SAVE THE PLASMAS | The "CRT TV" of 2025

[@Edward135i]

Aw yes the thinness of a LCD, but the weight of a CRT.

[@Dreamroom64]

Haha, I will say though, I can easily lift these 37" plasmas, but you won't catch me lifting a 36" CRT alone 😅.

[@tommynobaka]

I got a free 60 inch Kuro. It weighs about as much as I do I was able to lift a 42inch plasma on my own, but no way in hell the 60 inch lol

[@kiwas83]

​@@Dreamroom64I remember when my Uncle in 1990 bought or 37' or 39' (dont remember exactly) Sony Trinitron - curved only horizontaly... That was like a starship for me - it had digital video editing, up to 21 windows on 'Picture in Picture' mode, split screens, up to 3 or 5min time shifting (broadcast freeze), real audio detachable columns, and more stuff... Remote Control had two sections and was huge like two I-Phones (had to study a book before entering deeper...) I remember that cost like cheap new car at that time...

[@Dreamroom64]

@@kiwas83 That thing sounds amazing! I wonder what model number it was. Sony's engineers used to go wild with overengineering stuff back in the day. They made some really amazing products.

[@kiwas83]

@@Dreamroom64 I was trying to find by picture on google, but there is so many models... I could promised that was 39' Uncle sadly didn't survive Co✓19, so... Tube of TV after around 20 years of heavy usage (I think around 8-10 hours per day) started to 'warming up' every day slower and slower. Probably brightnes was also droped, but I wasn't use it to take a look. Anyway did You know that first HD broadcast had place at Japan in 1991, before that HD was... maybe not known, and not named at that time 'HD'... but it was at 70's!!! There was few prototypes of high resolution TV's... Story is saying that President Nixon said 'everybody should have it at home'... But Like always, HD wasn't s business for TV Broadcasters, too expensive equipment - but not more money from adverts... If only remember last Olympic Games were in... FULL HD 1080p 🤣 even not HDR 🤣 and the funniest is, that electronic shops had commercials of 4K TV's everywhere- just for Olimpic 🤣🤣🤣

[@TheWretchedWorld]

A family member has a very high end pioneer plasma he paid 10k aud for back in 06. 55inch. Still works and uses it to this day.

[@Dreamroom64]

The prices back in the day for these things were wild. Great to hear that it's still alive and in use.

[@marciomaiajr]

I remember the PS3 image looking so good on plasmas. For me it is still the best way to enjoy 7th gen consoles, the image looks great.

[@CandyMan2001]

I'd agree, but QD-OLED TVs are just so good.

[@garrettstrutz7421]

I still have a Fujitsu plasmavision from 2003 and a pioneer elite pro from 2006 that work perfectly. Both were $10k+ TV’s when new and only 50 inches. Really shows how cheap big high quality TV’s have become and how lightweight they have become also. Plasma was such a neat era for TV’s but such a short era they will always have a special place in my heart

[@Stoddardian]

A Fujitsu? Amazing!

[@InsideTheScull]

A nice bonus of keeping you warm this winter if I am not mistaken. Looking forward to more plasma videos, might even have to track one down myself

[@Dreamroom64]

I've heard lots of people say that theirs put out a lot of heat, but the two I have don't get very warm. It's probably because they're on the small side. The stickers on the back of each say that they use 323 to 325 watts. The 480p monitor doesn't even have cooling fans.

[@InsideTheScull]

@ id be curious in learning about the differences / benefits of a plasma monitor. Does it mostly come down to is there is a tuner, or do they support higher resolutions?

[@Dreamroom64]

@@InsideTheScull Correct, the lack of a tuner is what makes it a "monitor" rather than a TV. I believe that the FCC won't allow it to be called a TV without one. My 480p plasma monitor from 2003 also doesn't have built-in speakers. Though it does have volume control and stereo speaker terminals. I used to have a pair of bookshelf speakers directly hooked into it -- a pretty neat feature! It supports up to 1080i, and I think that it is pretty forgiving when it comes to accepting oddball signals. Another slightly interesting distinction is consumer vs. industrial models. While reading deep into old forum posts, I found this site: web.archive.org/web/20031214044607/www.creath.net/plasma/faq.html It basically says the the 2001 consumer model has RCA jacks (instead of BNC), has thicker glass, and comes bundled with a stand. Otherwise, back in the early 2000s, there wasn't much different between the two. My 2003 monitor is a consumer model with an oversized sticker tacked onto the back to kindly remind the owner. When it comes to the 2006 model I have, an annoyance of it being a consumer model is that I cannot adjust the 3% overscan. There's not even an option in the service menu. Nonetheless, the picture quality is incredibly good, but I'd love to make perfect use of the 720 lines of horizontal resolution instead of the TV slightly sizing up a 720p signal. There might be an industrial model equivalent with adjustable overscan.

[@logan.5413]

Me and my family still use a 55” hd plasma from 2008 to this day lol. Still looks and works perfectly fine

[@PJmaxx]

Just sold my vista TV for 25$ same exact one. I had found it on the street but it worked perfectly I had like 5 different working tvs I found for free on the street. Now I'm trying to get rid of this 61' Samsung projection TV or if I can modify it to a LCD screen

[@travisnorman]

I have an unused plasma TV in my basement. My monthly energy bill dropped significantly when we stopped using it. Yes it looks great, but ugh they use so much electricity, especially in a home where the TV is almost always on.

[@mikes5311]

Why is your TV always on

[@travisnorman]

@ I am a gamer living in a house full of gamers. Binge watching TV. Leaving youtube on in the background. Etc. All things I consider pretty standard in 2024.

[@Dreamroom64]

Yup, the higher energy consumption is true, especially for the large sets. These little 37" models state on the back that they use 323 to 325 watts -- not too bad in my opinion for some nightly gaming. I believe it costs about $0.05 per hour of use for either of mine. But I'm curious to find out if the stated wattage is based on maximum brightness. I'm going to test energy usage with a meter and different brightness settings and sources to find the real cost.

[@travisnorman]

@@Dreamroom64 I'd be interested to learn what you find out! We did run ours at a high brightness, I can't remember if it was max brightness. When my kid was younger she'd warm her hands by touching the screen, heh. The plasma TV was so heavy I didn't want to mount it on the wall. The picture did look glorious though, I really felt like I stepped back when we switched from plasma to 4K.

[@ErixsonGaming]

Then you should use it with power strip for limited amount of time.

[@chandlerbing7570]

We gave our Plasma TV from 2004 to our aunt back in 2016 and she used it well up to 2021. Was used every single day of it's life and eventually started tripping the breaker so we had to get rid of it. That thing was a tank and was one of the first Plasma TVs with HDMI. I remember my dad buying a component cable for the Xbox 360 and hooking it up to that TV. The quality was a massive upgrade for the time from AVI

[@Shadepariah]

"What do you look for in TVs at estate sales?" "If the TV screen looks gray, I'm interested" - Me, 2021

[@Geardos1]

480p plasma is one of the best ways to play 480p gen but mostly widescreen game consoles like the Nintendo Wii

[@Dreamroom64]

Yeah, Wii is pretty nice on the 480p panel. I'm happy with 4:3 content on it though too. But it is nicer having the screen filled. There are some early plasmas that were 4:3. I'd love to try one of those out, but they're super rare.

[@filipmartinez1162]

@@Geardos1 oh yeah and Dreamcast/N64/PS1/Saturn

[@MEWJr90]

You're 100% right when you say that motion clarity and colors just look nice on a plasma. I remember playing Kingdom Hearts with my friend on my dad's plasma sometime after the PS3 came out. I mentioned how great the ending looked to my friend and he said that the PS3 has graphics just as good. I had to sit there and explain to him why that was impressive.

[@Dreamroom64]

I remember seeing some plasmas back in they day too and they looked way better than the LCDs. It's odd how just about everyone seems to have forgotten about them these days.

[@ignacio6454]

@@Dreamroom64 Because most people are id1ots, an abundant mass of id1ots. I have a 2012 1080p Plasma and it is glorious, I use it for everything, from old PS3 games to new games. One advice, I had one plasma TV killed once because I stored it in a moist room (didn't know), the thing popped when I turned it on after that winter. I was so sad that day, keep those TV gems on a dry place.

[@mramaretto114]

Remember Pioneers Plasmas was the god tier

[@Vvewa]

Pioneer Kuro

[@Dreamroom64]

Yup, Kuros are legendary and I dreamed of having one as a teenager. Couldn't afford one let alone a LCD TV at the time! I've done some research, and it sounds like the last gen of Kuros looked amazing but are now widely plagued with a red tint issue that is very troublesome to correct. I believe they also have higher input lag than many earlier plasmas. I'd love to try one though. They're probably incredible for watching Blu-rays. Plus the "Elite" badge looks so... elite.

