Do NOT buy. The bulb life is very short. Need to replace the $400 bulb frequently. Not worth it at all.

good picture

Breaks down frquently. Do not buy without an extended wasranty.

great pictue BUT sever problem with short bulb life. Expect to replace $300 bulb frequently. The set has a problem with the ballast as well.

Good Picture quality

MODEL DISCONTINUED. you will never get any parts if the tv is broke. DONT BUY this model

I read all the reviews about this TV and also did extensive research before buying this TV 8 months ago. I was very pleased with the performance and was happy with the TV. BUT IT ALL CHANGED WHEN IT BROKE. I had extended warranty from Best Buy and they said the PC board is broke which they have to order and get authorization from Panasonic So i waited.. waited.. waited.. nothing happened for more than month and half. When i called Best Buy they said they are waiting for authorization from panasonic. If i call panasonic they said they never received any request from Best Buy. finally i was given the authorization to g o and get my TV replaced. That is when i found that THIS TV MODEL HAS BEEN DISCONTINUED BY PANASONIC. Searched the web. found lot of problems with this model. But the bottomline both Best Buy and Panasonic didnt tell me truth about the model being discontinued and parts order is backlogged. So to all who own this TV.. pray that it never breaks.. if it breaks.. get ready for a battle and you wont get your tv replaced atleast for month. And if you dont have extended warranty, then what you paid will just go down the drain!!! If you are planning to buy. Just take this TV of your list. do you really want to consider a discontinued TV? most of the stores including online stores dont tell that this model is discontinued but provide heavy discounts.. because they just want to get rid of it. So beware. Thanks AK

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I am going for a Sony Wega

The TV is very good, the picture is clear and excellent but buyers beware. In my experiences there is a lamp issue. I've gone through 2 lamps within 19 months. The first was covered but the second one will cost you approx. $300. In my opinion, Panasonic is not recognizing that there is an issue and it is up to the customer to prove otherwise.

Picture quality is good.

Chronic problems with bulbs blowing out. Three bulbs within an 18 month period is unacceptable performance.

Item purchased Sept '03. Dec '03 bulb blew out and replaced. Nov '04, second bulb blew out and bulb and ballast replaced. May '05, third bulb has blown out. After each breakdown, I requested that set be replaced. Chronic problem evident after 2nd bulb failed. In spite of obvious flaw, request for set replacement has been denied.

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none

Very sharp picture quality. Small foot print. Built in card reader.

Bulb issues

I bought this tv in Dec 2003. I love the picture and am very happy with the many features. My problem now is with the bulb. It started with the unit takeing 3 or 4 tries to turn on. Now it will not come on at all. I was sent a new bulb but it still will not come on. Sears is sending a service man back next week. The service man said that all brands are haveing issues with the bulbs. Not just a Panasonic problem. When they resolve this issue I will be very happy with my purchase.

--Picture quality as good or better than plasma, for much less $$. Picture adjustment is easy and offers flexibility. --only 89 pounds, heavy but not gargantuan --TV's built-in speakers sound good! --every kind of inout you could want. once VGA and aux video input is on the side of the TV, making it easy to get to --VGA-in and PCCard/SDRAM reader. --Low fan noise --No manufacturing defects that I've found

--Off-axis performance isn't perfect (i.e. the screen looks darker if you aren't right in front of it), but it's not bad compared to DLP --VGA input has a limit of 1024X768 resolution --top of TV is thin, making it tough and risky to balance a center-channel speaker. Los Angeles earthquake sufferers beware! --the optional stand isn't great (kinda small), but it's pricey. I'd shop around for a better stand or do without.

A truly outstanding choice for a 50-inch HDTV. I looked at the Hitachi 50-inch and the Samsung DLP. Unfortunately for these other companies, Circuit City has the Panasonic sitting next to them in the showroom, making it easy to see the difference in picture quality and expecially color depth and vibrance of the Panny vs. the others, so for CC customers it's kind of a no-brainer! What really drew me ot his TV over the others though was the feature list. In addition to most of the standard features in HDTVs these days (PIP, DVI-in, optional TV stand, 720p and 1080i modes, etc.), the Panny also has a) an MMC card reader, for viewing pictures taken on a ditial camera or camcorder (both SDRAM and PCCard formats no less) and b) VGA-in ports (two of them) for connecting a computer directly to the TV! I'm typing this on a Dell D800 laptop that's connected to said VGA port, and it works great. The only drawback is that the TV will only accept 1024X768 (or lower) resolution, a decent size but I was hoping to do 1280X800 so as to take advantage of the fact that aspect ratios of the laptop and TV are similar. 1024X768 is alomst square, so I have to widen the picture on the TV to get the PC screen to take the entirety of the TVs screen area. This is minor, though; the sheer idea of being able to use an HDTV as a computer monitor (like in that mobie The Bone Collector) is just WAY too cool for words! Another point in the Panasonic's favor is that there are no bugs or flaws in its design, an important factor since many other top-name HDTVs ARE being shipped with defects. In reading reviews on the Circuit City page, I've discovered that the Sony XBR high-def TV, supposedly the best one there is, has suffered from bulb problems and dead pixels (though is seems that brand-new models are being shipped with good bulbs), and the Hitachi equivalent of the Panasonic seems to suffer from delamination problems (i.e. the outer screen likes to delaminate from the inner screen, causing gray areas to appear on the screen). I've also heard that the Hitachi's cooling fan is loud. The Panny has been trouble-free so far (I've had it about 3 weeks now) , with nothing but good reviews. One thing too: I'm told that Circuit City is the only retailer whose 4-year warranty includes bulb replacement, and important factor to consider. The bulb in this model is supposed to be a 10-year bulb, but if you get one with a defective bulb and it goes out, it costs anywhere from $200 to over $400 to replace it depending on who you ask. So the warranty would pay for itself if the bulb burned out even once in 4 years, to say nothing of the other parts of the TV. Another word of caution: if you go to Circuit City or Best Buy to view this TV firsthand, the picture may very well look crappy in the store. DON'T BE FOOLED into thinking that the Panny is a substandard TV! The store's customers (or worse yet, the salespeople) probably have the picture setings jacked up somehow. To make a long story short, the picture seems to look best with the "Picture" setting almost at maximum, the "Color" setting between half and 3/4, the "Brightness" and "Tint" settings at default, and the "Sharpness" setting at minimum. Als the color temperature should be set to Warm. (Also, in the Picture menu, be careful; selecting "Normal" resets everything to the factory default with no prompt as to whether or not you really want to do this!) The "Sharpness" setting is of paramount importance in my book; it MUST be set to a bare minimum IMHO. Sharpness merely accentuates the differences between the pixels on the screen, which makes the picture appear grainy. It isn't so much a problem with HDTV feed (which is what you'll be seeing in the stores), but it was a big thing with DVDs and non-high-def TV feed, from either satellite or cable TV. You'll have to play with it in the store to see what works best for you as far as picture settings; I'm merely relaying my own experience. I disagree with the review here that said that the plasma screen looked better than ths Panny; to me, if anything the Panny looked better. I see this debate raging a lot out there, which says to me that the pictures are pretty comparable. So why pay more for a plasma TV that's going to burn out in 3 years or so and hums at high altitute? So you can hang a plama on a wall; BFD. I'll take the cheaper yet more full-featured Panasonic any day. Everything I've watched looks great so far. But you need to judge for yourself! Pixelation from picture loss on DirecTV (due to the compresson of the picture information that occurs when the signal strength dips) seems to be accentuated on projection LCD TVs. Again, such pixelation appears to be minimized when you set the sharpness setting on minimum. You'll also have to play with the different aspect ratios to see which one you like. I like to to Justification for non-high-def feed, Full for high-def, and Full or Zoom for DVD movies.

