What is the difference between panasonic s30 and st30

Blu-ray reviews: 1. Trading Score: 4. I don't think the need for THX mode is all that great if you will be doing any type of personal calibration. Thanks for your reply I bought the VT20 last week and have been literally floored by the picture quality - seriously, it tears my LCD to shreds. Congrats on the purchase. I am about 45 hours into the break in slides with about an hour or so of normal TV viewing each night as well.

I don't know much well The break in is to help the phosphors age evenly for the first or so hours. There is also someone online that posts calibrated settings for different models after the break in has been run, this usually gives you a spectacular picture and a great place to start if you need to make minor adjustments. Thanks - so it's more to do with the actual 'health' of the panel rather than improving the image quality? With regards settings, I'm in THX mode at the moment. The 'enhancements' have also been turned off.

It will help get the panel to a point where the calibrated settings posted online may look better to you and be closer to "perfect" I will say that some of the calibration settings you will find involve accessing the service menu which can be a little scary for sure, my G10 setting did. Like I said, I was literally floored when I first got it. Member since: Sep Blu-ray reviews: 4. Trading Score: I am looking for the best color reproduction, particularily the black levels.

That to me is the most important thing in a TV. I could care less about that as I will be using custom settings anyway. Last edited by singhcr; at PM. Member since: Dec Originally Posted by singhcr. All times are GMT. The time now is PM. Archive - Top. United States. Remember New member Lost password. Home Theater. Best Blu-ray Movie Deals. Top deals New deals 12 13 14 15 16 Amazon Blu-ray. Highlights and bright areas looked a bit duller in our dark room as a result, a difference that was most noticeable in mixed dark and light material.

The white hair of the diners and the lights of the chandeliers, not to mention Voldemort's pale face, all looked dimmer in comparison on the ST30, which robbed the scene of some impact and contrast. The snowy ground in Chapter 19 provided another example, and again the ST30 appeared too dim. Of course using Custom could address this issue at the expense of some color and gamma accuracy, and as usual this issue would be much less apparent outside of a side-by-side comparison.

The ST30 outperformed the GT30 handily in terms of gamma accuracy, a strength that showed up as realistic shadows with plenty of detail, as well as faces in well-lit areas that has the right amount of shading without appearing too washed out.

We kept an eye out for "floating blacks" or fluctuations in black level, but didn't notice any during "Harry Potter," nor during the scenes in "Tron: Legacy" that caused them to appear on the GT We also didn't see any overt fluctuation of black level on test patterns with the ST The issue might still be apparent in some scenes, especially at different picture settings, but in our experience it's quite subtle, at best.

Color accuracy: The inability to properly calibrate the ST30's Cinema mode cost it some accolades in this category, but Cinema was accurate enough in the end. Skin tones looked realistic, for example in the faces of Hermione and Harry in Chapter Colors didn't appear as saturated as we'd like to see however, so the leaves on the forest floor and the green of the trees, for example, appeared less impactful and vibrant than on some of the other displays increasing the color control wasn't an option since Cinema on the ST30 still evinces some color decoding errors, albeit not as prevalent they are as Custom.

In its favor the also ST30 delivered a very accurate shade of near-black. As usual we found the 48Hz mode flickered too much to be watchable. On the "Digital Video Essentials" test Blu-ray we noticed shifting lines and minor instability in the downtown Philadelphia buildings during an upward-facing pan.

We didn't see any similar issues during other program material, but assume they might crop up. Panasonic also introduced dejudder processing this year with a setting entitled "Motion smoother. As usual we found both relatively distasteful. The GT25 from last year had a "Blur reduction control" that, when engaged, delivered full-motion resolution. That control has been dropped for , but Motion smoother basically does the same thing: when it was engaged, in either Weak or Strong, we saw an increase in motion resolution in our test pattern see the Geek Box.

As usual any blur was impossible for us to discern with real program material. The ST30 passed our i deinterlacing test with pull-down set to On, but not when we used the default Auto and, despite what the menu explanation says, this setting does affect HDMI sources. We did notice brighter reflections in the ST30's screen compared with the GT25, but overall we still consider its bright room image quality an improvement and among the best plasma screens we've tested.

