Here is this Press Release on the 34WX52 http://www.panasonic.com/consumer_electronics/pressroom/cont2.asp?Filter=12& cont_id=63

Features, styling, adjustable parameters

Non HD Picture, non NTSC standard on color saturation.

This is my third set in direct view Sets. All have been 34"
By far the superior unit has been my 5 year old Philips 34W560C. Philips was way ahead of the game when they introduced this set.

I purchased the Toshiba CW34X92 and owned it for a week before returning it. The toshiba with 1000 lines of horizontal resolution by far had a superior image to that of the Panasonic with only 800 lines of resilution. However, the distortion on the top and bottom of the tube was too much to look at especially when watching CNN and ESPN with the ticker on the bottom of the screen. