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Opinions on big screens and 3-D

Discussion in 'Fred's House of Pancakes' started by daniel, Dec 28, 2010.

  1. amm0bob

    amm0bob Permanently Junior...

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  2. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    Jands: I have read about a 3-D technology that does not require glasses, but it does require you to be viewing from exactly the right spot, since images are projected outwards at an angle from the screen, one for each eye, and if you are off center or too close or too far away you won't get the effect.

    I thought the 3-D on the set mentioned above was spectacular, but since it made me motion sick (just a little) I won't get it.

    Rene: I am going to get 1080p if I get anything. I mentioned 720 because that was the only 3-D that Sears had. And it was still spectacular. In the demo disc, a friendly-looking monster stuck its tongue out and just about licked my face; and bits of colored paper fluttered around the entire space between the screen and me. And objects behind the screen were very 3-D. I really loved it. But since it was making me a wee bit sick I don't think it's for me. (I get sick in iMax theaters, also.)

    My two questions now are: Would I notice a difference between a contrast ratio of 2,000,000:1 and a ratio of 5,000,000:1?

    And:

    Is burn-in an issue with the newest plasma screens? If I'm watching a 4:3 source, there will be bars on the sides. And in general, will the image degrade with time due to burn-in? How good will the image of a plasma screen be in five years?
     
  3. koa

    koa Active Member

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    My 7 year old plasma has no burn-in issues. Mine has an auto pixel shift that helps, but the new ones are much better at avoiding burn-in. I also have not increased the brightness from original calibration and movies still look great.

    You will most likely start out with the brightness and contrast turned down quite a bit from max for correct calibration so as the panel ages you can increase it if you find it degrading.

    Many movies have black bars on the top and bottom and I've no issues there, also I watch some movies and TV in 4:3, again no issues, so unless you are watching only 4:3 all the time I doubt you will have a problem. Mix your content to fill the screen. You can also stretch the picture on content you don't care about, or change the bars to grey. Many of the high def local news channels are now 16:9 rather than 4:3.

    New panels like the Samsung, Panasonic and the no longer made Pioneers are better in every way than my old Pioneer but without one of the newer ones next to my panel to compare I'm still very pleased with the picture.
     
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  4. cproaudio

    cproaudio Speedlock Overrider

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    I have probably seen over a dozen 3D sets without glasses from different manufacturers over the past few years. All using their own proprietary technology. They all sucked. I have not seen one that impressed me at all. Sure they look somewhat 3D but you have to stand at a certain distance, facing at a certain angle. Most of those 3D sets only support 4 side by side viewers unless you spoon the person in front of you or get spooned by the person behind you. The resolution is not that great either. It requires HD resolution to see SD in 3D. Many of these sets would have a sticker on the floor directing the veiewers where to stand to see the 3D. I'll be at the 2011 CES this year. I'll see what new 3D sets manufacturers are cooking up.

    It is different than looking at the 3DS. The 3DS is small and are held about 18" from your eyes. It is meant for single viewer so it's designed exactly for that, 18" from the viewer at dead center.

    As for motion sickness, you have the film makers to blame for that. They're the ones doing all the fancy camera moves. If they just stop moving the damn cameras and let the actors do their thing the viewers wouldn't have motion sickness.
     
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  5. boulder_bum

    boulder_bum Senior Member

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    Something to be aware of is that "dynamic contrast ratios" are marketing bullcrap and basically made up. Generally the higher the numbers the better, even with the marketing gimmick, but it's not really an objective measure of picture quality.

    See here:
    Display Myths Shattered: How Monitor & HDTV Companies Cook Their Specs - Page 2 | Maximum PC

    To keep things simple, think of things like this in terms of image quality ranking by technology:

    1. Plasma
    2. Local dimming LED sets (some of the best local dimming sets rival/surpass many plasma sets).
    3. Edge lit LED sets.
    4. Normal LCD sets.

    After selecting a set using one of those technologies, you really need to look online for reviews that helps understand the true differences between the sets in terms of picture quality.

