR. It might be because the characters were grey & colourless but even the full screen seem 'full' and not 'two halfs' which IS a wonder. I again warned hin not to use the XD demo mode on plasma which I don't think he will do.
Baseline, I could not see the IR in any of the TVs there. probably they were new enough not to have any. (I did not go insanely near the panels but observed from normal viewing distance)
Sound :
LG has nothing to offer in this department, though PQ70 having two extra speakers which might help (never demoed). Panny is also not great but is better than LG by quite a margin.
Summary -
LG - RED weaker than Panasonic, Black levels in most scenes match the pana, Brighter than pana by quite a margin, I feel it has more contrast than the pana, Blue prominence actually increase picture quality in some cases (subjective), Greens are sexy! (again may be due to brightness), More suited for 'Not so dark' rooms, Lots of features, Costs less than pana.
Pana - Excellent RED/Black levels, Produces exact same colours the video intended (This could be bad in some cases), Less options for picture enhancements (Not that the original picture was bad). Better sound than LG. Needs comparitively darker room to shine.
Conclusion:
Panasonic has got all the basics of plasmas right! But unfortunately it carried forward all the disadvantages of a 'typical' plasma also. (Less brightness, lesser picture enhancement modes, Reflective when viewing, Requirement for dark rooms etc)
LG has put the effort in the areas of 'disadvantages' of plasmas and seem to have succeeded in archieving few of them. (Has better brightness, Suited for 'Not so dark' rooms, Reflective surface is not as reflective when switched on, Looks gorgeous, Features, Features & Features to match the LCD rivals!). It still has some problems getting the 'basics' right though these may not be the typical problems a viewer faces (ie does not notice in isolation from panasonic). Also, Priced it very competetive!
Both are good TVs on their own right. It finally depends on your personal preference and budget.
P.S 1: While some in the forum feel that PQ30 is less reflective than the PQ60/70. My observation says otherwise. PQ60 is defenitely more reflective when switched off, but better handles reflections than PQ30 when switched on. Panasonic is more reflective than both LGs.
P.S 2: Adder once mentioned about the C10/X10 having 'lesser' whites than PV8 & PV80. This might be the reason they seem 'not so bright'. I have not seen the PV series yet and the above observation is ONLY for C10/X10.