[@tommynobaka]

Got one for free last weekend

[@garydiamondguitarist]

When they were new, probably, but finding a working Kuro now is... for me at least, next to impossible where I am. Much easier to find mid to high tier latter era Panasonics and those have crazy robust build quality. Get a working one, baby it, it'll last a long time. Samsungs in general are... don't even bother. I've had several (plasmas, LCDs) and they never last as long as similar age Sony or Panasonic stuff.

[@dylanmooney327]

Wow, my grandma had that same panasonic plasma back in the day lol. We inherited it from her and used it for a few years and left it behind when we moved in 2012. We also had a newer 3d 55 inch plasma from 2011 that we used for 6 years before it died. I also recently joined the plasma community on reddit lol.

[@damian9303]

If you’re playing on a plasma HDTV, at least be sure to utilize the digital A/V out for a sharper & cleaner image. What I like about these too is how they often include a VGA port for if you play on Dreamcast, I just don’t like how most third party cables have the RCA jacks for audio when most of these TVs by default use AUX.

[@Dreamroom64]

Yeah, my 480p plasma has a VGA input with a 3.5mm AUX input. Just the other day I got an inexpensive Dreamcast VGA cable to test it out with. Looking forward to trying it!

[@ThreeTreee]

@@Dreamroom64 it has hd labels so It should support 720p at least, also hook up a pc to it as it might support a higher res than 720p like 768p

[@slarbiter]

I’ve been thinking about the best way to watch widescreen DVDs and plasma makes sense

[@Dreamroom64]

Yup, plasmas are excellent for DVDs. I've had good results on both the 720p and 480p plasmas. They handle lower res video very well. The other day I watched a dreaded non-anamorphic widescreen DVD. The built-in zoom function on my 720p plasma did a great job at eliminating the black bars and scaling the image to nearly perfectly fill the screen. It looked way better than the zoom + scale of other displays.

[@nora-bee]

Hey no way! I have this same model Viera in 42", it's so good that it very quickly became my main TV. PS3 and 360 just look so right on that panel, and the motion clarity helps a lot with the jumpy frame pacing and resolution woes (most games were not actually rendered at 1080p, so displaying as 720p or 1080i on a panel designed for it is exceptional). The only issue with this specific Viera is the in-built overscan that you can't turn off. Many modern consoles allow you to set your own display area (like Switch and PS4 for example) but PS3 and 360 lack this feature. Being an early Plasma model, the panel is prone to rapid burn-in if you leave the display idle for too long (though it is easily fixed, just turn the TV to one of the defunct analog channels for a few minutes) Plasmas are in their dog days at the moment and they really deserve more love, they bring a lot of unique things to the table just like CRTs, but fit into your average home with a bit less friction than our beloved little tube TVs do. For anyone wanting a quick rundown: - Plasmas have very low response times, reportedly as low as 2μs, which is theoretically on par with CRTs (though slower in the end due to how extremely fast the display is drawn on a CRT), and on par with higher end modern OLEDs (which themselves have the disadvantage of severely reduced motion clarity as phosphor displays are able to blend frames in a more organic way). - Have higher dynamic colour range than many modern TVs, with colours blending more naturally due to the way the phosphors interact with each other. - Display vibrant, incandescent-like results for lights displayed on your screen, this is one of my favourite things about Plasmas and very immersive. And you guessed it, this is possible because of the phosphor-based display. - Typically accept a wide variety of inputs, this particular model accepts: Composite (x5 ports), Component (x2 ports), S-Video (x2 ports), VGA (x1 port), and HDMI (x2 ports). Some PAL models also accept SCART too. TL,DR: Plasma GOOD, go save one from e-waste and get the best of the mid-late 2000s media experience!

[@Dreamroom64]

Thanks for the super helpful comment! You're totally right about the overscan. It looks like 3% based on the Switch's adjustment screen. I didn't know about the forced overscan when I first picked it up. I had assumed it wouldn't be an issue, since my older plasma lets me eliminate overscan from even the user-accessible menus. I looked through hundreds of old forum posts, explored the service menu, tracked down and scrolled through the whole service manual, and finally I even tried updating to the latest firmware using an old SD card. I really dug deep but couldn't solve it. But I figure 360 and PS3 games were designed with this amount of overscan in mind. Plus, some games have built-in adjustments. My model uncommonly has exactly 720 lines of resolution, so I was really hoping to have that exact match for 720p content -- at least it nonetheless looks remarkably good even with the forced overscan. Anyway, after the firmware update, one of the "fixes" is that analog snow/noise no longer displays on the TV tuner for more than a couple seconds -- a bit disappointing! The firmware supposedly improves some parts of the picture quality though and didn't introduce any problems. I noticed what you're saying about lights displayed on-screen looking really nice. Last night I watched Home Alone on Blu-ray. The colorful incandescent Christmas string lights looked remarkably nice on screen. I have a few questions: Does your 42" model get very warm? Neither of my 37" models get hot. The older model doesn’t even have cooling fans! Do you have any audible buzzing on bright white screens? Which RGB HDMI setting do you find best: "full" or "limited." I think on this 2006 model, "limited" usually looks best, but I was expecting to use "full."

[@nora-bee]

@@Dreamroom64 Happy to help a fellow Plasma enjoyer! It's a shame about the firmware update, I only went as far as the deeper service menus, it's a strange flaw that Panasonic and other Plasma manufacturers had early on, I believe the very next model they made included an option to disable overscan. - My TV does start to warm up a bit after extended use, but not nearly as much as some claim. It's certainly not warming up my room lol. - I do get that buzzing also! It's not overly loud, but you do hear it switch when the screen suddenly cuts to white. It seems to be just a result of the screen working hard to have those phosphors blasting at that level. - Personally I think Full range looks best to me, it takes advantage of the vibrancy of the display and (usually) doesn't look too busy, though there are some games that benefit from toning the colour range down. On the TV itself I keep the Contrast, Brightness, Colour and Tint at halfway, and Sharpness at about 3/4ths. Colour Temperature looks best set at Cool for me, with Colour Management and MPEG NR off. Of course this is all just personal preference, and I tend to prefer a slightly cooler picture, but I think this yields the best results when given a full colour range image to display! I have thought about sending my TV to a repair shop to see if there is some way they are able to jerry-rig a solution to the overscan issue, but as you said, most media from the 360/PS3 era accounted for overscan anyway, and a lot of games still included UI scaling options too. Hope all this helps you, and Merry Xmas!

[@Dreamroom64]

@@nora-bee Glad to hear that the buzzing on bright screens is probably just quirk of the set and not something to really worry about. I wonder if a drop of hot glue on the right component or panel piece might solve it though. I lean toward liking "cool" on my set too. Instead of making white look blue, it seems to make it look more neutral. So far I've kept HD sources at zero sharpness and brought it down pretty far negative for 480i/480p testing -- but I haven't done too much testing there yet. I'll give full range another try. I'd probably give up on the idea of trying to eliminate overscan on it. I was particularly intersted in it for my 37" model since it has exactly 720 lines, but I think that the larger models like yours have 768 lines -- so there wouldn't be the same kind of benefit to getting it perfect. I really put a lot of time trying to find a solution and came up emptyhanded. Anyway, thanks for the additional info and Merry Christmas!

[@Dreamroom64]

@@nora-bee Glad to hear that the buzzing on bright screens is probably just quirk of the set and not something to really worry about. I wonder if a drop of hot glue on the right component or panel piece might solve it though. I lean toward liking "cool" on my set too. Instead of making white look blue, it seems to make it look more neutral. So far I've kept HD sources at zero sharpness and brought it down pretty far negative for 480i/480p testing -- but I haven't done too much testing there yet. I'll give full range another try. I'd probably give up on the idea of trying to eliminate overscan on it. I was particularly intersted in it for my 37" model since it has exactly 720 lines, but I think that the larger models like yours have 768 lines -- so there wouldn't be the same kind of benefit to getting it perfect. I really put a lot of time trying to find a solution and came up emptyhanded. Anyway, thanks for the additional info and Merry Christmas!

[@tylerbrunton7696]

This black Friday we finally bought a 4k TV for the living room and the old Panasonic Vieira is now in my game loft next to the CRT. That TV displays PS3 and 360 so beautifully.

[@Dreamroom64]

Glad to hear that you'll still have a place for it. A game room is where it belongs!

[@creepycomputer]

I still have a Hitachi plasma tv manuafactured in 2006 and also bought in that year. 43 inch that monitor. It uses elektricity as a power plant man! Good monitor by the way. All my 5th, 6th and 7th generation consoles works flawlessly on this monitor.

