Hitachi 42PD5200 review

The screen can also 'wipe' itself by neutralising all the pixels periodically, to prevent any screen burn. The 61-inch NEC plasma that we had recently was very good at recognising still images -- even after 10 seconds it would begin to move the image around pixel by pixel to stop you burning anything in to your lovely new screen. The default setting for Screen Wipe on the 42PD5200 is 60 minutes, but during the first few weeks of use you might want to change it to lower than this or do it manually yourself, especially if you are going to be playing computer games or making any presentations. There's also a built-in screen saver designed to tackle this problem, which will intervene after 20 minutes of inactivity.

If you're really paranoid about the life of the plasma, you can dim the panel brightness down across two settings, from normal to Extend 1 and Extend 2, which is something we normally only see on projectors. On the remote, you can also activate cross-source Picture in Picture, as well as freeze and zoom (which actually alters the aspect ratio as opposed to zooming in) on any of the pictures.

Performance
Bear in mind that the actual resolution of this screen is 1,024x1,024, not true widescreen. But it's not too important a factor, because the picture is detailed and it still offers a high-resolution image.

We haven't seen any other plasma do better, but analogue video on a plasma is, to use the old terminology, like putting a Mini engine in a Ferrari. You'll be punished by an image that's barely watchable. However, invest in a FreeView box and the RGB Scart feed is much improved, with rich colour depth and better detail. True, there's still a lot of noise and dot crawl if you look up close, but at normal viewing distances you'll only be able to notice the great depth of contrast and superb colours.

High definition is predictably where it's at. Whether using the component inputs or DVI socket to service the screen, the detail and smoothness of the image was superb. We used Xbox Media Centre to link up a DivX HD version of Star Wars Episode II, and the fast-moving chase through the skies at the beginning of the film was incredibly involving, while 1080i clips from Microsoft's website were just as gorgeous. If, like us, you're looking forward to the maiden voyage of Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, this is the screen to take with you.

Edited by Mary Lojkine