Panasonic TH-50PZ800 Plasma TV:
Measurements Measurements

Contrast & Resolution

Peak white level

• Full screen: 19.7fL
• 100 IRE window: 24.3fL

Black level: 0.015fL
Peak contrast ratio: 1620:1
Overscan

• 480i/p: 2.5%
• 720p: 2.5%
• 1080i/p: 0%

Horizontal bandwidth at 1080i

• HDMI/DVI: 37.1MHz
• Component: 37.1MHz

The component input was more rolled off than HDMI, but still visible. Also, the high-frequency burst was very noisy via component.

Interestingly, the difference between full-screen and white-window peak-white levels is much less than on most plasmas I've seen.

The above-white section of the Reverse Ramps with Steps pattern on DVE: HD Basics could still be seen if the Picture (contrast) control was set much higher than I ended up with. However, the clipping pattern on the Spears & Munsil test HD DVD was totally blown out. I set the Picture control according to the Spears & Munsil disc, which resulted in lower light output, but still plenty for a dark room.

Grayscale & Color Temperature

Before calibration, much of the THX mode's grayscale skewed slightly toward blue, though it drifted toward red at 50 IRE.

Calibration brought the grayscale closer to D65 except for 50 IRE, which remained on the red side.

As expected, blue was dominant in the color tracking except at 50 IRE, where red poked through.

After calibration, color tracking was much better except for that pesky red bump at 50 IRE.

Color temperature was pretty good pre-cal, with a dip at 50 IRE.

Calibration couldn't improve color temperature all that much.

Color Accuracy

The THX mode's color gamut was not bad with the Color Management control disabled. Green was slightly oversaturated, and the secondaries were off the mark.

Turning Color Management on made the gamut much worse, especially green oversaturation.

Interestingly, the color gamut via component was nearly perfect.