[@IntuneGames]

I just found this exact model a week ago somebody was throwing away on the street curb. Now I'm using it as my back patio TV. Fits perfectly on my patio table.

[@Electrohead92]

I’ve been gaming on my 60” plasma for the better part of a decade now. The black levels and motion both look great and I’ve never felt the need to upgrade to a higher resolution tv. When given the option, I always choose the higher frame rate option over resolution anyway.

[@Dreamroom64]

I totally agree on opting for performance over resolution. Resolution is one of the most overrated specs I'd argue, and almost nobody pays attention to motion clarity. And that's awesome that your 60" is still going strong. When I was finally ready to buy my first big, new TV in 2016, plasmas had been discontinued for a few years.

[@Vaporwave64]

Great video! My only concern for these older plasma would be input response time. Some people confuse input response time with pixel response time, but they're separate. Last i checked online, the highest end model of Plasma's has between 28-36ms of input latency, but if i can get my hands on some for cheap, I'll update this post with more concrete info. It seems like plasma's are fairly expensive in my city, being over $50+ for the same model as the ones in this video. If you can't find a Crt and your budget limited, a cheap plasma is a great way to jump-start your retrogaming setup. Paired with a scaler like a Retrotink 5x, and it's a good experience. If latency is your concern, there's many smaller monitors that have great colors and low latency for under $300. I personally went the OLED route, LG C3+ Retrotink 5x, but it was an expensive pill to swallow. Great video and happy these plasma's are getting more love :) Edit: And Merry Christmas!! 🎅 🎄

[@Dreamroom64]

Merry Christmas, and thank you for the nice comment! Yes, input lag on all plasmas seems to be at least 30ms. However, my understanding so far is that they have an advantage in how they immediately display full frames on screen, which works great combined with the incredible motion handling. I ordered a Time Sleuth the other day and will provide precise measurements soon for the two that I own. Tonight, I tried Super Mario Bros. 1 on my 720p plasma played through a core on my Analogue Pocket. I definitely felt some input lag on this game, since it controls so precisely and I know how it feels on CRTs. But nonetheless, it was still fun and very playable. For Xbox 360 and PS3 games though, they feel right at home on my plasmas. I believe it's the best way to play games from that generation.

[@Aaron-cg1zs]

Dude!! I just found one at my local goodwill. Only $10 bucks. I was watching your video last night and I was on the look out for one because I need a tv and OLED is out of my price range. Thanks dude your video came at the right time

[@Dreamroom64]

Awesome!! Let me know which model and how it works out if you get a chance. I bet you'll be pleasantly surprised with the picture quality.

[@Aaron-cg1zs]

​@@Dreamroom64it is a pioneer plasma display PDP -4304. I love it!! I got my PS5, Nintendo switch and Series X hooked up on it. The picture quality just feels right. I appreciate you dude keep up the good work. More people need to start taking note and save this piece of history

[@nathanddrews]

My wife says that I have too many displays in the house... she's probably right, but I'll just say this: I've got many CRTs, several OLEDs, a couple LCDs, and just one plasma. I only have one because it's a very, very special purpose display for me: it's serving as a rotating retro arcade monitor. Generally speaking, nearly every plasma I have ever owned or tested has high input lag *relative* to CRT, OLED, and modern LCDs. However, we're talking about ~28ms (two frames at 60Hz) over the lowest-lag inputs, over 50ms for other inputs. Compared to many LCDs of the era that were up in the 60-100ms lag, they were good. Today though, if you want an amazing experience, just get an OLED during a sale. Not only can you get the smaller sizes for under $800, but the power consumption is far, far lower than the old PDPs. Not only that, OLEDs are actually LESS likely to suffer burn-in and image retention than plasma, it's not even close. If you do any emulation, then check out the newer CRT shaders as they use the finer resolution and HDR capabilities of OLED to provide a very convincing phosphor-like glow and trailing effect for retro gaming scan lines, etc.

[@Dreamroom64]

Yeah, like you said, they have some input lag but it's often not that bad. I ordered a latency tester since I'm curious exactly where mine stand. The power consumption on the little 37" models that I have is pretty modest. I'm going to test them out to see the true cost and will provide an update in a future video. I like OLED, but my LG OLED C1 definitely doesn't handle motion anywhere near as nicely as the plasmas. Great picture nonetheless. I have a QD-OLED PC monitor, and that is a real step in the right direction.

[@kornweed]

I have this exact TV in a part of my setup I use it for Xbox 360 Kinect games and my SEGA Saturn with S-Video it looks incredible 👌

[@Dreamroom64]

Awesome, and it's neat to hear that the S-Video inputs are actually viable for use!

[@paul_daniel_gaming]

Great video! As an owner of 5 Panasonic plasma tvs, including a 58 inch THX model, I would highly recommend the 2010+ models with VGA input. They are far lighter, less prone to burn, and the better models support 1080p. Even gaming from a PC is nicer on a plasma 👍

[@Dreamroom64]

Thanks, and I appreciate the tip! I'll be on the lookout. From your experience, do the 1080p models let you eliminate overscan for 1:1 pixel mapping? And do they handle 720p upscaling reasonably well?

[@IsaacGabriel-kh5ds]

​​@@Dreamroom64Sadly most Viera plasmas have some degree of overscan for 720p or 1080p models. The only one of the 5 I have that doesn't is the 2010 THX model. Lower end models have more significant overscan than the higher end ones. That said, most HD CRTs have the same problem as well. It was common back then and most people didn't notice it.

[@sage11x]

I still have my 55” Panasonic VT60. The best plasma ever made. Sits in my living room and everyone thinks it’s some weird oled. Only issue is the lag- most of these old sets (plasma or LCD) had pretty horrendous lag. They got a lot better near the end (early 10s). Plasma was one of the last ‘pulse’ type displays- DLP is the very last. Plasma/DLP don’t use sample and hold like all current LCD/OLED/LED. Instead they ‘flash’ the image at you extremely rapidly. That’s why the motion handling is so good.

[@garydiamondguitarist]

Well said! And kinda why they have a little bit of CRT-esque flicker if it's bright screen and you're looking at them in your peripheral vision. A worthy tradeoff for that smooth motion though, absolutely.

[@TeeBeeDee]

Hmmm I wouldn't necessarily say that the VT60 is the best. It's certainly beaten out in picture quality by the KRP-500m/PRO-101FD, I'd also say the ZT60 (which is essentially just a minor improvement to the VT60) and *maybe* the PNF8500. Panasonic struggled quite severely with maintaining high light output, never matching the PNF8500 or 500m and only the ZT60 matches the 500m in black level afaik.

[@kristiangurholt59]

@@TeeBeeDeeST/GTVT/ZT vs Kuro is so close it could go either way, depending on your personal preferences. My 500M has perceivably 0 blacks and very good colour accuracy. ZT have better shadow detail and bright room performance.

[@rtyt2007]

My parents bought our families first flatscreen in 2010 with my youngest sister’s baby bonus ( a thing in Australia at the time ). Was bought for $700ish if I recall. That TV is still in use in my parents bedroom and is great for older analog/dvd/vhs content. We also have 2 Panasonic ST60s which are used in my bedroom and our lounge room. These were both bought cheap on Facebook and rival the quality of brand new sets. I haven’t seen our power bill though and don’t wanna know haha

[@Dreamroom64]

Very nice! Glad to hear they're still serving you and your family well. The ST60s that you have are really late model plasmas, and they had pretty good efficiency by that time. They're probably barely driving up your energy bill compared to what newer sets would use. So I'd keep enjoying them!

[@terraincognita2012]

Watched this on my LG PB6900 60". Bought back in 2014. Still rock solid!

[@Dreamroom64]

Awesome! That must be one of the very last plasmas produced. Most other brands ceased production in 2013 or earlier.

[@samuraivader3814]

Had a plasma tv once, Curtis brand, it was heavy back was probably made of metal and woukd glow at night when "off". Thing took a while to turn on, eventually the logo burnt on the screen. Eventually it started getting picture issue and we had no idea how to fix it.

[@Dreamroom64]

Oh man, that sounds like it was a bad one!

[@Jayrod64]

My only real complaint with Plasma was brightness compared to LCD. It can be a problem in well lit rooms, but may still look great with darker or controlled lighting.

[@Dreamroom64]

Definitely true, especially since the front glass on plasmas always seems to be glossy. Though I always prefer glossy screens to matte, reflections can be a challenge.

