Panasonic VIERA TC-P42G25 42-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV

10 Review to this product

• 

  Rev Kurt
  June 24th, 2010 on 8:08 pm

  Rating

  The new Panasonic plasma set is an amazing step up in picture quality and varieties of options available in use, settings, and convenience if one can master all the instructions. As an old guy this was not easy. I only hope the performance continues without malfunctions developing.
• 

  Terry Turner
  June 24th, 2010 on 8:12 pm

  Rating

  Light weight and mounts on the wall nicely. Outstanding picture/audio quality. Connects to the my network easily.
• 

  Steve
  June 24th, 2010 on 10:30 pm

  Rating

  Although I have been working in the AV industry for many years I have been holding back – seen a lot of feature hype and hoopla go by but this is the first flat screen plasma I liked with a price that was reasonable.
  
  For a couple of years now I have been looking for an HDTV with wide viewing angels – worked well in dark or well lit room without too much reflection – rich accurate color reproduction – Works well with games or sports motion – works well with over the air/cable SD signals or SD DVD play back – ease of use – easy break in – Minimal chance of image retention – Multiple input/outputs – reasonable price.
  
  We have had our 42G25 now for several weeks and have been very pleased with our choice – did have to buy the component cables for our Wii which improved the picture quality fairly well for an SD video game. We also purchased a Panasonic Bluray player with the TV it works nicely with SD or Bluray playback – The TV’s THX certified picture setting is very pleasing and color accurate for movies – I use the Custom setting for over the air and cable TV watching with a few minor adjustment tweaks I got excellent results. Both the TV and player have internet abilities – I have used utube so far works fine. Also I was easily able to updated the firmware for both TV and player. Bought a Mini DVI to HDMI adapter to use my 2 yr. old MacBook computer works fine @ 1920x1080p resolution streaming Hulu etc. There is an RGB port on the TV but only lower resolutions work – since RGB is limited anyway I would use the HDMI port if your computer is 1080p capable. The sound is a little on the tinny side for me but my wife doesn’t seem to mind it personally I usually use the AV amplifier when watching TV or Movies. The TV remote is easy to use and lights up. The BR player remote is also easy use but does not light up not sure I get that – it makes it very awkward to use in the dark. So I just put everything on our Sony universal 2100 remote and the wife was happy controlling all sources with one touch screen remote that lights up.
  
  One last thing – I’m keeping an eye on the alleged “rising black levels” but I have not notice anything yet. I’ll repost if anything comes up. However I do recommend this TV to all it’s a good value, sharp accurate picture and a great product.
  
• 

  Miha Ahronovitz
  June 25th, 2010 on 4:35 am

  Rating

  I already have a Panasonic 58″ since 2006, and it is in my opinion one of the best TVs on the market. I wanted to replace -in the second smaller family area upstairs – a TV replacing our old 32″. I bought first a Samsung 46″ LCD (not LED) and the screen seemed too big for the area. Maybe this was a subjective impression, because the view from sides was full of spots tainting the picture. They disappeared only if one sits right in front of the TV. I returned the TV next day.

  I looked at all Panasonic plasma. The large electronics store and Costco sell cheaper 720p versions. Even the model S2, one step below G25, although it is a 1080p, it does not have the “infinite black” feature. I located the Panasonic G25 42″ in another electronic store. The difference between S2 and G25 was day and night for me. The sound is more than good for me. One feature G25 has and S2 doesn’t is the swivel from the base. Little detail, but significant in smaller rooms.

  The price on Amazon was good. The reputation of Amazon is re-assuring even when buying a large item like a TV. However the G25 is sold by an Amazon third party. In the remote possibility that I need to return the item, I know from experience, Amazon policy is to redirect the buyer to the seller, and only if the authorized seller does not solve the problem, the Amazon will return the money. The process works, but it may take months.

  This is the reason I purchased the Panasonic G25 locally. I highly recommend to anyone considering a TV.
• 

  C. Evans
  June 25th, 2010 on 4:41 pm

  Rating

  We originally started shopping for Sharp LED TVs since those are the latest & greatest thing, and while there are some advantages, we were directed by a saleperson at HHGreg to the plasmas for truly “black” blacks and clarity of picture. Glare can be a problem with plasmas, and that was a concern, but this model has an anti-glare filter that does make a difference. We do get a little reflection from lamps but if you place them properly, you can easily work around it.