    Again, CNET is an excellent resource:
    Samsung PN50C8000 Review - Flat-panel TVs - CNET Reviews

    That said, unless you're a videophile, chances are you won't notice/won't care about the differences in image quality between models of the same technology and manufacturer, and any set you get is probably going to have significantly more "pop" to the picture than an old projector, albeit on a smaller screen.

    It's probably more important to compare your candidate sets by the video inputs and streaming video services to see if they meet your needs.

    Burn-in is something to be aware of, but new plasmas move pixels around, have screen savers (many Blu Ray players and game systems do, too), and broadcasters do their part to help out nowadays.

    Basically, take it easy on the video games and don't pause a movie for extended period of time during the first 100 hours of use and you should be fine.

    See here for tips:
    Plasma burn-in: Seven things you need to know - CNET Reviews

    One issue to be aware of is that Panasonic plasmas have a reputation for losing black level performance over a short period of time, but they're still considered some of the best on the market, regardless.

    4:3 content will have black bars on the side, and even widescreen DVDs and some Blu Rays have black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. Some newly released 4:3 Blu Ray content from Disney (Snow White Diamond Edition, for example) has a "DisneyView" feature that fills the sides of the screen with a hand-drawn border that fits with the scene, but this can be good or bad depending on your viewpoint.

    Many TVs have settings to stretch the content so it's full screen, but it can come out distorted or cropped, as you might guess.

    In a nutshell, just get used to black bars: they aren't that bad.

    Also, a few random asides:

    1. When you buy, either buy online from a reputable store like Amazon.com or NewEgg.com, or use the price of the online store to haggle with your local brick-and-mortar store. You'll save 25%-40% a lot of times (+ no tax) and Amazon in particular often has the same 30 day return policy as brick-and-mortar stores (free return shipping included).
    2. If you're this much on the fence about 3D and you're still not persuaded to the negative, I'd say go for it! Yes, technology will improve as it always does, but unless you're planning on buying ANOTHER TV in the next 4 years or so, why not buy a set that's a little bit future proofed?

    Ironically, I bought my (very nice/expensive) UN55B8500 set just before 3D sets started hitting the market, and even though I would have done it over again given my buying timeframe and picture quality requirements, I find myself looking forward to 3D in the next few years and my A/V receiver, Blu Ray player, and even a few of my Blu Ray combo packs support 3D! All that's missing at this point is the TV itself! :)

    If you're going to go 3D, however, may I suggest you take a strong look at the Panasonic Plasmas. The best ones are CNET editor's choice, but they also have an exclusive lock on "Avatar 3D", which comes free with the set. Avatar is hands down the best reference quality Blu Ray out there, and it's certainly the 3D title to have! You'd make more than a few people jealous with the purchase.
     
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  6. cproaudio

    cproaudio Speedlock Overrider

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    I'm a little 3D bias. I think it's a great technology if it's done right. Currently the best method is using shutter glasses because its ability to show full resolution from a single display.

    Right now price premium for 3D is not worth it because there's no low end 3DTV. Using the Prius analogy 3D is like IPA. To get it you have to buy the Prius Five and Advance Technology Package. Once you get it, how often are you going use it? At bestbuy Samsung 63" Plasma is listed at 2099.99 and 63" 3D is listed at 2899.99 That's a price difference of $800 just for the 3D capability.

    If you want big screen and forgo 3D, use front projector. The front projector technology is catching up to near theater quality.
    It's worth a look.

    I wouldn't say 3DTV is a gimmick. I'd would compare the 3D feature to the Prius's IPA. some folks use it some folks won't. It's cool to show off to friends. I show off my Prius's IPA and my 3D laptop to my friends and co-workers all the time. I have never had anyone tell me that I wasted my money on those gimmick.