Great picture (no ghosting) Split screen options Tons of inputs Size vs Weight ratio (only 80 lbs) BBE Sound Enhancement Descent remote comparitively

None really noted yet

Best Buy was selling it for $3300, Sears was selling it for $3000 and I forced them to price match Sears had I used my Sears card which gave me an additional 10% off. Anyhow, I've been completely satisfied with this TV. It was side by side next to the 50" Samsung DLP and both had stunning HDTV pictures...the best I've seen in projection screen. The DLP was $1000 more and the picture was ever so slightly better. Noticable, but not worth the extra G. Plasma is way over priced and once they burn out, they are useless. With the LCD's and the DLP's there is one white bulb as opposed to three colored bulbs in older projection screens. If that bulb blows, just buy another...the bulb is suppose to be good for like 30,000 hours or something like that. Anyhow, the options on it rock. Split screen for any input, it has a feature where it will scan thru the channels on the right half of the screen in a thumbnail like mode, so you can see up to 6 channels on the right side. Tons of inputs in the back. The picture is great and I'm a big fan of the BBE sound enhancement...I am a recording guitarist and have used the same BBE in all my mix downs and live play. It restores the harmonics that are lost in frequency-dependent phase shifting...ie corrects for phase delay and envelope distortion. Not a huge selling point, but impressive that they are finally starting to correct for this in suck everyday applications such as Television. The remote is great, has a backlite button which is nice, but I have trouble finding it in the dark-maybe that button should always be lit or even on the side of the remote-somewhere easy to find. Comes with a DVI cable. X-box looks great on it and I can't wait to try some of the new HDTV games that have coming out. This TV is extremely light only like 80 lbs...beautiful compared to the 300-400 lb projection screen monsters of yesterday. There is no ghosting in the corners which is huge. And the picture doesn't ghost from the sides or at wierd angles....I can sit anywhere in the room and enjoy the picture unlike most other HDTV's that darken as you move off to the side or move out of that "cone" of vision. One thing that I would like to point out as with any HDTV is don't expect to get that crystal clear image in the store unless you have Satelitte HDTV or your Cable provider provides HDTV. All of your normal cable channels and DVD's will most likely not change significantly. DVD's are only 480p...HD is 720p/1080i, so infact your weak link now is the quality of the DVD. So if your watching regular cable or DVD the video quality is going to be almost unnoticable between DLP, PLASMA, and LCD. It's the High Def where these three start to seperate. Infact if you're watching regular cable it may look slightly worse because of the bigger screen which amplify's all the flaws of regular cable. Not to worry, it's not that bad, but just something to keep in the back of your mind when you're trying to decide between a $2500 HDTV and a $4000 HDTV....look at the options and the ghosting effects becuase those won't change from Cable to DVD to HiDef. By the way...they are starting to come out with DVD upconverteres which converts the 480p DVD up to 720p so that you can enjoy your DVD in almost HiDef. Samsung is the only one right now that makes one and it does not stand up to it's claims...read my review on it Samsung HD931. So although right now your DVD may look as good on your old Sony Wega compared to your new HDTV...they technology is starting to come around. Something to look forward too for sure. Lastly, I did hook up my laptop too it and the picture was ok, I wouldn't use it for that reason, but I thought I'd try. I only messed with it for a bit and didn't try the split screen. The picture was grainy as is usually the case. Managable, but not perferred.

Tons of Inputs and features, Bright Clean Picture

On very bright scenes, there is a glare from the screen, although the glare is not visible 90% of the time. I feel a glass screen would have made this set perfect.

Clean Crisp Picture, HiDef picture quality is very good - not a good a plasma but you cant beat it for the money. Sound quality is good - to get the best result you'll need a receiver connected.

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Mitsubishi HDTV, Philips HDTV