Pioneer PDP4280XD Review

[gav121]

Nice,

thanks

[gav121]

A question for Vincent or anyone that has seen a 428 and/or 508 in action:

PWM noise, is it visible from a viewing distance of 8-10 feet? How noisy are these pioneers compared to other high-end plasmas or lcd's?

Cheers
Tom   

No visible signs of PWM noise from 7+ Feet, I also have a LG 42inch LCD and the Pioneer is indeed nosier.

[TomJones83]

A question for Vincent or anyone that has seen a 428 and/or 508 in action:

PWM noise, is it visible from a viewing distance of 8-10 feet? How noisy are these pioneers compared to other high-end plasmas or lcd's?

Cheers
Tom   

No visible signs of PWM noise from 7+ Feet, I also have a LG 42inch LCD and the Pioneer is indeed nosier.

Thanks! I take it you are happy with it and that the noise doesn't bother you too much?

[gav121]

A question for Vincent or anyone that has seen a 428 and/or 508 in action:

PWM noise, is it visible from a viewing distance of 8-10 feet? How noisy are these pioneers compared to other high-end plasmas or lcd's?

Cheers
Tom   

No visible signs of PWM noise from 7+ Feet, I also have a LG 42inch LCD and the Pioneer is indeed nosier.

Thanks! I take it you are happy with it and that the noise doesn't bother you too much?

Yep, love the TV, noise is not an issue, also the review stated the plasma has an audible buzz, though mines whisper quite:S

[teddy]

I am a bit depressed at the moment... now before you quickly recommend the guys in the white coats, I shall explain:

I have been waiting for all the hype of the LCD/plasma market (and the prices) to fall a bit over the last 12 months.  Prices have fallen to around the £1,000 mark on the internet.  I have been scouring the reviews and (by the way, this forum is one of the very best for reviews!) I shortlisted my new 40/42" toy to the following:

1.  Sharp LC42XD1E, seemed best spec at the price, but got concerned about the poor viewing angle and need for HD source to get the best from the TV, plus banding problems
2.  Sony 40W2000 - gobsmacked by the rave reviews/awards, but wondered about the motion blurring and clouding problem
3.  Panasonic TH42PX700
4.  Pioneer PDP-4270XD, but then heard from a sales person that this model is now discontinued, replaced by the new 4280XD

But now the PDP-4280 is launched and it has complicated things!  I like your reviews and I am now wondering whether I should now wait another few months for the price to drop by circa £200, or just take the plunge and get it?!  Or just choose one from the 4 above?  I won't be gaming for a while, until my son gets older (he's only three yrs old).

Please help - I don't want to spend more than around £1200 because I'll still need to shell out for a TV stand and home cinema system!  Which of the five mentioned above would you recommend?

My requirements are: I have a small family of three of us and an odd shaped room, so viewing angles are important; will be watching a lot of sports and films / DVDs on SD for a long while before I subscribe to HD, but still want to future proof; and I'll be sitting around 10-12 ft from the screen.

[swinster]

Well, IMHO and as by no means an expert, I would loose the LCD screens immediately, so this narrows it down to the Panny and the Pio. Given your budget then the only choice is the Panny which you can pick up with stand and still get change. However, on performance, especially with SD media, the Pio looks as though it will win. Again I stress that I have not seen these side by side and have only spent week reading and debating over the very same dilemma.

I personally have upped my budget and will go for the Pio in around September/October. Mainly because the room the TV is destined for in not ready, but also in speculation that a new 1080p Pio will be out in September. However, I believe this will  only be a 50" screen and I doubt this will have the effect to reduce the prices of the other Pio models, but I'll wait and see, and I doubt they will rise.

[Anjou]

In the review it mentions that Pioneer allows the user to change the white balance, but what do you use to do this? The colour temp? If so, how do I stop my whites the top end of bleaching out - on freeview people often have shiny spots on their faces and windows or shirt collars are too white, losing detail. I've tried dropping contrast but it doesn't help and just dulls the image.

Any Clues? Vincent?

[gav121]

In the review it mentions that Pioneer allows the user to change the white balance, but what do you use to do this? The colour temp? If so, how do I stop my whites the top end of bleaching out - on freeview people often have shiny spots on their faces and windows or shirt collars are too white, losing detail. I've tried dropping contrast but it doesn't help and just dulls the image.

Any Clues? Vincent?

itd help if you post your current settings???

[Vincent]

In the review it mentions that Pioneer allows the user to change the white balance, but what do you use to do this? The colour temp? If so, how do I stop my whites the top end of bleaching out - on freeview people often have shiny spots on their faces and windows or shirt collars are too white, losing detail. I've tried dropping contrast but it doesn't help and just dulls the image.

Any Clues? Vincent?

Hi Anjou

Your problem sounds like above white clipping... are you sending RGB signal to your Pioneer, or using a splitter by any chance? If so, try setting [Option] > [HDMI Input] > [Video] to "Colour-4".

If it works, thank Andrew Fee who discovered this issue (he's reviewing a Pioneer at the moment). I won't steal his thunder... I'll leave it for him to explain when he publishes his review.

Warmest regards
Vincent

[Plasmatron]

Hello.

Sorry for my bad English


Your`s Pioneer 4280 test is great ! ,best on web !


Would i ask you about choosing 42" or 50" Pioneer plasma tv?

I plan to buy Pioneer 428XD or 508 XD, which is better (picture quality)?

But i think: is the 42"to small to cinema experiense.Or not ?