    Headaches and dizziness could've been caused by 2 reasons. 1 is how the footage was made. If the camera man had use a stationary tripod and not zooming in and out, there shouldn't be any headaches. dizziness is caused by what your eyes see and the lack of corresponding movement. Think of seasickness or carsickness or reading a book while in a moving car. film makers are still using single camera technique to film 3D footage. The second reason is that the screen does not completely fill the viewer's field of vision. There are stationary backgrounds around the TV set. Part of your eye sees stationary scene while the center of your field of vision is seeing all these movements. This can be remedied by turning off all the lights in the viewing room.

    If you're planning on upgrading your TV in 5 years then definitely don't buy a 3DTV now because 3DTV is still at its infancy. How knows what'll be available in 5 years.

    3D content is very scarce but the library is building up. You should buy a 3DTV if you're going to delicate some money to provide the content. This means invest in a 3D bluray player and build up a 3D video library, or subscribe to a cable or satellite service that provide 3D content or create your own 3D content by rigging up 2 identical cameras and edit the footage yourself. If you're iffy about securing 3D content then don't bother getting a 3DTV. You're just wasting your money on a feature you're not going to use. IMAX is releasing alot of their 3D films to 3D Bluray now.

    If you have a PC ( sorry macs) with bluray drive and a newer Nvidia grafix card such as the 2XX, 3XX, 4XX, 5XXGTS/GTX cards and have their 3D vision IR emitter and 3D glasses, then 3DTV is worth it. There are 3D contents you can download or you could buy 3D blurays.
    I believe the current 3DTVs are pretty versatile in accepting 3D content. I've read people reporting that they had success playing full sbs 3D video with just media player classic on their computer. Others have reported success using stand-alone media players such as Popcorn Hour to play half sbs 3D videos. NVidia has a free stereoscopic player you can try out. It's good for playing 3D videos that has a left eye file and a right eye file. The video player processes both files into a single 120fps stream much like taking 2 half decks of card and shuffling them together with your thumb with alternating cards from each of the half decks of cards.

    It is possible that the 3DTV's requirements could improve the 2D video quality. the 3DTV's pixels has to react fast enough to display each eye's frame. Having a fast reacting LCD panel will definitely improve the quality. especially during high motion scenes.

    I think the TV manufacturing industry has vested too much money into the current shutter glasses 3DTV. all the major players have a 3DTV set of their own. Even Vizio has a few 3DTV sets. This is good because it'll trickle down to low end TV sets. As long as there's 3D content, there will be 3D TVs.
     
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  7. Flaninacupboard

    Flaninacupboard Senior Member

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    Do you watch completely in the dark, or do you have a lamp on? if you have any lighting in the room then you won't see much difference. If you are in complete darkness the 2mil:1 set will look grey while the 5mil:1 will look almost black.

    It can be. 2 christmasses ago i started playing Fallout 3 on the 60" set. i played for about 130 hours over a few weeks, and the text "CND" and "AP" were burned into the screen for MONTHS. After that i turned the "Pixel shifting" feature on, and not had a problem since. Watching 4:3 material we have grey side bars, that's not been a problem.
     
  8. Jands

    Jands New Member

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    I am hearing reports that manufacturers don't recommend anyone under the age of 6 watch 3D..something about it being bad for their developing eyes and some people are reporting that watching 3D makes them sick...don't take my word for it though!
     
  9. Darwood

    Darwood Senior Member

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    Good thread. Thanks all for the read.
     
  10. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    Wow. Thanks for all the information, especially boulder_bum and cproaudio.

    To respond to a few points:

    I don't play games on the TV. I do play chess, solitaire, sudoku on the computer, and a few games on the iPod, my newest being Dodge Dot, which I highly recommend. Fun, addictive, and sometimes frustrating. But I don't play video games. So that's not an issue.

    I'll probably buy from Sears if I get a big TV. Their price is the same as Crutchfield and nearly the same as Amazon. The advantage is that they will deliver and install. If I buy from Amazon and hire a handyman to install it (wall mount) I'd have to deal with unmounting and returning it if there were issues, and I could not expect Amazon to cover damage done during installation. With Sears, if they sell, deliver, and install, they will warranty the whole process.

