Home > Consumer Reviews > Panasonic TH-50PX500U 50-Inch Flat Panel HD-Ready Plasma TV

I researched and personally looked at around 2 dozen 50" plasma displays at different local stores and by far the picture produced by the panasonic 500u blows away everything out there. My dad has a pioneer elite 50 which is great but we both agree the 500u's picture accross all colors and shades is far superior. It displays HD signals flawlessly and everything looks layered, If you have not seen a HD sports program you are missing out! As far as finding one of these was almost impossible, Online retailers advertise a low 3500 dollar price but can never deliver on their promise. I got the run around for 2 months from east cost retailers and finally found one at a local dealer , ended up paying 1000 dollars more but at least its sitting in my living room all hooked up and running. Pay the extra money for the 500u over the panasonic 50px. It has more features and the stand looks much better. Dont be fooled into paying 3000 or so for another 50" HD plasma! Good luck finding one. Andersons TV in Dublin, Ca has 2 left in stock.

Initally purchased the Panasonic from Amazon. I received it damaged, so I had to send it back. They didn't have any left in stock, so I decided to purchase a 50" plasma from a local dealer. None of the locals had the Panasonic that I wanted, so I went with the Samsung HP-R5072. I had the Samsung for 20 days before I returned it and purchased the Panasonic TH50PX500.

All-in-all, the picture on the Samsung had a good picture, but it did not have near the picture clarity and color vibrance that the Panasonic has. Additionally, this Samsung model has and "electronic program guide" - not to be confused withe the "TV GUIDE" version. Needless to say, the Samsung version did not work and requires each channel to transit their program information and that just does not happen. The Panasonic TH50PX500 does have the "TV Guide" version and it worked great. Finally, the split screen cabability and integration capability with other Panasonic products put the Panasonic over the top when compared to the Samsung. One last thing, the Samsung remote is very minimal as far as capability goes. Panasonic has this beat hands down.

Like many others I've been waiting for plasma to drop into the barely afforable price range. The Consummer Reports review sent me to the stores. I looked at every plasma set I could find and when I could watched them next to LCD and projection HD models. Every one looked good, the 500U looked better. Good quality DVD (Superbit Lawarence of Arabia or the Fifth Element for example) look terrific at 480P via component or HDMI inputs. Good as it was out of the box I tried a video tuneup disc and both DVD and HD movies were impressively close to film. and I bought locally at a specialty store so even with a discount from the general retail price in this area, delivery and painless setup were included. That is some thing to consider if you buy. The set weighs 114lbs. My wife gave my a hard time over the price, but the set looks good and is slim enough even with out a wall mount to sit tight against the wall.
Negatives:Standard Def cable is not as good as on a CRT, especially if streched, but it is very acceptable six or eight feet back. It has only has one HDMI input.

Can't say enough positive things about this set. I'm watching the local HD signals on rabbit ears - the picture is stunning. A lot of people I talk to are unaware that they can get HDTV without cable or satellite. Our market has a 24 hour PBS HD channel. I normally don't watch PBS, but they put on documentaries and travelogues shot in HD. You can't NOT watch it - not to mention the sports programming on the other over the air channels. I feed the analog cable signal thru my Replay TV. Looks great.
For some reason I wasn't recieving the FOX HD channel. Was advised to simply reprogram all the channels and it came right back up.
If you force me to find something to quibble about, here goes. I wish the remote had a CC button. To get it displayed, you have to go thru several clicks. For some reason the SAP channel has a remote button and not the CC. It's still a Great TV.

This plasma is by far the best I have seen for the price and the size. I did some extensive research on this model and virtually all the reviews were highly positive. This Panasonic has the 8th generation plasma panel which is currently the state of the art. To use an automotive analogy, "You have a high end 8 cylinder engine running under the hood".
It really makes a difference, the blacks are deep in saturation and the colors are vibrant. HD TV looks incredible on this panel and regular broadcasts are well defined. DVD's look great, so when HD-DVD comes out I'm sure the video will be awesome, you get very spoiled to the HD feeds after a while. Mitsubishi and Pioneer both have equally high-end plasmas which rival this Panasonic, but there price is not in the same ballpark. For the money, you can't beat this Panasonic.