Plasma vs LCD
PLASMA VS LCD
Like David vs Goliath, Plasma vs LCD is an epic battle, but who is the underdog and which one comes out on top?
So Plasma or LCD? Which should you go for?
I’m sure you have heard lots of ‘information’ about both, so let find out which is best, which will suit you and the truth behind those so called facts.
To start let’s look at the main points you would consider when buying a screen and how each fares:
Size (yes it does matter). The simple fact is if you looking for a large screen you are currently hard pushed to find a reasonably priced retail LCD over 55″.
If you want to go beyond this you simply need plasma. When looking for a larger sized screen, plasmas generally tend to be cheaper, well as long as you don’t look at Pioneers.
Of course the reverse is the same as you go for a smaller screen; plasmas below 37″ are very few and far between and are up against a boat load of LCD competition.
Colour. This is a tricky one, the general consensus is about a 50/50 split.
Some prefer LCD and some prefer plasma, again as with most things I would suggest getting off your couch and down to your local retailer to have a look and see which seems better to you.
Black levels. This is one where plasma generally wins out. As a rule, plasmas do give better black levels, though LCD is catching up quickly and has made significant gain especially with the event of LED which we will look at later.
Better black levels give more contrast and a greater depth to the picture.
Response Time. Here LCD is the winner nearly every time. LCDs are usually quicker, which means they are very well suited to fast moving images, i.e. sports, actions movies and to games consoles.
This also makes most LCD screens double up a pretty good PC monitors.
Resolution. A simple draw here, both Plasma and LCD both offer HD and Full HD resolutions dependant on the screen you are buying.
One thing to be wary of is a lot of the cheaper large plasmas are not full HD. A good rule of thumb is, if you are looking at 50″ or above, expect to pay at least £1000 and always remember to check for the full HD badge.
Sharpness. This is another area when half tend to favour Plasma and the other half LCD.
Personally I would lean towards LCD giving a sharper image from my experience, and would really put my answer that way when connecting a games console to the screen.
On the flipside LCD can sometimes be a little too sharp and Plasmas slightly softer image give a more natural result.
Viewing angle. Another win for plasma here. As plasma emits light from each of the pixels in it screen you have a viewing angle of nearly 180°. LCD on the other hand passes light from behind the pixels so reduces the amount of light seen on an angle.
A little like a light passing through a tunnel. It definitely worth noting here that LCD has made significant improvements in this area.
The first LCD I ever saw lost the image completely when going much beyond 45-50°. Today a near 180° viewing angle is possible but they do still suffer from a loss of brightness and contrast at the extreme edges.
Price! From reading lots of magazine and website articles that have been shoved in front of me over the years, this is one thing that most Plasma vs LCD comparisons seem to miss out.
Strange as it is usually the number one deciding factor in purchasing a new TV, or most things for that matter. Plasma takes this one with most screens being cheaper, Pioneer sit down and keep quiet, than their same sized LCD counterparts.
Of course this is not always the case and you have to take into account what technology is included in the screen, but as a rule plasmas do tend to be cheaper.
Plasma vs LCD - The ‘facts’
Screen burn. Screen burn occurs when a none moving image is left on a screen for an extended period of time. I have seen many demo sets have images left burnt into the screen when they have been used to run a still advert for 8-10 hours a day.
The first main point to note here is that while plasmas are more susceptible to this, screen burn has been around for longer than LCD or plasmas. The main culprit to screen burn is the phosphors used in both LCD and plasma and was also in the big old CRTs we all had until the last 10 or so years.
Plasmas were really bad to start with, but you will be glad to know that with advancements in technology this really has got a lot better with things like a TV stations logo not being of concern anymore.
Energy use. No I’m not sure where this one came about, but I have heard it a lot. Let me cut to the fact and say outright, plasmas do not use lots more power than LCDs.
Now to contradict myself, if you were run a plasma and a LCD next to each other both showing a plain white screen the plasma would use more power.
This is due to the fact that a plasma needs to turn on each pixel individually to show that white screen, while and LCD has just one light behind the screen.
So why did I say that plasma doesn’t use more power? Well when did you last watch just a plain white screen? When a plasma needs to show black it simply turns the pixel and saves the energy.
This means over the course of a usual viewing lifetime plasma and LCD works out about the same. In fact if you are watching a dark movie for example, plasma can actually use less energy.
Who would have guessed horror movies could be helping to save the world?
Regassing. Fortunately I have not heard this one for a while now, but let me say for the record, PLASMAS CAN NOT BE REGASSED. Even if there was a way to get into those pixels and change the plasma gas, would you really want to for all 2,073,600?? (On a full HD screen). The reason this myth came about was because early plasmas had terrible life spans.
Apart from the fact they almost cooked themselves and I have seen many dead straight out of the box, when then did work they didn’t last for long, I would think most of the ones sold in the early 2000s will have been retired by now. Nice for something you had spent £10,000 on. Fortunately today’s plasmas have a much longer lifetime due to improvements in technology and phosphors.
Most of the major manufacturers claim between 30,000 and 60,000 hours use, or around 10-20 years for and average household. The same as most LCDs.
The latest technology and the future.
So LCD and Plasma are both looking pretty good, but they are also a little old hat in todays fast moving technological world.
What do you do if you want the latest thing?
Well currently you have two real choices, firstly LED technology.
This is essentially an LCD but the light comes from lots of little LED lights which can be switched on and off individually.
This means you get the brightness and rich colours of LCD with the deeps black of plasma. One such screen is Samsungs LE55A956 which you can read my review of here.
Secondly is OLED, or organic LED. This is basically a flat light emitting sheet of LEDs which means you can again produce the deep blacks by turning off individual pixels.
Because the whole screen is essentially a sheet you can produce incredibly thin screens which use very little power in comparison to today common screens. Unfortunately there are problems with the lifespan of these screens but this is getting better with each new development.
If you are feeling very frivolous you can purchase Sony’s 11″ XEL-1 OLED screen. At 11″, with a reported lifespan of half that of a standard LCD and costing around £2500 this is definitely not a normal purchase, but I’m sure Sony have and will sell a few.
One more technology to look out for is 3D screens, but I will look into those in further detail in a future article.
So Plasma or LCD then?
Both plasma and LCD will have their supporters and doubters, but in my humble opinion there really isn’t too much to choose between them.
Size and price will help you decide one way or the other but at the end of the day, as I have said to thousands of customers and friends before, the best way to decide which is going to be right for you is to go and spend some time looking at the various models and perhaps inviting yourself round to friends houses and see what works for them.
For the record I have one of each and I can’t pick between them!!