    I was considering the C7000 series from Samsung, but since I've decided against 3-D (motion sickness, lack of available content) I'm now looking at the 58 inch C550, which is $700 cheaper, and is the biggest and best Sears carries, though it is out of stock at the moment.

    I do watch in a dark room. The modem, router, surge protectors, etc., all have their tiny lights, and in the daytime (when I seldom watch movies anyway) a tiny bit of light gets around the window shade, but the room is very dark. So maybe the C7000 with its better contrast ratio would be better. But Sears does not carry it, and it's $700 more at the same size, or double the cost if I step up to 63 inches.

    I'm not concerned about the black bars except that someone had told me they could burn in, although I don't see how black would burn in, and anyway I gather burn-in is not an issue with the newer sets as long as I don't pause movies for an extended time.

    As for the demo 3-D I watched at Sears, it was almost all animation, with just a couple of brief film bits. Of course, animation is where 3-D really shines. When the little creature practically licked my nose with its long tongue I nearly flinched.

    * * *

    I'm now also considering a projector. A year ago the cost of a HD projector made me decide to stick with what I have. But Crutchfield has a couple of Epsons that look pretty nice, in the same price range as the TV sets I'm looking at. The contrast ratio is less, but I could keep the larger size of my projection screen (68 inches side to side, which ends up being 75 or 80 inches diagonal).
     
  11. mrblaise

    mrblaise Go Lakers!!

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    Have you ever played Clickomania? Talk about an addictive game ... :rockon:

     
  12. KK6PD

    KK6PD _ . _ . / _ _ . _

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    Until this LITTLE minor detail is resolved, I would not waste a DIME on either content, or hardware in the 3D realm! At some point there might be a survivor, that would be the 3D to possibly consider for purchase.

    Just get yoursef a nice non 3D flatscreen. In 5 or 6 years, when the dust has settled, maybe 3D will become viable!
     
  13. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    Based partly on all the advice above, and partly on the very slight motion sickness, and partly on the dearth of content, I decided not to get 3-D. Once that decision was made, projectors began to look better. I use a projector now and I have a projector screen that's 68 inches wide, and a room that is very dark with the window shade down, the door closed, and the light off. So I decided to get a 1080p projector, and of course the Blu-Ray player. I've already enabled my NetFlix account for Blu-Ray discs, for which they're charging me an additional $5 per month. And I moved a couple of Blu-Ray movies to the top of my queue.

    Thanks to everyone who offered advice and suggestions. The comments about 3-D were especially helpful in deciding against it, as the effect of 3-D in an animated demo on the plasma screen was truly impressive.
     
  14. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    The projector and BR player arrived yesterday afternoon. It turned out that the BR player is ONLY a player and cannot drive my 5-speaker sound system. My old DVD player is also a tuner and amp, so it had not occurred to me that this would be a problem. What this meant was that I had to make a snap trip to Sears to pick up an optical audio cable to send the audio from the BR player to the DVD player, and then phone the dealer to figure out how to get the sound to come out. But now everything works. I am expecting a BR disc today from NetFlix.

    I'm not sure if DVDs are a tiny bit better, or if I just perceive that because I want them to be better, as I think the BR player is supposed to "up-convert" them for a slight improvement. I was told that with this projector I would not see a difference between my new image and a flat-screen plasma screen. But since they only show HD content at the stores, and I don't have BR disc available yet, that remains to be seen.

    I was planning on selling or donating the old projector and DVD player. Now I'll have to keep the DVD player, but I don't imagine it would have been worth much anyway. I now have three remote controls, which is a pain in the neck. One for the projector, which is really just to turn it on and off; one for the DVD player, which now is just for volume; and one for the BR player, which I dislike highly because it's hard to find the buttons I need in the dark and the up-down-left-right-select buttons are too crowded to operate easily by feel. The remote for the DVD has half as many buttons, and they are much more sensibly organized.
     
  15. qbee42

    qbee42 My other car is a boat

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    It might be time to buy a new AV amplifier to go with your slick new setup. That way you could dump the old DVD player and get better audio.

