Philips LCD vs Panasonic Plasma

pug_

OK I have to admit I'm completely torn. I'm looking to get a new TV, and Ive finally whittled it down to two choices. The Panasonic TX-P42V10E Plasma and the
Philips 42PFL9664H.

They both look like excellent TV's, and both have different things going for them. I just can't make up my mind and it's starting to drive me a bit nuts.

I just can't decide between them on things like HD picture performance, sound quality, extra features etc, they each have their own individual strengths and weaknesses. I think the final decision is going to have to come down to SD performance though, as outside of HD content from a Blueray player and Media streaming from my HTPC, I've only got Chorus TV in the house so whatever I get will need to have good upscaling capabilities. I've read that the Samsung TV's have the best upscaling, but the models I've looked at have a lack of SCART, and poor sound so I've ruled them out.

Any advice greatly appreciated, as I really am struggling with this one

byte

There isn't much to call between them.

Personally, I'd go for the Panasonic. Their plasmas are generally good working with SD pictures. I've not witnessed the 9-series Philips to give an opinion on the SD quality on that.

How do they compare price wise?

pug_

There isn't a great deal of difference between them price wise either which doesn't help.

I'm kind of leaning towards the Panasonic myself. The only downsides I can think of are sound quality isn't supposed to be great (zero chance of external speakers unfortunately), and the fact that it's going into a fairly bright living room so being a plasma sunlight could be a problem.

Even as I'm typing though I'm thinking of how damned nice the Philips looks, and the fact that to most people the picture quality difference between it and a plasma probably won't even be noticeable, and LCD's are better in a bright room, and the sound quality is definitely superior... But the Panasonic has much better response times for games, and those oh so deep blacks, and the THX mode is supposed to be secks. But.....

And so it goes, sigh...

Idleater

byte wrote: »

I've not witnessed the 9-series Philips to give an opinion on the SD quality on that.

If it's any use, I have a philips 9603 and I am very impressed with the video processing for SD.

I watch ntl digital mainly for tv, and I pass DVD through to the TV to scale as opposed to using the scaler in the AVP, which affirms my belief in the quality of the video processing in the "pixel perfect 2" chipset or whatever they call it.

Obviously it is perfect with 1080p, and I have switched the wii to 480p over component and it is fine with that too.

Having said all that, at the time when I was buying, I had no intention of every buying plasma, so I never considered options from pioneer or panasonic. I compared the philips to the Samsung, and went with philips because of styling (not gone on the red coloring in the samsung range).

pug_

Thanks Nereid. It's good to get an opinion from someone who has first hand experience

rednik

I replaced a samsung for the 9664 in Sep. I use it for Sky HD and blu ray and I think it is a fantastic set. I don't use it for games so can't help you out there, I do use it for net tv occasionaly and this is very useful when the sprogs and the oh are using the computers in the house. Have you actually gone in and viewed both sets if not I recommend you do so. The staff in the Philips shop in town are second to none and will demo the 9664 for you.