Panasonic Viera TH-46PZ80U 46-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV

By HDTVReviewsDigest On October 25, 2011 · 3 Comments

Panasonic Viera TH-46PZ80U 46-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV

1920 x 1080 Resolution
1000000:1 Dynamic Contrast Ratio for the Brightest whites and darkest blacks
4096 Shades of Gradation for spectacular Color Reproduction
Viera LinK™ HDAVI Control lets you operate all of your home theater components by pressing a single button on your TV’s remote control
GalleryPlayer® allows you to enjoy the world’s finest high definition art and photography on your Panasonic HD plasma TV

The 80Us sits above the PX80Us with a better panel that is a native 1080p and higher contrast ratio and comes below the PZ85Us that have a higher contrast ratio and more features. Unlike the higher-end offerings the PZ80Us don’t have the one-sheet glass design or the 24p mode. It remains to be seen whether this means these televisions can’t accept 24 frames per second content at all.With its 2008 Panasonic Viera Plasmas, Panasonic brings anastonishing 1,000,000:1 contrast ration to the table. advanced pixel resolution and image-processing technology with the plasma TV’s natural ability to beautifully reproduce fast moving images, so every detail is rendered with amazing clarity, and all the action is delivered with a high degree of fluidity.

What’s New This Year?

Super Contrast–native contrast ratios on the PZ85, PZ800 and PX 850 series are 30,000:1, double last year’s 15,000:1.
Dynamic contrast ratios are up to 1,000,000:1.
new anti-reflective filter; lead-free “Tough Under Force” panel is resistant to impacts and scratches
x.v. Color and Deep Color (HDMI 1.3 features)
Game Mode auto-adjusts image quality suitable to games and includes anti-image retention
Viera Link is now compatible with Onkyo and Yamaha home theater systems
At least 3 HDMI inputs on all models (4 on PZ800 and PZ850 series)
THX Certification on PZ800 and PZ850 series

Which Viera is Right For You?

Click here to see a comparison of step up features on each Viera series.

Amazing color reproduction

The incredible black reproduction of a Panasonic High-Definition Plasma TV results in impressive contrast and beautiful, natural colors. So you’ll get warm, accurate skin tones, gorgeous greens, breathtaking blues and vivid reds. For color that’s as rich and bold as life itself, look to a Panasonic Plasma TV.

Consistent brightness from any angle

A Panasonic Plasma combines anti-glare and anti-reflection technology with the natural light-emitting properties of plasma, to give you a super-wide viewing range with a crisp, beautiful image from almost any angle.

Smooth, graceful motion

When you’re watching sports or movies with fast-motion graphics, you want a TV that can keep up with the action. With over 900 lines of moving picture, self-illuminating plasma displays eliminate afterimages in fast-action scenes. So whether you’re watching a sporting event or an action-packed movie, you’ll always get the most impressive viewing experience possible.

1,000,000:1 Contrast

The Panasonic’s Real Black system (a pre-discharge suppression system) and improved panel production processes combine to reproduce outstanding blacks with superb contrast. Each image is richly expressive, from bright scense, like scorching desert landscapes, to dark cave scenes. Compare the image produced by conventional HDTV on the left to the Real Black image produced on the right

More Colors

Viera HDTVs support the xvYCC color profile (Extended YCC Colorimetry for Video Applications), or “x.v. color” for short. Standard RGB color space allows the display of a portion of the colors that are viewable to the human eye. The next generation “xvYCC” color space actually offers an available range of colors that exceeds what human eyes can recognize.

Next-generation “xvYCC” color space supports 1.8 times as many colors as existing HDTV signals
Lets HDTVs display colors more accurately
Enables displays with more natural and vivid colors

Deep Color

Where x.v. color expands the available range of colors your HDTV can display, Deep Color increases the number of colors your HDTV can display within that range, for smoother transitions from color to color.

Lets HDTVs and other displays go from millions of colors to billions of colors
Eliminates on-screen color banding, for smooth tonal transitions and subtle gradations between colors
Enables increased contrast ratio
Can represent many times more shades of gray between black and white.

Connectivity

Viera flat panel HDTVs interact with an array of high-definition devices and services, making it easy for consumers to access and enjoy content as never before. As of 2008, Viera Link is compatible with Onkyo and Yamaha home theater systems.