[@random_n]

I'm having a hard time parting with my final-gen Samsung PDP. Poor thing has 17,000 hours' service and some nasty burn-in, but it was special to me. Native 1080p BGR striped subpixel layout with 1:1 pixel mapping, minimal dithering noise, and pretty good ambient light handling. Native colour space well outside of Rec.709 so colours could get wild if you let it. Rooted proto-Tizen firmware, even. I'd toyed replacing it with a second hand entry-level Panasonic PDP from 2011, but the dithering, crosstalk, image persistence, and way it would glow green with the smallest bit of sunlight in the room was disappointing vs the Samsung. Also had an atrocious factory calibration needing service menu adjustments to fix. There really was a large gulf between the best and worst plasma displays. I use a Samsung first-gen QD-OLED now. It's absurdly better for video, especially if you feed it high quality HDR, but I still miss the motion clarity in gaming that plasma brought. Anything that hit 60fps was just a delight. The latest OLED panels are getting close to 600hz now though. Fingers crossed that they'll use it to allow a subfield drive emulation mode to bring back that motion clarity without the instant headache of BFI or needing to actually drive the game at 300+ FPS.

[@mexdrago3009]

I want to see more of your plexiglass switcher set up

[@low_e_music]

Still have a 65" Panasonic VT30 and I love it. It looks spectacular and I will have it until it kicks the bucket.

[@ViperGTS737]

I have a Panasonic TX-P50X10 plasma tv and it’s awesome for my 360, that’s actually its sole use, but it is extremely heavy and very awkward to carry because of it’s size and shape

[@llynellyn]

In 2011 I bought a PlayStation 3 because it was the cheapest BluRay player on the market and I wanted to play GT5. To go with it I bought a 42" Panasonic Viera plasma TV, it cost £550 (~$650). I'm still using it because LCD just looks washed out/fake to me and OLED is still stupidly expensive.

[@Dreamroom64]

Glad to hear that yours is still going strong all these years later. Yeah, these plasmas look way better than LCDs even today. It's amazing how quickly the price dropped on plasmas over its time in production. The 42" version of my 2006 model retailed for $2,500 USD!! My 37" model was just $300 less.

[@dmo848]

600$this year for an OLED was unbelievable. If I didn't already have a good tv. I would have bought it. Was an LG OLED also

[@universalmudkip7397]

I have a 43” LG plasma tv that my parents acquired in 2012. Once they got LCD and OLED tvs I inherited the plasma and to this day, I use it to watch and play games. After 12 continuous years is still functioning very well with a little screen burn in from playing a lot on my Xbox 360 years back lol

[@Dreamroom64]

Hah, great to hear that it's going strong. I'm curious what burned in. CoD or Halo 3 HUD elements? Or did you leave a menu open on the screen for several hours?

[@MrOlek700]

I have a Panasonic 42 inches plasma tv from 2010. It's awesome. It has better colors than the cheap 4k tv that my parents bought to replace it. I use it to watch anime and play on PS5.

[@rednwhitecooper]

The first thing I ever bought on a credit card was a 50” Panasonic plasma TV around 2005 at Best Buy to replace my 36” Zenith. I think it was like $4000, maxed out the credit limit instantly lol. Had to borrow a friend’s S10 to pick it up. I upgraded to a 55” plasma a few years later but my sister used it until about 2016. I have an 86” OLED now but nothing was as exciting as my first flat screen.

[@Dreamroom64]

I love this. Thanks for sharing your story!

[@quatz1981]

How does the 480p plasma handle PS2 era games. I would imagine it would look better on that display than even a 720p plasma.

[@Dreamroom64]

I just tested PS2 on the 720p plasma today for the first time. It's decent on there, but yes, I'd say it looks nicer on the 480p panel. The same goes for GameCube. Both look really impressive compared to your usual HDTV's built-in upscaling, but it doesn't match the crispiness of the 480p panel. The 480p panel is also pretty cool since the pixels are so large that you can faintly see the grid.

[@quatz1981]

@@Dreamroom64 awesome i always wondered about SD Plasmas

[@amsmuh]

My LG 42 inch is from 2003, resolution of 800x600, pip, a lot of features, 4 16ohms 10w each speakers, 400w... had to adapt from hdmi to vga to use with the PS3. It heat a bit, you can feel warm stand in front of it, but the colors is amazing. Sadly the main board board give up... I always knew that Plasma tv where better than CRT about image, the problem is that consume a lot of energy, some statics images (like tv logo for exemple) burn in (newer plasmas tv are less suitable to have this problem), a little torsion can crack the glass painel (it should have a nice frame to support it).

[@Dreamroom64]

Agreed, the colors on plasmas are amazing. They don't beat CRTs on input lag, but they win for resolution, weight, and geometry. Sorry to hear that a board in yours failed though. Maybe consider grabbing a replacement plasma now while they're still around and so cheap. The power consumption really isn't too much of a concern unless you're playing for several hours per day.

[@garydiamondguitarist]

Reading the comments here and comparing against my own experience, I have to say there's some inaccuracies and maybe stigma around plasma displays, both of which probably will disappear with time. I have a Panasonic TX-P46S20B which is 1080p plus a smaller Samsung one which is the not so good 1024x768 but in widescreen, and have had a couple of others before . Latter era plasmas don't use nearly as much wattage when on as early ones, and they're heavy because of the solid metal frame construction but more akin to an early LCD than a CRT. Mine I think only uses 200w or so when in Cinema mode, a bit more in Game mode because I set that to run super bright with slightly more vivid colours, partly because I set the Energy Saver to on as it actually works and only reduces peak brightness a little bit, it's a fair trade-off. They don't get as warm as a few people here have said, really no warmer than an LCD from the same era in my experience. There are definitely weaknesses to plasma technology, for example they can't dim down as well as LCD or other flatpanels without crushing a lot of the darker areas into complete black, so they're not great for low brightness nighttime use. Their overall contrast also changes depending on what's being displayed. If you stand or sit close enough you can see the plasma dots moving around too, distracting if you sit very close to a bigger size plasma. Image retention does happen but again, on latter era ones with technology like NeoPDP this is kept under much better control and is barely noticeable. The screen is ultra reflective so it can't face a window or anything like that, really. Every display tech has it's weaknesses, but not every type has the strengths of plasma or at least not to the same extent. They have pretty low latency (mine is about 16ms maybe less in Game Mode), the motion clarity for 60FPS content is often stunning. Persistence blur is still a problem on LCDs to this day, but plasma basically lacks this entirely, so 1080p still and 1080p in motion look about the same. Colour vividness is wonderful - reminds me of a good early OLED screen but less prone to oversaturation and for whatever reasons reds especially look eye-poppingly gorgeous in the right circumstances. They upscale 480p and 720p pretty well, to the point where for most things 720p into a 1080p plasma, I struggle to spot the difference on anything that isn't a wall of text. Really ideal for PS3 and Xbox 360 era gaming as the video points out. If you get a Pioneer or Panasonic plasma you're almost always getting rock solid build quality made to last - not Samsung though, their displays in general aren't as robust as I've found from those two or Sony. I think what really killed plasma other than the expense and the weight when they were current era tech which was already causing dwindling sales as cheaper LCDs became "good enough" for most people as they improved, was the jump to 4K. From the little I've read, getting the pixel density needed was next to impossible in any cost-effective sense in the 30"-50" range, when plasmas were already struggling to get 1080p sets viable at smaller sizes. I expect a 4K plasma would have had to have been around 80" if it was even possible at all, and then you *would* be talking about weight and size that was unmanageable. When you put all this together you can see why they died, but that doesn't mean they weren't among the most interesting and impressive display tech ever made. I personally find them more of an achievement than a 3DTV or HD CRT partly because of that stunning picture which is usable and enjoyable on a daily basis. If you want to watch a 1080p Blu-ray at native resolution rather than upscaling, or do some retro arguably also modern gaming on a big screen with vivid colours and exceptional motion clarity even given the 60Hz limitation, a 1080p plasma is a really good way to go, for my money one of the best actually. One day working ones will get expensive, like CRTs did. Right now they're not, they're going for so little maybe even free, therefore it's a good time to grab one or two.

[@koomar341]

Aw yes, STILL ROCKIN 4 PLASMAS @ HOME! A panny gt50, kuro 60", kuro 50", and an old panny 10UK

[@Dreamroom64]

That is awesome. Are the Kuros holding up well? I was recently considering one but then read a lot of posts about how they inevitably develop a red tint after reaching a certain hour count, some kind of engineering defect. The posts I've read and guide I looked at made it sound like a nightmare to try to reverse. I'd love to get one but worry about this. Also, do those large Kuros handle 720p well?

