 Samsung PN50B550 - Awesome TV |
| Review Date: June 4, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Brian A. Appel, Tampa, FL |
I researched a lot of TVs and narrowed it down to the Panasonic Viera 50" and the Samsung 50" Plasma. I had seen the A550 Samsung for a long time and when I was finally ready to purchase I noticed the B550 had come out. This model is just a beautiful television. The picture is very crisp and sharp. The blacks are nice and rich. My favorite feature is the swivel base. I was debating whether I wanted to invest in a swivel wall mount or not, but I knew I wanted to be able to view it from angles in the kitchen and towards the outside of my house. This was the only TV this size with a swivel base. Since receiving my TV, I've watched movies, basic cable, HD cable, and playedmy Wii on it and I haven't found one issue. I highly recommend this television.
When purchasing a TV like this, I wanted to go online to get a good deal. I also wanted a merchant I trusted because this is such a large purchase. [...] I purchased this TV with no tax and no shipping, which right there saved me about $200. I wouldn't have walked out of best buy for less than $1800 and I got this TV for $1360. I chose basic delivery to keep it free and the guy wheeled it right into my house next to where I was going to keep it. It was delivered within just a few days after ordering. Very fast and reliable shipping!
I would definitely buy this TV again [...] Can't wait for football season!! |
worth the wait
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| Review Date: June 2, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Patrick Harris, Minnesota |
This is a great TV. I was torn between buying last years model the pn50a vs this years pn50b. I decided to get the newer one because its supposed to use half the energy. The pn50B is dramatically cooler to the touch, front and back than last years model.
Picture quality is amazing. The colors and clarity from blue ray and HD Comcast programming in my house is better than I have seen on most other HD TV's at the box stores.
There is more glare on the screen than my old HD Sony tube it has replaced.
Overall, I am very very happy with this plasma and highly recommend it. |
Wow. Just......Wow.
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| Review Date: October 30, 2009 |
| Reviewer: imvho, |
Spent almost 2 years researching our next HDTV (I kept putting off our purchase in hopes that CableCard 2.0 would actually be developed...). I studied all the relative benefits & drawbacks of LCD/LED vs Plasma.
PROS:
LCD/LED - No image burn-in risk. Almost no screen reflection, so it's great for rooms with lots of daylight/windows or bright evening lighting.
PLASMA - Richer colors, deeper/darker blacks, greater contrasts, more vivid/natural picture. No "rainbow effect" in fast-moving images. Virtually no image degradation when viewing off-angle (i.e. if seated at an angle to the screen or if standing up).
CONS:
LCD/LED - Blacks are never deep/rich and colors aren't quite as true as plasma. Some viewers will notice "rainbow effects" in fast-action scenes. Picture deteriorates as you move away from "dead-center" (so, people seated at an angle to the TV or standing up will not see a good picture). Considerably more expensive than Plasma for screens 42" or larger.
PLASMA - Screen is more reflective than LCD/LED, which can be distracting in rooms with lots of daylight/windows or bright evening lighting. Potential for image "burn-in". Not available in screen sizes smaller than 42".
I had decided to go with Plasma because picture quality and viewing angle was critical for me, and since I never planned to frequently use a 50" TV as a computer monitor, and didn't plan to watch news channels for hours on end, the burn-in possibility was a non-issue.
And last year had finally settled on this model -- or more accurately the precursor to this model (the PN50A550) --after reading many reviews and ratings, including the ones by that well-known consumer reporting/testing organization, and checking the pictures on the walls of TVs at local big-box retailers. I just waited until the price came down below $1100.
Then about a month ago, a big-box retailer offered a special deal in the Sunday-paper circular: This TV plus a Samsung Blu-ray player (BD-P3600) for $1099 including delivery & set-up & haul-away/recycling (of the old TV), so I impulsively jumped that very day....and couldn't be happier.
Even SD content looks better on this, but HD content is jaw-dropping. The picture is amazing no matter where you are in relation to the screen, and the colors are deep and rich.
At certain times of the day, the room can get quite a lot of daylight, but this TV is actually a bit better than the 36" CRT it replaced as far as annoying reflections go.
This latest model has a grey "TOC" [Touch Of Color, a colored rim], so you really don't even notice it. (Personally, I never saw the big deal about the "TOC" thing; it was just a rim of color around the outside lucite edge. Whoop-dee-doo. And I really didn't want the red edge anyway, so I'm happy they switched to grey.)
