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LifestreamBad news all around! I’ve tested the G30 plasma some more and come to the conclusion that at least as far as I am concerned, the panel is complete garbage. I still don’t support the term RBE (rainbow effect) but that is nevertheless what I am seeing. Just so that we’re all on the same page here. RBE may be a DLP term but everyone keeps using it with plasma so I guess I should too.
I tried capturing part of the effect and uploaded the videos to Vimeo:
In addition to seeing what the camera is seeing, I also get a sort of green tinge or aura to or around high contrast areas. White text on a black background for instance. Especially when I pan around, just like I tried to do by moving the camera. It’s probably impossible to explain the effect to someone who can’t see it and never will. I.e. the majority of people. The TV has been adjusted to the best possible picture and has now run a good 130+ hours using break-in slides. The effect however remains.
So what is going on? Well, best I can tell, the different subpixels light up (and decay) at different speeds. Explained in more detail here. Not rocket science. But the question is why some people, like myself, are able to see this at all. Researching the topic brings me back to the term "retinal persistence" or persistence of vision (Beta or Phi?) and that most people are wired in such a way that their optic nerve "responds to changes in light at about 10 cycles per second" .
I did however not see this in any of the stores where I examined the 30-series before buying. My mistake was not play material bright enough and with high contrast. Rather I focused on animated material because I had heard of "large area flicker" effects. I thought that RBE would stand out like a sore thumb and besides, all TVs look a little wonky in stores when placed on a wall with dozens of other panels.
Knowing all of this I went back to the store where I bought the set and examined their other plasma sets, including Panasonic (G30, VT30) as well as LG (PZ570) and Samsung (7005). And I brought new high contrast material. Not only was the effect clearly visible on the store G30 (which had run for almost 1000 hours) but on the VT30 (1400 hours) as well. For the sake of reference I did try the LG and Samsung and much to my amazement, they did NOT exhibit the same effect. To the contrary, the image seemed A LOT more stable and enjoyable in addition to having little to no phosphor trails and no RBE. The LG had minute phosphor trails if truth be told (but only on fast horizontal or vertical movement as it perhaps should be), but the Samsung was eerily perfect. Having said that, I must stress this is just a crude evaluation to establish if and how Panasonic differs and if I can even use plasma based displays. The answer to the last question seems to be a resounding … maybe.
And who knows what else I’ll be able to see on the LG and Samsung once they’re set up in the living room. And they have their own quirks to be sure. LG has a nasty mirror glass panel that is terribly reflective and Samsung seemed a bit dull and exhibited a troubling vertical contrast problem most likely due to its filter. Look at it from above and the screen goes completely dark, much like if you view some LCDs from extreme angles.
So anyway, I tried contacting Panasonic and they did a good job pretending they did not understand what I was talking about. They had read about it online apparently but weren’t aware of any problem basically. Thanks for nothing.
I will try to return the set and then I’m back to square one.