[@koomar341]

@@Dreamroom64 Thanks man! The Kuros were my most recent acquisition a few yrs ago by a chap who took care of them well, BUT, yeah, they've lost their KURO level black performance as they do over time. BUT, they can be reset easily from what I've read, but I've been too lazy. They still look incredible, and motion performance is awesome (my lil bro uses it for ps5 gaming, I've never used it for lower res, but I assume the processing is better than new tvs). Nowadays I use the panny gt50 (still low black level) and an epson projector. Perhaps one day I'll snag a massive oled, but for now I'm cool with the retro 1080p tech 😂😂 BTW the 480p plasmas have to be incredible for retro gaming as well! I gotta keep an eye out for one

[@kristiangurholt59]

@@Dreamroom64It is a bit of a hassle, and you have to accept that this is skill that takes time learning and that there will speed bumps along the way. Once you’ve familiarised yourself it’s much easier, but not everything caries over between various models and screen sizes. Now that I’ve learned the process to reset KRP-500’s, I can take one with a bad purple glow and give it ”Oled blacks” within minutes. But you might keep adjusting things for a while, depending on how anal you are about achieving optimal results. There’s never been a better time to fix Kuro’s though, with all the information and tools that exist today and how cheap they are. I fear in another 10 years many of them will be sitting in a landfill.

[@hamsterwolf]

another thing to consider is that older tv's may also have better picture processing for the lower resolution than a modern tv. modern tvs will do a good job displaying 4k and 1080p content but when you present them with 720p and lower well its a mixed bag as there is no guarantee that the manufacture spent any real time to get the best out of the lower resolutions. in general sony is a little better with this.

[@Curly21029]

Motion looks better than a modern television because plasma was impulse based instead of sample-and-hold. And I agree that plasmas still have their place even though they haven’t been produced in over a decade. I still have three of them myself. (along with two OLEDs and two FALD LEDs) My classic game consoles are connected to a plasma.

[@Dreamroom64]

Thanks for the info! I'm going to read up on the differences more. My basic understanding so far is that plasmas seem to draw the whole image on screen immediately, with no difference between upper screen and lower screen input lag readings.

[@Sugurain]

I have a 42" FullHD Panasonic plasma from 2010. It had a high end panel for the time, highest specs except it didn't have 3D. Still use it daily, never had any trouble with it. The only problem is that the anti-reflection varnish Panasonic applied over the glass begun flaking off. For now, this is hardly noticiable with it in use, I'll remove the rest when it gets too bad. I tried finding such varnish but had no luck. An option would be applying an anti reflection film, the same stuff you see in LCD screens, but that would give ot matte finish which I wouldn't like that much. Yes, it pulls a lot of energy and gets ridiculously hot, but since I've installed solar energy, this is not a problem anymore. I just turn on the A/C when I'm gonna use it. Hahah The reason I love it so much is because it works FLAWLESSLY with both modern and retro consoles. Low resolution sources still look GREAT on it. I have HDMI modded my Dreamcast, GC and Wii. And with scanlines enabled, the picture is SO good, it really looks and feels like a 42" CRT!

[@Dreamroom64]

Yeah, they really have an uncanny ability to scale sources well without any special devices in the mix! My first plasma shown in the video, from 2003, had heavy scratches on the front glass when I first got it. I realized that it was just a plastic film over the front glass. I fully disassembled it to get the front glass out and peeled that layer off. It was easy to peel but left an extremely frustrating adhesive behind. I after a few days, I finished removing the adhesive. I think there was also a film layer on the back, which I also peeled but more cleanly. Using the monitor without any replacement tinted coting resulted in very poor contrast. I found and applied a suitable automotive window tint to solve the problem. It sounds ridiculous, but it worked! It no longer has anti-glare properties, but it looks virtually brand new now. While I had the front glass off, I also had to replace the rotten foam gasket bordering the screen with some inexpensive window weather stripping, which also worked great. The old foam had begun flaking onto the plasma panel, making it look dusty. Maybe this idea could work for you down the line if the problem continues to worsen. It's a decent amount of work but not too expensive and looks good in the end.

[@Shadowo199]

ive been using a 2012 panasonic viera for as long as i remember, the image quality is really stunning

[@Dreamroom64]

Glad to hear that it's still going strong! They're really underappreciated.

[@Eddies_Bra-att-ha-grejer]

We're still using a Panasonic plasma from like 2007 in my family. It cuts off the edges of the image like the overscan of a CRT and there's no way to turn this off, is this like a "feature" to make it work better with DVDs and other video sources of the era?

[@Dreamroom64]

Analog video sources usually have little unwanted bits at the edges of the picture. Around the time these were on the market, people were still widely using a analog equipment and watching SD content. My guess is that, to reduce store returns, they just defaulted to a ~3% overscan to hide any possibility of that video edge noise. I really wish that it could be turned off. I say this because people really do return things for ridiculous reasons. I worked in retail and some folks once told me that the returned their previous widescreen TV because everyone's faces looked stretched out -- they didn't know about the aspect ratio control for 4:3 content! On your 2007 model, it might be possible in the service menu to eliminate overscan -- but be extremely careful if you ever mess around in a service menu. Settings on mine are permanently, immediately saved. You can ruin the TV very easily. On my 2006 model, it's unfortunately not possible to eliminate the overscan. By the way if you or anyone reading this plays Nintendo Switch on it, there is an overscan adjustment feature in the Switch settings. I set mine to 97%, and the whole picture is now visible.

[@Eddies_Bra-att-ha-grejer]

@@Dreamroom64 I just discovered that the reason it is so is because it's actually not real HD, it's one of those weird "HD Ready" displays where the resolution is 1024x768.

[@aster934]

Still use a Plasma as my main TV a Panasonic something txp-55-GW10? with a VU Receiver and a Xbox Series.

[@ace-xj1fq]

Got one off the side of the road this summer I remember going to lift it thinking it was lcd and was not expecting how heavy it was it works great though

[@Dreamroom64]

I'm glad you were able to save it. These things are densely packed, built like tanks.

[@shadowstrangler1]

I have 2 42 inch versions of these. I use one downstairs for KZbin and the other one for my gameroom, for old consoles like you mentioned. What makes these great is that they support S Video and TBH that's all you need for N64 and GC to look amazing on this TV, but I mostly play rock band on it and it does a great job. I recently got a sound system I found at goodwill for it but it doesn't need it lmao the on board speakers are so DAMN GOOD. Please enjoy this TV and make more vids. I was planning on making one because it's so good.

[@Stoddardian]

How's the black level and input lag?

[@shadowstrangler1]

@Stoddardian black levels are great input on modern consoles is ass of course it's a plasma, but for what it's worth I played BLOPS6 on it since my One X is connected to it and I did really well on Nuketown so it's not that bad definitely not for competitive games though.

[@Dreamroom64]

S-Video really is underrated. It's a terrible connector but has nice quality, and it used to be my primary cable of choice several years ago. I later RGB modded my N64, and I'm not even sure I can tell the difference hah. GameCube though does benefit a good bit from component video for progressive scan. Nice to hear that you're enjoying Rock Band on it. I love those games. I haven't played RB on mine yet, but so far I've enjoyed some Guitar Hero III. It looks so good on it.

[@shadowstrangler1]

@@Dreamroom64 even modern games look amazing. i played a bit of silent hill 2, new until dawn and Alan Wake 2 on it. It is gorgeous and its only 720p or may be even less lol

[@Taken_Alpha]

I still use a Panasonic plasma for a bit of my retro gaming outside of a HD CRT

[@dbnpoldermans4120]

I'v been saving plasmas for a long time They are indeed the new crt's

[@Dreamroom64]

Thank you 🙏

[@jeremybreau2482]

I love my plasma tv, I built my arcade computer with a plasma tv!

[@cabraturri]

I've got some plasmas recently, 720p and 1080p, I'd like to play some older games in a 480p so please post a video about it ✌🏻

[@richiefarm]

I have a Panasonic P42S10b plasma that i just cant get rid of. Does HDMI, SCART, component. Does 1080p. Even the Wii using component at 480p looks great. Picture is awesome for the age that it is. Even running a PC through it is worth it

[@garydiamondguitarist]

AH, similar era to my main plasma, the TX-P46S20B. Love that thing. Minimises plasma problems, maximises everything that's good about plasma. Can't fault much about it.

[@Dreamroom64]

1080p on a 42" model must look pretty nice. I've never tried one of those out yet.

[@voltare2amstereo]

Couldn't get use to the flicker and burn in. Was team LCD. But it was funny seeing the "small" 32" and 27" PDP "

[@mmpsp693]

My full HD Panasonic Vieira works perfectly to this day, will only replace it after it is dead and not repairable

[@cruise0074]

Still got my Panasonic zt65 plasma. Great tv

[@myunk]

What office chair are you using there? I’m picking up a Panasonic Plasma myself. I used to have many of these in the mid 2000’s. Loved them.