This has a pixel-shift function to help eliminate burn-in from steady images (like station IDs, or tickers on CNN/Fox/ESPN/any sports program), plus it has an "eraser" function if you see any slight burn-in. In my research, I found advice that suggested avoiding watching more than an hour at a time of those "ticker" shows for the first 100-200 hours (when the pixels burn the brightest), so we've been following that. My spouse likes NASCAR so by this next weekend, the TV will have gone thru its "break-in" period, so it will experience 3+ hours of NASCAR tickers. Will post back if there was any burn-in.
We currently have this hooked up to only standard cable (our HD Cable box is hooked up to the original HD TV, downstairs in our home-theatre setup...and I refuse to pay Time-Warner another $10/mo rental fee for a box that can't possibly cost them more than $40), but by running the Auto Channel scanning function, we're able to see HD channels for all "local" cable channels (ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX, PBS, etc).
Sound: Has been fine for everything so far. It's perfectly crisp, with plenty of treble, mid-tones and bass for TV shows, news, kids' movies. Much better than the 8-year-old CRT it replaced, but it's NOT a "theatre" experience; you must get an external audio setup for that, and can't expect it from any TV.
Sidenote: Really nice to have it hooked up to same-brand Blu-ray player! Can do everything with just the TV remote. And if you are a Netflix member, you should check out that P3600 Samsung Blu-ray -- we've watched a lot of streaming Netflix videos thru that Blu-ray player. I have a review posted there. |
This TV does not suffer from Burn in problems
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| Review Date: December 21, 2009 |
| Reviewer: D. Sinkovitz, Chicago, IL |
I see a lot of people confusing "Burn In" with "Image Retention" on these reviews. This TV does not have any "Burn In" issues. Burn in is when a image (like black bars, a logo, etc) is burned into the screen and you can never get it off. Image retention is when the image of the black bars or logo is left on the screen anywhere from a few seconds to several minutes. All Plasma TV's can experience image retention at first. This is why when purchasing any plasma it's recommended to follow "break in procedures" for the first 50-200 hours of viewing. After the break in period imagine retention pretty much becomes non-existent no matter what you watch, play games, have black bars, etc.... Even if you don't do a proper break in of a plasma it will do nothing to really harm the TV other than experiencing a few annoying moments of seeing image retention when changing the program.
AS for this TV it is absolutely wonderful. You would be hard pressed to find a better quality TV at this price and size. Almost every major professional review has this TV scored 95-100 or 4.5 out of 5 stars. Image Retention is the only downside to any Plasma TV and it's a minor inconvenience that really will only happen in the first 100 hours or so of viewing. Again,it can be avoided completely by properly breaking in the TV. As for Burn in this TV it is pretty much impossible with the pixel shifting technology Samsung incorporated. One website even tried to purposely cause permanent burn in for review purposes by leaving letter box programing running for over 3 weeks and was unable to cause permanent burn in. They were able to remove the black bars by running the image retention eraser (feature in menu)for 3 minutes. Honestly you can't go wrong with this TV. This is one TV (spec wise) where your not sacrificing quality for price. 1080p, 600 hz, 2 million to 1 dynamic contrast ratio, 4 HDMI, energy star complient, and a 50' screen. I've yet to read a professional review or even a reader review that has said anything bad picture/feature wise about this TV (the sound is it's only complaint) However to me that's a moot point as I would never listen to the TV speakers when I have 5.1 surround.
Anyway bottom line is this TV spec wise stacks up to 2-3 thousand dollar sets. The only things its missing is a internet port some newer TV's have and its a little thicker than the newer plasmas out now, but picture wise this TV is a amazing value for the price. |
Outstanding, as expected
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| Review Date: June 16, 2009 |
| Reviewer: Robert McLaren, Senoia, GA |
| This is my first HDTV, but I did spend a good couple months shopping around and studying up on my features, pros/cons, etc... First of all the picture is beautiful, but hey, that's to be expected. I love the ample HDMI ports, and as it turns out, the swivel stand ended up being a pretty awesome feature. Plasma is plasma, and there's no getting around the fact that you're going to have some reflective glare if there is a bright window or light behind you. So, in our livingroom at around 6pm when the sunlight is beaming in the side window, we just swivel that baby a little to the right and viola! No glare. I'm also a gamer and despite the fact that my 360 is an older model that uses component instead of HDMI, it still looks gorgeous. I'm dusting off old games that I haven't played in years and it's a whole new experience! I should also mention that I was concerned about the big plasma TV being hot. Some of the floor models I've seen almost turned me off of plasma because they let out noticible ambient heat. But I haven't noticed that at all with this set. Very happy. |
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