My distanse from the screen is about 2,6-2,8m (sofa),max-3,5m-4,5m.(second chair)
For my first distanse better choice will be 428 ?
for 1024x768 resolution screen,door effect is visible closer than 2m,
if i sit far than 2m,pixels are not visible.
The 50" screen will be better,if resolution is 1920x1080 for 2,5-3m distance.
508 is very expencive:(

Thanks for help.

Best regards.
Vladimir,Estonia.

[sicofante]

I was wondering what this TV was like for gaming with the PS3, there seems to be an accepted wisdom of gaming=LCD, is this truly the case?

It's a case of give and take. For gaming, LCD is brighter and not prone to image retention/ screenburn, but suffers from more motion blurring. Having said that, the Pioneer PDP4280XD can go as bright, and I've not seen even the slightest hint of image retention, so I guess the only shortcoming when it comes to gaming is its low native resolution which means that you can't full take advantage of the HD games.

I have the same concerns about games and burn-in, image-retention, etc. If any such issues arise, would they be permanent or will they fade away at some point? I'll be using a HTPC for feeding the plasma and while I'm not a passionate gamer, I love to play some old MAME titles every now and then (otherwise, the set will be used for film and TV)

Also, will these new Pioneer plasmas take 1:1 1980x1080p from a computer over DVI/HDMI?

[Anjou]

In the review it mentions that Pioneer allows the user to change the white balance, but what do you use to do this? The colour temp? If so, how do I stop my whites the top end of bleaching out - on freeview people often have shiny spots on their faces and windows or shirt collars are too white, losing detail. I've tried dropping contrast but it doesn't help and just dulls the image.

Any Clues? Vincent?

Hi Anjou

Your problem sounds like above white clipping... are you sending RGB signal to your Pioneer, or using a splitter by any chance? If so, try setting [Option] > [HDMI Input] > [Video] to "Colour-4".

If it works, thank Andrew Fee who discovered this issue (he's reviewing a Pioneer at the moment). I won't steal his thunder... I'll leave it for him to explain when he publishes his review.

Warmest regards
Vincent

Ah yes - that was the problem! I discovered it at the same time as Andrew (he posts on the AV forums and has been very helpful to people) by comparing Auto to the manual colour modes. However, Andrew actually explained why this cure it as well.

All I have to do now is cure these blasted plainbows, which seem to have changed from red, green and blue flashes to yellow and blue....

[jeedpi]

Hi Everyone,

  First of all thank you Vincent for your detailed reviews.
  (please forgive my poor english)

  For years I wanted a HD TV. I was postponing the decision for various reason.
I've been disappointed by the first HD ready plasma that I've seen because the pixel effect was very
important in my opinion. That being said, I was waiting for Full HD tv even if I was planning to buy a 42".

  I've finally acquired a PDP4280XD 2 weeks ago which is not a Full HD screen.
I must admit that I'm still a little bit scared to see pixels when I will see 1080p (blue ray) films, but
while I was hesitating between the Pioneer and the Panasonic Full HD screen, I asked to see SD images
(tv) and I preferred the Pioneer image. The vendor also made a point when he argued that animation and
colors are also very important in the quality of a plasma screen.

The first movie we've seen on the PDP4280 was "memoirs of a Geisha" and we were very impressed by the
colours (and the image size since our previous tv was 45cm).

Anyway I finally have a question : my 2 main usage for the tv at the moment are sports and movies (dvd at the moment and  blue ray or HD-DVD as soon as I will feel comfortable about how I could choose the best product).

I'm only playing with STANDARD/SPORT/MOVIE mode and the image size (I'm a little bit confused with the difference between LARGE, FULL, CINEMA, etc.) I'm in automatic mode for now, but sometimes the top and bottom black line are very big for a film which is supposed to be in 16/9.

I like the fact that the colors are very flamboyant in the default configuration,
but I'm looking for the best settings possible. When I changed the colour theme I was disappointed with the
result (too insipid this time)

My 2 questions should be very easy (I hope):
- what would be your settings recommendation for the best possible image for movie and sports
- what is the best size settings to avoid distortion and what are the differences between large, CINEMA, FULL,
etc. I've noticed that ZOOM hide part of the image so I avoid this settings. I also don't like when there are
border on the left and on the right of the screen.

I've also one additionnal question because I felt silly and it ruined my pleasure on the very first day :
- I told my friends about my new tv and the fact that I like it a lot and one of my "geeky" friend asked me
technical settings. Then he said : "you will find people distorted because you bought a 4/3 resolution plasma with a 16/9 size and anyway I can't understand why they can make so expensive tv with such a crappy resolution (1024/768).  Following this remark I found your test on Internet and many thanks again because it made me feel quite better.

It's a long post, I guess because I'm not used to posting.

Thank you
Jeremy

[Vincent]

Hi Jeremy

Your English is perfect, no need to apologise.

[Movie] mode in [Colour Space] 2 should be good enough for most people. For sports use [PureCinema] off and [Drive Mode] 2; for movies [PureCinema] Advanced and [Drive Mode] 3.

I personally don't mind the black bars on top (2.35:1)/ side (4:3) of the TV as long as I'm not missing out on any cropped portions and the aspect ratio looks right... sorry I can't help you more there.

Warmest regards
Vincent

[gav121]

Vincent!!!!!,

please post the settings, im sure everyone else wants to know just as bad as i do,

quite ignoring us lol,

thanks in advance