[@Dreamroom64]

It's an Ergohuman Eurotech ME7ERG. I got my first secondhand several years ago, which is in my office and still holding up. The gray one in my basement was purchased more recently, and it's just as good. I'd just recommend swapping the stock casters for rollerblade style, which really applies to any office chair in my opinion. And good luck with the plasma you're picking up!

[@dirty_tuna]

Dipped my toe into the plasma scene for a time. There's a lot to like about them, but the deal breakers for me were the high power draw, heat output, and input lag. I was in love with the motion clarity though, and the incredible array of inputs most of them accept. At their worst plasmas would make a great test monitor for nearly any system one might be doing work on.

[@Dreamroom64]

The motion clarity really is the amazing feature. And yeah, the selection of video inputs is second to none. It's also amazing how well they handle any source that you plug in, be it SD or HD. My 480p model seemed to accept even wonky signals. I'm going to make another video sometime soon to cover power draw and input lag. It seems that there is a lot of variance between models on these specs. Mine actually don't get very hot, and the older 480p plasma doesn't even have cooling fans. Unfortunately it's very tough to research info on the many plasmas manufactured, so it's almost just a matter of buying one and hoping it's a good one.

[@depletable]

I had a really nice plasma that was gifted to me, but it ended up going dark on the side of it. So I had to leave it at the dumpster. I thought about trying to out of the way to repair it, but I don't have time for that. I really dug it for movies.

[@Dreamroom64]

It's sad, but I've had to do that with some CRTs long ago. There just isn't enough time and space to keep every screen alive. Yeah, plasmas really shine for movies too.

[@RichardTapia42]

I use a 50 inch Pioneer plasma in my bedroom! Had to trick more modern HDMI sources with a switch but everything on it works great, even added some ambient lights. Havent gotten around to connecting my Wii to it yet to test the looks

[@Dreamroom64]

Very nice, that Pioneer must look amazing. I'm going to add some ambient lights behind mine too. It's always nice to have bias lighting. Same for me with an HDMI switch. I found a good, cheap automatic switcher that is working flawlessly.

[@RichardTapia42]

@Dreamroom64 had it for about 2-3 years now but I like to use it in the winter to keep my room warm. Mostly just use it to watch movies or play my blurays on it. Tried to game a bit but I don't want to risk any kinda burn in

[@xakh]

Oh dang I have a Panasonic just like the one in your thumbnail, I hooked a lil Roku thing into one of its two ancient HDMI ports years ago and it's been trucking along as the TV in my office!

[@Dreamroom64]

Nice! I am probably going to hook a Chromcast into mine. It's pretty fun to watch KZbin videos on it.

[@micronian]

There was some guy selling 103" plasma monitors in Brooklyn a few years ago. He was gaming on one, and had like 3 in total to sell. I think he was on the second floor. Looking back I wish I could have asked him how he got a 700 pound 8 ft by 5 ft beast up the stairs into his apartment.

[@Dreamroom64]

That is wild, especially that he had three of those. They were probably from trade shows or something like that. The story behind how he got them inside must be pretty funny.

[@MTprototype]

men I love your setup ❤😊

[@Woodsmasher]

I just returned to life a lightning struck Viera with repair kits from eBay and a 2nd hand board, now I'm trying to rehabilitate it as my personal monitor...

[@Dreamroom64]

That's awesome that you brought it back to life. Which parts did the strike take out? I'm guessing it was the power supply board that you had to fully replace. It's neat that the inside of these things, though complex, are quite repair friendly.

[@Woodsmasher]

@Dreamroom64 Yes indeed. The 2 repair kits came with components for the power supply. At first test, it gave me image but it turned off protecting itself. I replaced the other board at the other end of the display and turns on faster and longer, but it still turns off after that, protecting from something still bad. Those kits didn't include some components that I already localized. With my next free money, I expect to buy those. After this, if it still protects itself, the last board unchecked is the one that gives the image directly to the display that goes alongside it. I'm happy with just the fact that it turned on after the strike. A neighbor gave it to me with the original remote control...

[@ByteSizeThoughts]

Keen to know more. Have a few CRTs but no plasmas. Do you have a mister setup to try out some cores with this tech?

[@Dreamroom64]

Glad to hear that you're interested. I don't have a MiSTer yet, but I will probably buy one after MiSTer Pi restocks. It looks like a great time to finally jump in. Currently for FPGA gaming, I have the Analogue Pocket with the dock accessory. I'll have to try it out on the plasmas. One catch is that I don't think the artificial scan lines or pixel grids will look good if set too thin, because the 720p plasma has a slight overscan of 3% that I cannot defeat. The 480p plasma has a natural pixel grid look though and overscan can be eliminated. I might also play around with my old OSSC on the plasmas to see how they handle a line doubled signal from it. I'm also excited to try Dreamcast over VGA on the 480p plasma.

[@ByteSizeThoughts]

@Dreamroom64 Sounds comprehensive - will look forward to the results mate :)

[@CavemanPerson]

_Elf_ brought me here. 70" plasmas were mentioned in that movie. Something like that probably cost as much a small house back in '03.

[@Dreamroom64]

Haha, I watched that the other night and my ears perked up when the guy mentioned having a 70" plasma in each house. They definitely cost a fortune. Out of curiosity, I looked up how much my 480p monitor from July 2003 cost. The best I can find is that it cost £3,500 (bundled with a tuner, of course) in the UK and was "Panasonic's most affordable plasma to date" 😲. I converted GBP to USD at the mid-July 2003 exchange rate (1.6023) and then adjusted for USD inflation... that little 37" monitor retailed for $9,621 in today's dollars!

[@TuiCatNZ]

A mate of mine plays his Nintendo switch on one. Looks great displaying a native 720p signal on a native 720p display without any upscaling. The quality of the contrast and color will largely depend on if you have a Japanese or east Asian model. the Japanese made units are the best obviously.

[@Dreamroom64]

They really do handle 720p well! I haven't found one with a panel that exactly matches the 1280x720 resolution of 720p, but plasma panels always manage to display it in their own resolution beautifully regardless. My 480p plasma was made in Japan and the 720p model was assembled in Mexico. The components inside the later are still really nice though. It's loaded with Nichicon and Rubycon capacitors. The quality of these things is really visible.

[@2fernandoc1]

If there's two slight issues I have with some of them, it's that they're sometimes a non-standard resolution (like 1366x768 with mine) and that they take up way too much electricity for the average household. However, they aren't too bad and they do have their pros like the color output (as least compared to LCD), the phosphor display, and the overall design (and if someone were to have a 1080p Plasma TV, it just looks excellent with just about anything from retro systems to even something like the PS5 and Xbox Series systems, though expect pricy electric bills).

[@GenX_in_the_wild]

A 37inch HD Ready Panasonic uses under 200 Watt max and 100 Watt average.. Totally fine..

[@Dreamroom64]

My 37" models say 323-325 watts on the back stickers, which I'm guessing is the max draw. If it is, it's only about $0.05 USD per hour of use at current rates. I'm going to test them with a meter to really get to the bottom of this; its probably fewer watts in practice since less electricity is used for darker scenes. Yeah, the non-standard resolutions of many sets are odd. The 720p set that I feature in the video has 1024x720 pixels, and it forces a ~3% overscan. Yet somehow it beautifully scales various resolutions to fill its rectangular pixels. I've seen 1366x768 panels before and they're surprisingly sharp too. It really doesn't make sense how it is possible.

[@GenX_in_the_wild]

@@Dreamroom64 Ok, that is a lot. Because it is an older model. Those are very low rates.. In my country (Austria) prices are climing again at 0,15 euros.. it adds up

[@slantedperspective]

I have a memory of a tv going bad when layed doen on its face. Is that plasma? Or jusr a fluke thing. Didn't crack the screen jusd went like wonky colors insred of rhe notmal colors but sill displayed fine.

[@Dreamroom64]

I haven't heard of that being a problem for any particular screen tech. For both of these plasmas, I laid the panel down flat to remove the back to inspect the internals and clean the fan on one. Nothing went wrong upon reassembly. However, I was very careful to load them vertically into my car for transport. It's a bad idea to move glass flat -- but that's just because it's more prone to cracking.

