OK, the forum that hosts my VT30 vs. D8005 post is down so I'm going to write it over again, and also some new information has come up that would have required a change or two in that post
As you all know, I was one of many unlucky VT30 owners that was pestered with green patches on my screen. I simply couldn't live with that, and at the same time I did not want to be without that kind of tv either (I have a PS43D455, but it's nothing special and I wanted it to be...)
I was worried, because I had heard a lot about both buzzing and brightness pops and was afraid it'd ruin it for me, then reports started showing up here on firmware fixes etc. and while I can agree that it's reduced, it's in no way gone. But I'll not get too hung up about that now, here's my take on VT30 vs D8005(D8000 for you guys) in what I believe is a highly objective comparison, and green patches are not taken into consideration.
Black levels:
First off, let's begin with the black levels as they're very important to many (including me). And it would be absolutely wrong to say that they're just as good as the VT30. They aren't. They're visibly worse, so as a batcave tv this one should be ruled out. However, on the bright side (no pun intended), what this tv lacks in black level it surely catch up with in brightness levels. Picture is much brighter than the VT30, which is a real plus and makes the worse black levels tolerable to me. In viewing in a dim lit room, there's little difference between the VT30 and D8005. Point for black levels go to VT30 but a point will be awarded to the Samsung for its bright picture too. So 1-1 after this round.
Contrast/brightness stability:
While I had my VT30, I could not spot any occurences of floating blacks at all, and I couldn't see brightness fluctuations either in other modes than Normal (and Dynamic
), so I consider the VT30 stable. On the D8005 I've both observed floating blacks (more subtle than the 2010 Panasonic range) and these so called brightness pops in addition to the fluctuating brightness experinced on the 2011 Panasonics prior to the updates. None of these issues are very intrusive, and is mostly considered trivial. Still, the point has to be awarded to Panasonic for this one (2-1, in favour of Panasonic)
Colors:
Wow! Just... WOW! Samsungs colors DO really pop as people has been claiming. They look very natural already out of the box. Colors looks so deep and vibrant, without getting the unnatural look of many LCDs. Its brightness really makes it stand out, and it's not all that different to what I'd expect from a good CRT set in either colors or brightness. Point awarded to Samsung, now making it a 2-2 tie.
Line bleeding:
Sets seems rather identical on this one to me, and since both sets exhibits it to some degree no points are given for this (I know it's to be expected for plasmas, though).
3D:
Not going very in depth here. Both TVs performs quite well on 3D, but the Panasonic has less crosstalk. Point awarded to Panasonic.
Menus and other GUI elements:
As I already stated, I really hate the GUI of the Samsungs. It's messy, it's slow and some options are unnecessarily hard to get to. Same goes for the internal tuner and its GUI. Come on, favorite lists cannot even be arranged in preferred order, and you NEED to push "info" to get the banner showing the clock, etc. Panasonic winning this one hands down, making them now lead by 4-2 and this round is won nearly on walkover.
Motion:
This is where it gets interesting... we all have experienced the phosphor lag of the Panasonics. I can't see this on the Samsung, even in faster panning scenes. There's some SLIGHT blurriness going on, but this is nowhere NEAR the phosphor lag on the Panasonics. Undoubtedly a point awarded to Samsung.
Gradations:
On the VT30, I noticed more than once that color gradations, particularly on a blue sky you could often see big steps between the colors. This is also much better on the Samsung, and here silly me thought this just had to be expected on a plasma. I was happy to see I was proven wrong. It's now back to a tie at 4-4. Point went to Samsung; easily.
And since I need something to settle this I will point out that the generic image quality of the Samsung seems to be a little clearer than on the Panasonic. Dithering is slightly less visible, and the fact that it doesn't feel like it's just a tad too dim also contributes to this. So if I were to choose a winner based on this, I'd say Samsung. But only just.
This shows that these sets both performs very well, but the Samsung is not riddled with these infernal green patches a lot of us has been seeing. The D8005's screen is perfectly uniform, and not a single green patch to be seen (or any other colored patch for that matter), and this is where my objectivity stops and my recommendations goes to Samsung.
Would I have chosen the Panasonic over the Samsung if the green patches weren't there? I probably would. I like the design of the set better, I also as I pointed out like the menu system and how the internal tuners works. I do also prefer inky blacks, so I would sacrifice a little white for more black. But as it stands now, I have no problem whatsoever recommending the Samsung for Panasonic owners who simply have had enough of green patches and wants a proper tv now rather than hoping the 2012s will sort this out. I'm happy I did this, and the qualities outweighs the flaws and shortcomings in my opinion. If you read this far, I hope it was worth your time