  We’ve been very happy with our choice. The picture is so clear, and so far there’s been no problems with the TV. We got a PS3 with it for blue-ray and games, and it’s been a great combo (you’ll just want to get a separate remote if you do that, since using the PS3 controller isn’t the best). Do note that you’re supposed to keep the contrast low on the TV for the first 100 hours or so to avoid burnout, before you crank it up, when you’re doing your initial adjustments. And you really can tweak/calibrate the TV to your preference. The only thing we might have done is get the 46″ but there wasn’t one available at the time.

  The shipping service was wonderful. We were nervous about it for lots of reasons, but it was easy to schedule, I received an e-mail confirmation AND the shipper called to confirm, then a couple days later they even called back to say they were in the area and could deliver it early. The guy showed up exactly when he said he would–unheard of–and was very professional. So, our overall experience was great and we’d do it again.
• 

  J. Robertson
  June 26th, 2010 on 6:14 pm

  Rating

  This is first plasma tv after owning a rear projection tv for 9 years. I like to do a lot of research before buying any electronic goods and it led me to choose plasma over lcd for a televison.

  One of the drawbacks you hear about plasma tv’s are the energy consumption as well as burn in issues. The panasonic tv is apparantly much lower in energy compared to older plasma’s and are not far off lcd’s for energy consumption. Also, the image burn in, although can still be a problem when simple guidelines are not taken, is not really a factor anymore.

  I purchased the tv through amazon and it was delivered in the allcoated timeframe that I chose when I purchased the tv. The gentleman unpacked the tv and installed the tv onto the supplied base stand which sat on top of my corner tv stand. The tv is fairly heavy and is actually quite difficult to push over. This was a concern of mine since we have a young daughter but the tv is far enough back that she cannot reach it. There is also a hole in the panasonic base where you can drill a screw into your own stand and I plan to do this.

  The tv picked up our cable channels no problem and the remote and option guide by panasonic were easy to use. The picture quality of the HD channels through my cable were excellent and considerably sharper and clearer than my old projection tv. We mostly watch all of our cable tv on the available HD channels and we are very happy with the picture quality. We don’t have a blu ray player but hooked up my Ono up-conversion dvd player and when we watched Sherlock Holmes we were blown away. I cannot imagine what blu ray must look like and we only had our old component cables hooked up (plan to get HDMI cables soon). What was most different from my old tv were the dark scenes. They were so much easier and clearer to see and I guess one of the advantages of plasma over lcd are the black levels. It made the movie so much more of an enjoyable experience. I do not have surround sound but the speakers are adequate and of good sound quality. Like I said we have a young daughter so we cannot have the tv on too lound when she is asleep.

  One of the other reasons we bought this tv were the options it has such as netflix, youtube and skype. Skype is not available until some time in the summer and I cannot wait to have videocalls with my family overseas. It does require a LAN adaptor if your internet is not close by to hook up and it would have been nice if this was included in the price of the tv. There is one available that comes with the panasonic blu ray player I plan on getting (DMP BD-85) which is wi-fi enabaled. However, in the mean time I have netflix through my Wii and the picture quality was much better than I though it would be for streaming movies. We have verizon fios so have a fairly fast wi-fi connection.

  Overall I am very happy with this tv and am looking forward to many years of tv and movie watching.
• 

  D. Meyer
  June 26th, 2010 on 6:20 pm

  Rating

  I bought this plasma from a local electronics store [...]. This is the second flat screen I have purchased in as many days.

  I first bought a Samsung LN40C650 LCD but returned it the next day because of a few issues that I couldn’t get past. It had very light vertical banding in some spots (It’s possible that I just got a bad one on this count), the image washed out when viewing from anywhere other than straight on, and I didn’t like the way the tv dealt with motion (whether the auto-motion was turned on or not). Also, the colors didn’t seem very natural although it’s possible that after adjustment this would have improved.

  So I decided to try the Panasonic TC-P42G25, a Plasma tv, which supposedly has none of these issues (but maybe its own inherent issue, read on). I brought it home, unboxed it, attached the stand and hooked everything up. I was able to accomplish this myself but I would recommend getting some help to do this step. The stand does swivel which is a nice feature to have. I turned it on and after a short setup wizard everything was ready to go. I live in Chicago and the tv had no problem finding all the digital channels from my indoor/outdoor antenna which you can see here – [...]