That said its dimmer picture in Cinema mode is even more of a liability than usual in a bright room, so you'll probably want to use a different, brighter picture setting under the lights at the expense of some accuracy. Crosstalk was minimal, on par with the GT30's, although black levels on the latter were a bit better.

The superior contrast of the UND gave it the edge over the ST30, overcoming its slightly worse crosstalk, while the UND series subbed in for 3D in our lineup outperformed them all. Comparing between the four using "Tron: Legacy," for example, we saw a bit more crosstalk in the Chapter 5 dressing room scene with the Dvisible as ghostly outlines around the girls' forms during one overhead shot, for example On the UND those outlines were much dimmer, while the Panasonics split the difference.

In other scenes, like the piping Quorra's dark suit as she looks in the mirror in Chapter 9, the UND again outperformed the plasmas at reducing crosstalk, although both again showed less than the UND In this scene the GT30 actually showed a bit more crosstalk than the ST30, a difference we assume has to do with the former's brighter image.

The ST30 showed the lightest blacks of the bunch, and as a result dark areas washed out quite a bit compared to the LEDs and, to a lesser extent, the slightly darker GT In the other hand the ST30's whites were dimmest as well, so as a result its picture was the least contrast-y and punchy among the four. We appreciated that the ST30 and GT30 lacked the annoying moire artifact we first noticed on the grid floor of the command room in "Avatar" at , for example when watching the GT As usual we checked out 3D using the default settings--Cinema in the ST30's case--since we don't currently calibrate for 3D.

Power consumption: The TC-P50ST30 uses a bit less power than the TC-P50GT30 post-calibration--perhaps the latter's thinner cabinet is a factor--which allows it to creep into Average territory considering its screen size and match the "efficient-for-a-plasma" G20 from It's no power miser compared to LEDs, however. In case you're wondering, Standard is still woefully dim, albeit brighter than the GT30, while the Cinema mode we used for testing consumed watts mainly since it's dimmer than Custom, which is what we used for the "Calibrated" numbers here since it actually hit 40 fL.

David Katzmaier. I cant seem to figure out why its not lighting up. I bet its something simple! I am thinking about wall mounting this. Will this mount be ok? Thanks again. I don't think the remote control has any backlighting I'm afraid.

The wall mount should be fine, as long as it can take the weight and matches the mounting points at the rear of the ST I want to future proof as much as possible but obviously am conscious of cost. I also use a non HD Humax PVR so presumably can use this with either box hence the benefit of the GT which has Freesat HD inbuilt although my plan is in future to buy a Humax HD box - perhaps the compromise is to buy the ST and a Humax HD now but I've also read there are differences in Gamma tracking which sways me to the GT as its a superior model hence the question now as the price differential has increased Personally if you can afford it I'd go for the GT30, it's a great TV for all the reasons you've mentioned and with the two pairs of glasses there really isn't much difference in price.

Steve Withers said:. Click to expand I'd give it a week but if the problem persists then I'd suggest replacing the unit. What is the best settings for my Pana? How can I calibrate my TV? I'd use the True Cinema preset and then set the Brightness and Contrast to suit your viewing environment. Im sending this TV back as it is faulty. Have a pink splodge mack bang in the middle of the screen.

Amazon don't have any more in stock either unless I go for a 42". Is their a non 3D version of this TV? Do you recommend any other plasma for gaming like LG etc? I have a tight budget see. There is, it's the S Thanks for that info. What is the difference between the S30 and the S30B?

Same specs? I dont care about 3D. All I care about is gaming, input lag, motion blur and contrast a bit. Any help would be great! Last edited: Feb 18, The S30 and S30B are the same, the suffix just denotes country of sale. If your primary interest is 2D gaming, I'd go for the S Thanks again for your help Steve.

I have sent back the ST30 as I said it was faulty with the dreaded green blob in the screen! Cant wait. One thing though. Do you think I would notice a difference between the contrast level of the S30 to the ST30? I think the S30 is meant to be 2,, and the ST is meant to be 5,, HonoredShadow said:.

Well I will only be playing games with just one lamp on that is not situated any where that the screen can be affected by it. So would I still notice the difference?