Videos and stills recorded on SD cards can easily be viewed via the SD slots on Panasonic Blu-Ray Disc players and Viera HDTVs.	Viera Link means easy connectivity via HDMI cables. Finally, consumers can easily operate their Blu-Ray Disc players, DVD recorders and home theater systems with a single remote control device.


4 HDMI inputs to connect all of your devices directly to your television.

Long Life

Panasonic plasma panels are rated to last 100,000 hours, which is about 30 years of regular or 11 years of non-stop usage before the brightness of the display is halved.

Get Full HD with Blu-Ray Disc Players

A Panasonic 1080p plasma television is able to render 1920×1080 pixels, but standard DVDs have a resolution of just 720×480. Blu-ray discs output true 1080p High-Definition resolution and have a storage capacity ten times greater than standard DVDs, so no pixel gos to waste.

Which is the Right Viera for You?

	Screen Size Measured Diagonally	1080p Full HD 1920 x 1080 pixels	Native Contrast Ratio	PC Input	THX Cert	24p	Speakers	HDMI Inputs	One Sheet of Glass Design	Swivel Base	Shades of Gradation	H.264 Codec	Digital Cinema Color	Studio Reference Mode	Pro Setting Menu	Serial Port	Standard Features
TH-42PX80U	42 inches		15,000:1				2	3			4,096						480 Hz Sub-field Drive Technology Anti-Reflective Filter Viera Link HDAVI Control Built-in SD Card Slot w/Photo Viewer Deep Color Technology x.v. Color 3D Color Mangement Sub-Pixel Controller Motion Pattern Noise Reduction Anti-Image Retention Mode Game Mode Scratch and Impact Rsistant Panel 100,000 Hours to Panel Half-Brightness (>30 years @ 8 hours/day) Lead-free Panel
TH-50PX80U	50 inches		15,000:1				2	3			4,096
TH-42PZ80U	42 inches		20,000:1				2	3			4,096
TH-46PZ80U	46 inches		20,000:1				2	3			4,096
TH-50PZ80U	50 inches		20,000:1				2	3			4,096
TH-42PZ85U	42 inches		30,000:1				2	3			4,096
TH-46PZ85U	46 inches		30,000:1				2	3			4,096
TH-50PZ85U	50 inches		30,000:1				2	3			4,096
TH-42PZ800U	42 inches		30,000:1				4	4			4,096
TH-46PZ800U	46 inches		30,000:1				4	4			4,096
TH-50PZ800U	50 inches		30,000:1				4	4			4,096
TH-58PZ800U	58 inches		30,000:1				4	4			4,096
TH-46PZ850U	46 inches		30,000:1				4	4			5,120
TH-50PZ850U	50 inches		30,000:1				4	4			5,120
TH-58PZ850U	58 inches		30,000:1				4	4			5,120
TH-65PZ850U	65 inches		30,000:1				4	4			5,120

List Price: $ 1,699.99

Price:

3 Responses to Panasonic Viera TH-46PZ80U 46-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV

C. Picardal says:

October 25, 2011 at 11:35 pm

40 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

Exceeds my high expectations, June 2, 2008

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C. Picardal –

This review is from: Panasonic Viera TH-46PZ80U 46-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV (Electronics)

I’ve been shopping for an HDTV for a while now, waiting for the prices to fall and/or the features and tech to improve. I narrowed my current list to the Sharp 52 & 46″ LCD (LC-52D64U/LC-46D64U), Panasonic 50″ 720p plasma (PX series), Hitachi 50 720p plasma (P50S601), Samsung’s 46″ LCDs and 50″ 720p plasmas and of coarse the Holy Grail – Pioneer Kuro 50″ plasma even if only at 720p. I almost bought the Pioneer Kuro 5080 when I saw it on sale for $2400. It was a tough decision not to buy it and I still regret it to this day. Now I can not find the 5080 let alone for $2400. That was the one that got away about 4 weeks ago. So I kept on shopping.

I came across the Pannasonic TH-46PZ80U at ABC Warehouse and they were having a weekend only sale. These were just release to retail. I took the plunge after I saw the picture on the display model. To say it was gorgeous is an understatement and that was with less than optimal component signal in a bright showroom.