[@pantslife]

I'll have to pick up a plasma just to experiment with. I had a nice one back when the PS3 launched and always enjoyed the way it looked. They have a reputation for high input latency, but I'm wondering if that's something to do with settings or just certain inputs (cough... HDMI) These sets really do look great, and a 720p PS3/360 just feels right for some reason with 16:9 only titles. I've watched your game room tour and I absolutely love the way you set it up. I have a decent amount of stuff right now, but I aspire to a setup like yours one day 🎉

[@Dreamroom64]

Yes, they do have a reputation for high input latency. I remember my uncle had a Samsung plasma, and it felt awful to play on. I had the same experience on a Samsung LCD from the same era too. Changing settings didn't help. I believe that late generation plasmas usually have more input lag since they do more image processing. I did some rudimentary testing so far on the 480p plasma from 2003. I put a CRT beside it with a split signal playing on both screens. For 480i content, it looked like about four frames of input lag -- not too good, though the plasma does an amazing job at deinterlacing the signal, the best I've ever seen. For a 720p source it was between 1 and 2 frames of lag, closer to 2 at most areas of the screen. Most importantly, the input lag on a 720p source isn't perceptible to me on these. Thanks for watching the tour and for the kind words -- I appreciate it!

[@Vvewa]

​@@Dreamroom64If you have the resources you should try a plasma with a vga port to see if it bypasses processing etc. I had a free 1080p Panasonic Vierra in 2016 until 2022, It was great for the ps4 and movies.

[@Dreamroom64]

@Vvewa Thanks for the tip. My 480p model has a VGA input and also lets me override overscan. I have a few things on hand right now to try out on that input, but I haven't done much yet: a Tendak HDMI-to-VGA converter, a Dreamcast VGA cable, and a couple old ThinkPad laptops with VGA out. It will be fun to see how things work out.

[@Killersnake432]

I assume the main drawback for plasmas for most people are the weight, power usage, and especially the input lag. I still have one around but recently stopped using it after getting a LCD TV.

[@Dreamroom64]

Yeah, all three of those are disadvantages when compared to newer TVs. In reality though, at least for plasmas on the small side like mine, they aren't big compromises. The motion clarity and how they handle lower res signals more than makes up for it in my opinion.

[@Killersnake432]

@@Dreamroom64 Oh yeah I know what you mean as well I also forgot to add plasma burn-in... I had it happen before due to games. It did go away over time though. One I have I think is a Vizio VP322 32-inch Plasma... Probably have to check it out later to make sure. That thing is heavy too...

[@dominicus9891]

Had to throw out my 720p 2009 mid-range Panasonic 43" because of an accident involving a Wiimote. Sad, my family loved that thing, and it was simply incredible compared to the 19" cheapo Sears bargain bin CRT we had before it (although it was also a vibe, I think it was a Sylvania).

[@axethepenguin]

Our 50 inch mid-range Samsung plasma we had for a grand total of 3 years was rendered useless with an incident involving maracas (don’t ask)

[@DadLadsGaming]

I stoll have a 1080p Panasonic plasma tv in my set up👍👍

[@camerondane04]

I have that exact one in the thumbnail! I gotta say I really do love the thing, unfortunately mine has horrendous burn in some areas and light patches on the top and bottom, the person who owned it before just watched a bunch of 16:9 bordered movies I’m guessing, so I’m a bit jealous of the quality of yours lol. I got it around the time I got component cables for my gamecube and I was just shocked, it also plays 240p games pretty good from my experience, but I’ve only really tried N64, it also sounds great too. I Currently use it for my ps3 through hdmi but I think component is just a bit better on this tv, if you ever see one or a similar plasma I would definitely recommend, they’re even mountable albeit really annoying to do so lol

[@Stoddardian]

I actually think plasmas are also still the best choice for current consoles. Most games on PS5 are within the 30-60 fps range, which means a lot of stutter and blur on an OLED or QLED.

[@Michael.Reilly]

Great video as always

[@luiscaraveo1747]

I literally have this same tv. Bought it at Goodwill for 20 dollars about 9 months ago. I saw it and immediately knew I wanted it. For 2006 it looks awesome. I also play my 360 on it. I

[@Dreamroom64]

That's awesome that we both paid about the same and arrived at the same use case for it. I played some Guitar Hero III on it today and had a blast.

[@luiscaraveo1747]

@@Dreamroom64 I’m just impressed by how good the colors look for such an old tv. I was playing GTA 4 on it, or I just use it to watch KZbin videos while I’m working.

[@cydragon2.099]

I think the free TV that the lady that hired me to my shift gave me a plasma TV and it only took some additional looking up... I got an Emachines CRT, a Vizio Plasma HDTV, an HP LCD monitor, and a Vizio modern time TV (currently unplugged since I am currently using a mix of my built in laptop screen and my Emachines CRT (idk what type of screen my GL has as the built in display)

[@Dreamroom64]

Very nice, playing around with various old screen tech is a lot of fun.

[@iansmith3975]

My mother still has a 53” LG plasma tv hanging on the wall. We bought that thing new back in 2006.

[@Dreamroom64]

I love hearing that so many people still have theirs in use, going strong. That 53" model must have cost a small fortune back then.

[@iansmith3975]

@@Dreamroom64 if I remember correctly we got it on or around Black Friday. That tv has the lifetime channel logo permanently burnt into the display lol

[@Dreamroom64]

@@iansmith3975 Haha, although burn-in risks are way overstated on plasmas, channel logo burn-in is a real thing. Pretty funny that it was Lifetime. I remember seeing a plasma TV store display model always tuned to ESPN, and the ESPN logo was lightly burned into the corner. The display TVs all ran for 14 hours daily though on this channel with brightness high. I think it actually took a while for it to burn in.

[@brandonlee7382]

The silver plasma looks so nice. I miss when TVs looked cool and had decent build quality

[@Dreamroom64]

Me too, TVs used to have a lot of style and heft. Panasonic's 2007 revision of their 37" plasma just has boring black plastic with a traditional stand. It basically looks like any cheap LCD TV from around that time, but that's probably what a lot of people wanted.

[@brandonlee7382]

@Dreamroom64 Yeah, maybe we will go full circle and designs will get better.

[@axethepenguin]

@@brandonlee7382with the invention and popularity of the OLED TV I’m not sure, but we can only hope

[@FerinaAryele]

I have a Plasma TV just like the silver one, I've been using it for years and love it other than the fact that it gets very hot and heats up my room overtime at least that's what I blame it on. The story is my old TV broke I knew it was likely an easy fix so I took it outside to the garage to repair and take it apart when I returned in 2-3 days but then my cousin came over in the meantime and stole my TV and took it back to his house and fixed it himself without my permission so I made him return it since I still obviously wanted it since I already had my own plans to fix it and when he did he punched/kicked the screen in the middle and broke it so I did the reasonable thing and took his Plasma Panasonic TV that I was storing for him in the garage to replace it with. He was pissed but idc it's what he deserved.

[@Dreamroom64]

Dang, well at least you got a good TV in the end. Sounds like a guy you'll want to distance yourself from if possible...

[@FerinaAryele]

@Dreamroom64 he's kinda outcasted or whatever the word is my aunt doesn't even have contact with him anymore

[@Dreamroom64]

@@FerinaAryele Probably for the best!

[@mexdrago3009]

Im eyeing this kuro krp 500m.

[@BunnyslippersEUC]

Plasmas are heavy and use a lot of electricity. The chip is very slow. So not good for fast and precise gaming. But the contrast and colours are fantastic. I use my Panasonic only for games (even with the lag) and blu-ray. So the colours haven't fadded yet.

[@GenX_in_the_wild]

Most Plasma TVs have around 30ms input lag. That is not super fast, but playable.. The later built HD Ready Plasma TVs are under 200Watt max (37 and 42 inch) They use around 100 Watts..

[@Dreamroom64]

@GenX_in_the_wild Yeah, energy consumption really seems to be an overstated drawback. It's true that they use more power than modern panels, but I believe we're talking about a difference of a few cents higher operating cost per hour of use for the smaller panels.

[@GenX_in_the_wild]

​@@Dreamroom64 Panasonic made huge improvements with power draw over the years so the later models use less power. However large CRTs do also use around 100 Watts.. Real power suckers are gaming pcs with high frame rates..

[@Dreamroom64]

@@GenX_in_the_wild Good point. It's interesting how much electricity gaming PCs can pull and how much heat they put out --- and nobody bats an eye!

[@naircat]

dont plasmas have really bad input lag? can someone buy a time sleuth and test it?

[@casualcadaver]

Anyone old as heck and remember when plasmas were literally 8-12k$ dollars in the early 2000’s lol?

[@thebossnocompetition8757]

Dont forget uniformity and viewing angles both of those are superior to TVs of today. if you only watch SDR you will get the most natural image on an Plasma TV. the LED light that new TVs uses are an stripped down version of the natural glowing light here. colorspectrum is cut. what that means is that the light that the Plasma TVs sends out contains more colors from the visible colorspectrum. hey even whites looks more natural on the Plasma TVs.