    I wouldn't be surprised that your DVDs look better. Some of the new up-converters do a great job. DVDs played on my PS3 look better than they did on the old DVD player that I used before.

    Tom
     
  16. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    I get excellent audio on my old system. But then, I think the audio in my Prius (2004, standard CD player) is excellent. I am sure there are better audio systems than mine, but mine really is quite good. What I've been calling a DVD player, they call a "home theater system."

    And I checked. My new BR player is supposed to up-convert. So it probably is a little better. Of course, I'm looking forward to seeing what a BR disc looks like. One should come in today's mail.

    BTW, my old projector required me to turn off the room light to see the image. The new one is bright enough that for fiddling with settings, I can see it quite well in normal room light. Of course I darken the room to watch anything.
     
  17. Rae Vynn

    Rae Vynn Artist In Residence

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    When we switched from a DVD to a BR player, and got some BR discs, I was AMAZED at the improved audio quality!

    With some of the discs, the video isn't really any better (for instance, Labyrinth), but the audio is so well worth it.

    Our audio is through the TV, which has virtual surround. The audio really rocks, though the TV is a 780p. Yes, it's good. We've had it for about 7 years now -- not bad for a set we picked up at WalMart (yes, that was back when we would shop there).

    We are looking at LED/LCD, 1080p, that will mount on the wall -- freeing up enough space for TWO bookcases! :thumb:
    If we get one, we will get the add-on audio system with sub-woofer :p
     
  18. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    So I watched my first Blu-ray disc. The resolution was impressive. But I had the bad luck to rent a movie that was shot entirely in sepia. Practically B&W! So I didn't get to see the colors which are supposed to be so much better with BR. I've got another one coming tomorrow.

    As I said, my sound system is really quite good; two tall stand-up main speakers, woofer, sub-woofer, and tweeters. Six altogether. I said five in an earlier post because I had forgotten about the big sub-woofer hidden beneath the scanner stand.
     
  19. boulder_bum

    boulder_bum Senior Member

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    Congrats on the new system! Sounds cool!

    Now we have to get you some reference quality content to let you see how awesome Blu-ray can really look and sound. Here would be a handful of my recommendations:

    1. Avatar
    2. Blade Runner: Final Cut
    3. BBC's Planet Earth (you'll notice a flicker in the waterfall scenes because of a camera glitch)
    4. Kill Bill, Volume 1 & 2
    5. Chronicles of Narnia: Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe
    6. Coraline
     
  20. daniel

    daniel Cat Lovers Against the Bomb

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    Hmmm. I saw most of Avatar on TV in the hotel when I was in Hawai'i, so I rented it on DVD when I got home. It was a good movie, but I'm not sure I want to watch it a third time. Unless it comes back to theaters and I can see it in 3-D.

    Kill Bill 1 was such a bad movie I have no interest in watching number 2.

    Not really too interested in the whole Narnia thing.

    Coraline is described as stop-motion animation, which according to Wikipedia is the old clay-mation we used to see when I was a kid. I don't like it.

    Blade runner: A recut of a 1982 movie is a quality reference for Blu-ray???

    * * * *

    I still have not decided if the expense was worth it. Operating the Blu-ray player is so frustrating I came close to kicking the damn thing through the window when I went to pause it and inadvertently exited from the movie to the selection of streaming media apps, and then could not jump back into the movie, but had to watch the FU@^!%G commercials all over again, and then (unlike DVDs!!!) there was no "scene selection" item on the movie, and I had to fast-forward (and it was a damnably slow FF) up to where I was in the movie. Later I found, under "Tools" a chapter selector, but it was only by numbers, not by scene description and image as on DVDs, so you just have to guess what chapter number might be where you were.

    For this lapse alone, if I had known, I would have said f#@k Blu-ray. Most of the buttons on the goddamned remote just cause "Not Available" to pop up on the screen.

    The picture resolution is noticeably better, and the new projector is much brighter. I'm not sure the colors are any more intense.