  At first this tv looks a bit dim, but this is because by default the tv is set to standard brightness mode which is the least vibrant of the settings. I flipped through some of the other picture modes and THX seems to be bright and accurate, though I decided to leave it in standard mode for the first few days during the plasma “break in” period.

  I popped the dvd Ashes of American Flags (concert film, rock band Wilco) into a bluray player that I borrowed from someone. This film has a lot dark areas in the concert scenes which allowed me to check out the black levels. The tv automatically recognized that I was playing something and switched the source to receive video from the bluray player.

  If I had to describe the picture quality on this tv in one word it would be “amazing”. Screen uniformity is perfect, no light or dark places anywhere. Colors appear natural and realistic to me. The black levels are very deep on this tv when you dim the lights a bit or close the shades in the room. Motion appears fine to me (I found the motion looked better with the blur reduction in settings turned off).

  The default setting for this tv is to have C.A.T.S. turned on in the settings. This adjusts the brightness of the picture depending on how much ambient light is in the room. Some people may like this feature but I turned it off.

  The sound is good for normal tv viewing. It sounded better to me when I turned on bass boost in the sound settings; It is possible to adjust the treble and bass also.

  One issue that this tv has (as well as Plasma’s in general from what I’ve read) that LCD’s don’t is that the black levels don’t look their best in a brightly lit room. This is not a problem for me as I prefer watching in a dim, but not pitch black, environment. To my eyes the black levels look deeper than I’ve ever seen on an LCD.

  I have not tried the network feature on this tv yet. An earlier reviewer said some of the network features may not be available yet. It won’t really matter to me if this is still the case. I just want a flatscreen that does what it is supposed to do, and does it very well; This plasma delivers that.

  This is a polished product from Panasonic. Please Panasonic, don’t ever stop making Plasma’s!

  ****Quick update**** 4/26. When I said that the TV automatically switched the source to receive video from the bluray player, It may have done this because the bluray player that I borrowed also happened to be a Panasonic product. As to whether or not it will automatically switch the source for another brand of bluray player, you’ll have to find that out for yourself.
• 

  P. struble
  June 27th, 2010 on 2:52 pm

  Rating

  Arrived in just a few days Trucking company called and made delivery appointment at my convenience the next AM
• 

  Ivan Lavrusik
  June 28th, 2010 on 1:10 am

  Rating

  My Sony tv broke after 6 years, along with every other sony product I’ve had, all within 6 years. So now I’m going with quality products from panasonic and others. The TV picture is good, the sound is good also, I have it hooked up to my home theater system when I watch DVD’s.

  There are many options to choose from also. Great TV overall and it’s not too big or small, just perfect.
• 

  Jyotika Lamba
  June 29th, 2010 on 3:33 am

  Rating

  Got the TV yesterday. Bought this one from Vann’s. They delivered the TV a day late.

  I went by the instructions provided and let the tv lay around to warm up to room temperature for about 4 hours.

  Started her up; connected it to the LAN cable first cos I was excited to watch Netflix and Skype on it. The main reason I bought this TV was because it was the next gen release of the famous G10 series TV’s with THX. The TV started up and asked me “A software update is available, proceed?” I never had my TV ask me that before )

  15 minutes later…..Started the VieraCast feature (this is where all the widgets for Youtube, Netflix, Skype, Fox Sports, Pandora, Twitter reside…) and guess what ?

  Skype – Coming Soon….
  
  Twitter – Coming Soon….
  
  Fox Sports – Coming Soon…
  
  Netflix – Wait… where did it go?? Huh? Spoke the the Panasonic CSR and they told me Netflix will be available by late summer. So what does that make Netflix? Coming Soon…..

  1)Youtube Videos – Available and working. Saw a couple of videos too.
  
  2)Amazon Video on Demand – Working – starts buffering sometimes and not as smooth in delivery as Netflix. Quality is good though. If you register with Amazon before May 31st – u get a 5$ credit. So I signed up and watched a free movie – 2012 on HD.

  3)Weather Update – Nice, works.

  The TV is by far the best I’ve seen. No doubt about it. I’ve been patiently researching the Panasonic P42G10 for over 6 months before they launched this and I pounced right on the new release for the price. Absolutley no regrets on picture quality, looks and product capability.

  Im giving this 4 Stars cos Panasonic claimed they have features that work…. they dont. Well, not yet they dont. They are “Coming Soon”…..

  So until the next round of software updates. I guess I’ll just connect my laptop and watch netflix.

  Will update more soon.