[@LyuboA]

i like playing PS3 on my 1440p gaming Monitor it's looks really nice it's a fast monitor 1ms GTG and i also like to play my PS4 and PS5 on it especially PS5 can output 1440p i can't believe i was actually thinking of replacing it but after trying more then a few 4K Monitors and TVs i like this setup best but i do have two old Plasma TVs one is 720p the other i think is 1080p if i'm not mistaken i will definitely try those with my PS3

[@Dreamroom64]

Very nice, and yeah, get those old plasmas out and give them a try with PS3. I'm sure you'll be pleasantly surprised. Give Blu-ray and DVD another chance too if you have some to watch.

[@kyiscray]

My dad once got a plasma tv but within a few weeks it burned in so he returned it and got an lcd...

[@Dreamroom64]

Oh man, I wonder what went wrong. Usually burn-in isn't much of a concern unless you leave a static image on screen for many hours or primarily watch a single TV channel (which results in logo burn in at a corner).

[@8bitnation419]

It depends on the Plasma aswell as it's size, the bigger ones typically look worse, and there are a lot of crappy Plasma's out there with burn in, terrible black levels and poor colour saturation. I recommend the better brand plasmas like Panasonic and Pioneer. I have a 50 inch LG Plasma and it looks terrible. But for reliability Plasmas can outlast LED and LCD tv's and it has that CRT charm. I've been through dozens of LED TVs where the backlights failed in them, the Plasma like the CRT just keeps going. Don't recommend it as a daily driver, due to there high electricity usage like the CRT but it's great for retro gaming sessions.

[@Dreamroom64]

Yup, there are some bad ones and the good ones have a CRT-like charm. I've seen some plasmas still in use at restaurants and even a car dealership waiting area, where they're turned on daily for several hours. At this point, they have to have been in service for over a decade with tons of use. And yeah, for gaming sessions as an adult with not enough time to play games for hours on end, the energy cost is trivial.

[@MangoPango1973]

Some years ago, an idiot friend of mine was so proud for getting an Samsung Plasma TV for 200 bucks. Until I showed him 2 things: It had only 1024x768 physical resolution stretched to 16:9. And, a complete Cosmetic Products Advert was burned in. It must have been standing for years in the window of a cosmetic studio showing the same ad as still picture. Nevertheless, it had HDMI, accepted a FullHD signal and PC games look awesome on it. Of, course, he brought it back and got a proper working LCD instead.

[@garydiamondguitarist]

The 768p 4:3 stretched to 16:9 panels are often truly awful plasmas. I have a Samsung one, and not only does it have an age-related fault (vertical screen stripes about an inch wide and about 10 inches apart) because hey, it's a Samsung, most of their displays are lucky to get to the decade old point but it's 768p stretch and the raster/dither thing it does to interpolate makes text nigh-on unreadable and it general it just looks awful. It's an older plasma so image retention happens often, too.

[@rodrigocravo2888]

Looks awesome!

[@HomeCinemaEnthusiast]

I still have 2 plasmas . Picture seem way better with colours and blacks , compared to my Sony 4k LCD tv

[@Dreamroom64]

Yeah, they really blow away the picture quality on LCDs in many respects. It's funny how little the 4K resolution advantage matters.

[@davidbenning10]

Which Sony 4K LCD TV do you own?

[@InsideTheScull]

I had a HD CRT for a while and played around with that and my PS3, curious if you’ve seen / have one and how it compares to a plasma. Would be much easier to justify storing a plasma vs the HD CRT

[@Dreamroom64]

Yup, I've had three HD CRTs over the years, and I definitely prefer plasma. I owned models from Panasonic, Samsung, and Sony. I actually have old pictures of each of them in different setups and plan to talk more in depth in a video someday. HD CRTs were a big disappointment for me. Plasmas aren't so bulky, come in better sizes for 16:9 content, don't have any geometry issues, and will usually accept 720p and 1080p content. HD CRTs usually top out at 1080i, and most won't accept 720p from my experience. PS3 cannot output 1080i for many games, so you're stuck playing those games in 480p on a HD CRT. Xbox 360, on the other hand, can output 1080i for any game.

[@InsideTheScull]

@@Dreamroom64 the geometry on my HD CRT was like a funhouse mirror it was awful. The colors and built in softening really did look nice for switch, and earlier games but I just could not justify keeping it. How well do the EDTV consoles work on plasma, IE GameCube and Wii? The Wii is a funny console where it doesn’t feel quite at home to me on LCD nor CRT. Sorry for all the questions but just find it a fascinating topic and not many people online have put much together about using these sets

[@ExtremalMetal]

​@@InsideTheScull i feel the same way about the Wii, though i found a smaller "HD-ready" LCD looks nicer than a FHD LCD for it. so i assume a 480p/720p plasma would look quite good (i've never seen a plasma). But i thought an EDTV CRT would look the best..? either way, my 15KHz CRT is never far from my Wii 'cause of all the Virtual Console games in 240p beauty.

[@Dreamroom64]

​@@InsideTheScull 480p consoles look really nice on the 480p plasma. I've done lots of testing there and really like it. My only disappointment was with super dark horror games, like Eternal Darkness, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories (Wii), and Dead Space: Extraction. That old 2003 plasma just doesn't do too great with dark scenes, has very heavy dithering visible in dark areas. But for bright and colorful games, it looks brilliant. So far the only 480p console that I've tested on the 720p plasma is GameCube, and it looked surprisingly great for the one game that I tested (Super Smash Bros. Melee). I had to turn the sharpness down to around negative 25 to get it to look reasonable though. For whatever reason, the set over sharpens 480p it seems. It upscales internally beautifully though. I'll do lots more testing and will give an update. I will also see how it cooperates with the OSSC, if at all -- I still have that lying around! And no worries at all about the questions! I appreciate knowing what people are interested in hearing! And you're exactly right, it's extremely hard to track this kind of info down. I could barely find anything online. There are no good comparisons on the entirety of KZbin it seems. It's baffling, because this is definitely an interesting subject if you ask me!

[@lucifer1978b]

I have 6 panasonic Plasma Monitors ❤

[@Dreamroom64]

Is any specific model your favorite? I wouldn't mind getting another, especially a spare 480p model since mine has a big stuck pixel. They're really hard to track down these days though.

[@Stoddardian]

30 fps on a plasma looks better than 60 fps on an OLED. 100%!

[@Dreamroom64]

It really is shocking how well plasmas display 30 FPS content.

[@Stoddardian]

@@Dreamroom64 It's because of the pulsing. It's basically a hyper-effective native BFI.

[@Dreamroom64]

@@Stoddardian Interesting. I just learned that plasmas seem to draw the whole frame immediately on screen instead of "painting" it line by line. Is this what you mean by pulsing? And I guess it happens at an extremely high rate, way better than BFI on a 120Hz OLED, since plasmas refresh at 480-600Hz.

[@randomgamingin144p]

@@Dreamroom64 they flicker as well

[@Stoddardian]

@@Dreamroom64 Yes, they flash the entire image on screen. However, the real refresh rate is 60Hz. The 480-600Hz is a reference to the TVs sub-field drive. So a plasma of 600Hz flashes ten times for each refresh. The image we see is the result of dithering.

[@MrMosebysLobby]

my favorite era... IF THE DAMN THINGS DIDNT LINE LIKE HELL. We still have our monstrosity first gen plasma down in the basement with 3 lines on it

[@Dreamroom64]

Darn, I wonder what part failure causes that, maybe a ribbon cable connection gone bad? There are tons of internal ribbon cables connecting the plasma display panels to the boards. My 480p panel has a single stuck pixel, which is really annoying, and I don't think there is a way to fix it.

[@MrMosebysLobby]

@@Dreamroom64 problem is mine isnt like a sony or panasonic. I got a fuckin funai 42 inch widescreen. ED ready model

[@Dreamroom64]

@@MrMosebysLobby Hah, Funai. Now that is a name I haven't heard in a long time.

[@chopinhoven]

this is amazing for the Nintendo wii 😍

[@kiwas83]

Real nice! Was playing long time ago on even two plasmas paired with X360 great times... But I have to tell You the truth... I bought somethimg better at 2009 - DLP 720p projektor (Optoma HD65), and that was game changer, people were shocked when seen picture quality... And same question but diffrent object 'why people not talking about DLP Projectors for retro gaming?' You can buy cheap, not so used Projector (but originals lamps are expensive, and chinese are soo cheap and mostly real dark/dimmed, there, there is nothing im the middle ;( But despite, You have to take care of them, clean dust inside, change lamp, fans errors... DLP colours gamout is better than in Plasmas, natively 120hz, or even better (yeah Plasmas as well) and that thing... You could/can put X360 and Projector in Backpack and like me, fly over the world with it ;)