Panasonic TH-50PX60U 50" Plasma TV

Black Level Champ

Looking at DVDs, the detail was surprisingly good, especially for a display with less than 1920x1080 resolution. On Moulin Rouge, the buildings in Montmartre and the cabaret itself were crisply defined. The riotous colors were faithfully reproduced except for the green absinthe, which almost glowed, and slightly overemphasized reds, which is easy to do on this movie. Flesh tones were generally quite good, though perhaps a bit ruddy.

The blue backlight that begins The Mask of Zorro exhibited some contouring, but the color was very good throughout the movie, and the detail was excellent. The dark detail in the dungeon was quite good as well, probably due to the gamma coming out of black too quickly. (I must admit to a personal preference for this type of gamma, even though it is technically incorrect.)

The same was true in the below-deck walk at the beginning of Master and Commander. There was no contouring in the transition to morning fog following that scene.

To test the black level, I watched a bit of Star Trek: Insurrection—sure enough, the black of space was deep and inky. All of my other observations were confirmed as well: excellent shadow detail in the duck-blind observation post, excellent detail overall, and good color (except for green foliage that might have been a bit overhyped).

The story was much the same on HD DVD. Detail in The Phantom of the Opera was excellent in the opera house, on stage, and during the Masquerade scene. Color was likewise very good.

Individual blades of grass in The Last Samurai were clearly defined, if a bit hyped, and the shadow detail in the fogshrouded forest was very good. The inky black of space in Apollo 13 really made the spacecraft pop; flesh tones were a touch ruddy, but color was otherwise fine.

Conclusion

Panasonic’s reputation for making excellent plasma displays is in no danger from the TH-50PX60U. Despite less-than-stellar performance on some test material, it produced a very pleasing picture with superb black level, excellent detail, and surprisingly good color despite oversaturated green and red primaries. If you can tolerate knowing that it's not 1920x1080, you'll get a heck of an image from it. TPV