Before 1995, when LG was known as 'GoldStar', it wasn't exactly famed for making high-end products. Its rebranding as LG has seen it produce equipment of a much higher standard, but it still frequently takes us by surprise with how good many of its products are.
Now LG's presented us with one of its new range of plasma TVs, and we're very excited indeed. LG, you see, is one of only three companies making plasma TVs these days, and we're suckers for this technology. It offers deeper black levels and more modest brightness than LCD technology, and generally strong handling of standard-definition TV. The question is: does the 50-inch, 1080p 50PK590 have anything new to add to last year's model? It's available now for around £1,000.
Beauty and the bezel
After taking the 50PK590 out of the box, the first thing you notice is that it's quite heavy. A fairly weak adult male can lift it with few problems, but not very far. This is becoming unusual in TVs, which are generally getting lighter and lighter. The 50PK590 doesn't come with its stand attached, but it takes no time at all to knock it up yourself. There are just seven screws to fix, and you're ready to go.
The styling of the TV is a lovely surprise. LG has undertaken considerable work to reduce the size of the bezel surrounding the screen. Especially on the left and right of the screen, it's now down to waifer-thin proportions. Slim bezels really make a TV look fabulous, making the picture so much more prominent. We're thrilled to see LG continuing to improve on previous designs, because we understand it's quite an engineering challenge. LG calls this a 'Razor frame', and we heartily approve.
Scart dying a slow death
Turn the TV around, and you'll see the standard four HDMI sockets. You'll also notice the 50PK590 has only one Scart socket. It's good that this nasty, clunky port is being phased out, but if you have plenty of legacy equipment knocking around, it might inconvenience you. That said, if you're spending a grand on a TV and are still using VHS, you should probably reassess your priorities.
Lack of twin Scart sockets aside, there are component and VGA inputs to hook up computers and other high-definition analogue sources. There's also a digital audio out, for connecting the TV to your AV system, which we'll come back to.
THX for calibrating my TV
The nuts and bolts of this TV are, fortunately, amazing too -- we hate pretty TVs that don't have the performance to back it up. Firstly, the 50PK590 screen is THX-certified. That means it's been calibrated to get the most out of movies, and ensure the picture quality is as the director intended. Some claim it's not worth the hassle, but we welcome it, if only because it gives users a mode that will increase picture quality over and above the default. Also, anything that steers people away from using the 'dynamic' mode is a good thing.
The THX mode has two options -- either the standard 'movie' mode for the evening, or a setting that optimises the TV for bright rooms in daytime. If the THX mode doesn't impress you, the TV can be calibrated by an engineer certified by the Imaging Science Foundation. This will set you back about £200 and results in an image calibrated to your specific room -- something no default setting can offer. This is probably more worthwhile on a mid-range TV, such as this, than a higher-end set with better defaults, but you should weigh it up.
Fuss-free Freeview HD
Freeview HD is now officially launched and should be available for around 50 per cent of the country by the time the World Cup kicks off in June. The 50PK590 is one of the new models rushing on to the market with a built-in DVB-T2 tuner. Not much fuss is made about it, though -- the TV simply tunes itself in, and then, when you browse the channel list, you'll see BBC HD on channel 50, ITV1 HD on 51, and 4HD on 52.
The addition of Freeview HD makes the digital audio output we mentioned earlier even more important. Because HD channels can carry 5.1-channel Dolby Digital sound, it would be a terrible shame if this TV couldn't send them to an amp to be decoded and passed to some decent speakers. Happily it can, and this feature is also useful for media playback, which we'll come to shortly.
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amun82 21 May 2011
Good: price tag
Bad: burn in and image retention and lack of headphone socket
Comment: Good points in short: excellent picture quality (in dark environment - not so much in bright conditions as it is highly reflective), it's slim, easy to use.
Now, I will focus on the bad points of this plasma that were not mentioned in most reviews I read before I purchased this TV:
> burn-in and image retention
After just a few months of using the plasma ( anything from 5min to 8hours) there appears to be a white burn-in in the bottom left and right corners. To be more specific these are HUD elements from one of Xbox games Bad Company 2 (frame and digits size 3 inch by 3 inch). It's barely visible, nevertheless you can spot it on a grey background. I made LG aware of the problem. They came back with two points: the first is that warranty does not cover burn-in and the second is to run "white wash" which is simply white image which you need to keep on for some time. "white wash" no improvement at all. Now, I was aware of the concept of burn-in before I purchased this plasma and I was particularly careful not to leave still images for prolonged periods. But hey you can't help it sometimes some channels/games will have some still images present for some time - that's the way it is - I bought the plasma to use and enjoy it not to have it off or on 20% of brightness to prevent burn-in. Despite this the screen still suffered. I think this is quite bad that it is so easy to get burn-in on this otherwise good quality product.
> no headphone socket
Might be a problem if you want to use your headphones with your TV but your hi-fi / sound system connected to your TV does not have one either.
>reflections
The screen is highly reflective. I am aware of the fact that all screens reflect images to some extent but this model is a special one in this sense. You can use it as a mirror in bright conditions;).
The above is the reason why I took away 2 stars (I was tempted to take away 3 stars). Shame about the burn-in! I also have to add that before I bought this TV I read numerous reviews (including CNET's) and I am quite disappointed that none of them warned or mentioned about the highly likely burn in problem - which is very important as it damages your TV permanently. All I read was that "modern" plasmas are not really affected by this problem. Wrong! I would expect that such well known reviewer as CNET would mention this. It just shows how superficial and biased those reviews are.
fezzaman 24 December 2010
Good: Picture superb in HD
Bad: Sound not that great
Comment: This TV is superb for the money. The picture on HD is breathtaking, if you take the time to set it up properly. Sound quality is good but there's not much bass. It's useable though.
50" is pushing the boundaries of TV on standard definition, and I struggled to achieve a satisfactory result on FREEVIEW (non- HD channels) This is more a fault of the quality on standard definition than the TV itself.
We previously owned a Panasonic 42" Plasma, and the jump to 50" does make a difference in picture sharpness.
If you are watching standard definition on this TV, to save hours of your own time, try these settings.
Make sure "Energy Saving" is set to OFF.
Set the TV to "expert 1" and then contrast 85, brightness 55, H sharpness 70, V sharpness 70, colour 40, tint 0. Then in the sub menu OFF,OFF, MEDIUM, AUTO, ON, STANDARD, OFF, AUTO, OFF. In the third menu leave everything at the factory settings but make sure the colour temp is set at "WARM"
clancaster22 20 July 2010
Good: Huge, clear, good looking, good features
Bad: Slight shadowing across screen
Comment: There's only one thing I don't like about this TV and its shadowing. It isn't that noticeable unless you really look for it most of the time, but when credits are scrolling or bars are on the screen the tele seems to have a darker line ( or shadow ) running all the way across.
Like I say its usually not noticeable, but if you look for it it can get annoying.
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