I got it home and set it up on my new TV stand, I adjusted the picture (eyeballed it for now) and connected the cable and PS3 via HDMI. Threw in the Blu-Ray of “Live Free or Die Hard” and was blown away with the picture quality. Made some minor picture tweaks to suit my tastes and sat down and let it all soak in. I do believe I heard angels singing as I basked in the beauty of 1080p. Blacks were deep and shadow detail was impressive. A review said there is a red push on the PZ85U series but I did not notice it on the PZ80U. There may have been but it suits my tastes if that’s the case. I was afraid of glare being an issue with the plasma screen but I really did not notice it too much. It is there if you look for it but it wasn’t distracting during the movie even though it was mid afternoon in my bright sunlit living room.

Since my living room gets a lot of ambient light, I was leaning towards LCD for this reason only. But the fact that the picture washes out on LCDs as you move off center really bothered me and I could not get over that issue. So I crossed off the LCDs. The Pioneer Kuro did have a slightly better picture overall as I viewed it in the showcased home theater setup @ BB. But it wasn’t $1000 better than my Panny. On the PZ80U, sports was flawless on it. No motion blur at all. Not even the 120Hz LCDs can come close to plasmas here. I watch the Red Wings beat Pittsburgh in game 4 of the finals and was in heaven. Watching my beloved Wings in hi-def get a step closer to The Cup highlighted my weekend filled with Blu-Ray and HDTV glory. The PZ85U series has a higher contrast 30000:1 panel but as I compared the 2 side-by-side, I really could not tell the difference between them. Now, I could tell the difference between the PX and the PZ (720p vs. 1080p). 1080p is the way to go! Some will say that you won’t be able to discern between 720p and 1080p resolution at 50″ or under screen size. Bull!!! Maybe under 42″ might be more accurate. But even I could tell on 42″ at viewing distance. It was just on the Pioneer Kuro that it really did not matter as much – the picture was that good.

The Samsung plasmas in my pricerange had really good image quality and features as did the Hitachi but could not keep up with the Panasonic and Pioneer in the most important area – the picture. Just my opinion.

So now you know that the picture on the PZ80U is “all that”. Connections-wise, it was a fairly standard package with 3 HDMI 1.3 (one front), 2 component and an SD card reader but no PC input. I like the looks of it but not as much as the thin bezels of the Sharp, Samsung, and Toshiba. The base does not adjust like the motorized one on the Hitachi but its not problem for me. The sound quality from the speakers are decent and will due until I get my surround system.

Overall, I’d recommend the Panasonic TH-46PZ80U to anyone looking for a 1080p plasma with excellent picture quality at a reasonable price.

Get it for: deep blacks, shadow detail, overall picture quality, high refresh rates

Pass on it for: non-adjustable base, power consumption (628w, are you kidding me?!?!)

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Comments (3)
James A. Price says:

October 26, 2011 at 12:08 am

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

Panasonic Viera TH-46PZ80U 46-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV, July 12, 2008

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James A. Price –

This review is from: Panasonic Viera TH-46PZ80U 46-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV (Electronics)

This is as good as it gets. Great TV and a great company to do business with. The TV came by special truck and was setup by them in a few minutes. White glove service all the way. Oh, did I fail to mention it was the lowest price as well. $700 less than Best Buy!

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Ken Bailey "mikoyan" says:

October 26, 2011 at 12:47 am

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

Awesome TV…, April 16, 2008

By

Ken Bailey “mikoyan” (Ypsilanti, MI United States) –

This review is from: Panasonic Viera TH-46PZ80U 46-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV (Electronics)

After spending about three months of looking at different HDTV’s, I couldn’t decided if I wanted projection, LCD or Plasma. I ruled out projection fairly quickly as it doesn’t have the angle of view I’m used to with my tube TV (I can be sitting at my computer and still look at the TV). So it was down to LCD or Plasma. I didn’t want to spend that much money on a TV so that ruled out Sony, Sharp and Samsung (I like the pictures on those but you seem to pay a premium) so I was looking for a middle tier HDTV.

I had a 36″ tube TV and I din’t want to lose height on that, so I did the math and figured out I would need a 44″ TV in widescreen. Unfortunately, they don’t make those, so it was either a 42″ or 46″. I was going to settle on a Philips 47″ and was about ready to plunk down the money.

I went into the store and got a heck of a deal on this one. It looked nice enough, so I got it. So far I am pretty happy. The blacks are pretty darned close to black. HD shines on it. Even my old DVD player shines on it. I could see details in STar Wars that I haven’t seen since watching it in the theater. It’s not quite a Sony but I think it’s better than what I was looking at.

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