"I just don't see the justification of paying around the same price for a Panny, when you can get a Pioneer."
The Panny can be had online now for about £1850 (probably come down more in a few months) and comes with a 5 year warranty if purchased before end of July. With the Pioneer speakers and stand adding around another £400 to the average asking price of £2500 this makes the Pioneer come in at around £2900 which works out at over a £1000 (around £1400 if you take into account the 5 year warranty) more than the G9 Pioneer at the moment which is hardly around the same price - The then 50" G9 works out considerably more expensive.
Cnet USA rated the 50PZ800 very highly giving it one of its best ever scores and said it had better and more accurate colours than the Kuro's but not quite matching the black levels but it was next to impossible to tell the blacks apart unless you were in a totally dark room - that was against a G8 Kuro. Based on that, it stands to reason that the new G9's will be better than the 50PZ800 - whether the difference is worth between a £1000 - £1400 depends on the individual I guess!
Suave!
Well I have tested the 2 together, put the 800 on the TLC shootout wall next to the 5090, and the Panny PF10, basically the PZ800 did not last the day cuz it completly spoilt the demo as it just did not match any of the others in terms of colour accuracy. SD performance, like the PZ 80/85 is weak and IMHO think the CNET reviewer must have been p....d cuz for the life of me I could not get colour any where near accurate, The Panny PF10 knocks it for 6, far better in every respect, except black levels the the PZ800 is slightly better. BUT the Pioneer LX508 has better blacks than the PZ800, THEN next to the 5090 that knocks the PZ800 for 20!!!.
A 5090 with stand and speaker is about £2700, is it worth the difference, well I agree with Suave, its up to you, but so far EVERYONE I've met has not hesitated.
I'm sorry but this analagy has been done time and time again, it is like comparing an award winning Ford Modeo to an award winning BMW 5.
Both will do the same thing, just one does better and in a more refined higher quality way, the BM has better build, better performance has more accurate road handling AND costs more.
Not everone can afford a BM, not everyone thinks the difference between the two, not everyone thinks the difference is worth it. The Mondeo IS a fine car in its class, so is the Panny 800 BUT the 5090 IS in a different class, and the sooner people stop comparing like for like then the easier the choice will be, the Panny PF10 is the one to compare to the 5090 NOT the PZ's.
In the Mondeo class (PZ800) you have a large number of manufacturers slugging it out for a large number of buyers, in the BMW class (5090) you have 3 Audi, BMW, Merc. We have the Panny PF10 and the 5090, we used to have the Fujitsu!!!
Right now you should be comparing the PZ800 against the 508XD, thats closer but even though the 508XD is a 768 panel as IMHO I would still buy a 508XD/5080XD against the PZ800 because the overall performance IS better than a PZ800, SD is 30/40% better, HD detail is about 1 to 2% inferior on the Pio FROM about 5 inches away with a static picture, but at a normal viewing distance with normal content on correctly set up TV's, not having 1080p is a non issue.
But dont take my word for it, dont take the words of review, you HAVE to go see for yourself and YOU have to be the judge, not me, not anyone else, which EVER one ends up in you houses that IS the right choice to satisfy your requirements and YOUR pocket.
Like anything in life there are things we would like to have but may be unable too, and this is no different.
I want a dedicated home cinema room with a projector and the £15,000 of speakers that are currently in the TLC projector dem room (as of yesterday) I have to make do with my £6000 speaker system for now,
But one thing is absolutly certain, the £15,000 system is superior to my £6000 one!!!