Thanks you all who answered all my posts and helped me make my decision on what Plasma scrren to get.

I've got a PanasonicTW42PWD4BX arriving on Friday afternoon!

After a bit of haggeling (salesman wasn't expecting that! ), I got it from a local store that I rate for a competative price.

So my final couple of questions!

1. What settings do people use? I know that the sets usually come with the brightness & contrast set way to high, but what other setting should I look at.

2. I watch a lots of films on DVD and prefer to watch them in their proper aspect ratio, so this will mean watching many films with black bars at the top and bottom. Will this cause me any problems in the long run?

3. I was going to connect an old set of speakers to my plasma to use when I 'm using my Amp for other things. I've got two sets of old Sony speakes, both 60W, one with 6 Ohms impedance, the other with 8. Could I uses either of these?


Many Thanks again to all of you for your advice!


Glenn.
P.S. I want it to be Friday!

[codlord]

Nice one, you won't regret it!

In answer to your questions:

1 - The panny has a lot of settings and advanced settings - I used the THX video setup screens on the Terminator 2 special edition DVD and did not find the need to alter any advanced settings. It's going to depend on personal preference and the environment you watch stuff in, but for your info my settings are as follows:
Contrast -15, Brightness 5, Colour 0, Sharpness 0, White Balance Normal.

2 - Should not cause too many problems, I watch all my DVD's in the correct aspect ratio and have had no problems. Different films are in different ratios and some fill the whole screen so it's not like you are always going to be using the same screen area.

3 - The Panny speaker outputs are 2x 8w 6 Ohms - you should have no problem connecting your speakers but at only 8w output I would not expect anything great!

Thanks Codlord,

I've just downloaded the user manual and it constantly goes on about not watching to much 4:3 stuff!! I.E. normal tv size.

I noticed that there is a SP (side protection) screen saver. Doesn't this solve the problem of 4:3 screen burn?

As for sound, i usually be using my Denon 10SE with MK speakers !

[codlord]

As 4:3 is a constant size this could be a problem. I can't comment on the side screensaver mode as I don't watch any 4:3 stuff.

There is always the 'Just' mode that will 'Intelligently' stretch the picture to fit the full screen. As I never watch TV I could not comment on how good this is.

Also note that if you use the RGB to VGA converter to connect your sky or whatever then you will not be able to use 'Just' mode.

[stevelup]

Hi

John Sim's RGB to Component converter is available very soon which will enable you to run your Sky Digital into the component inputs on the plasma.

This will give you the best of both worlds - RGB quality coupled with the ability to use the Just mode to fiddle with the picture.

Regards,

Steve

thanks for that.

I'm propable going to get 2nd LNB and another Sky box so the RGB to Component converter would be usefull.

I could actually use my Denon 10se to switch betwen my DVD's component connection and a Sky box running through a converter!

Thanks again all for the info.
Glenn.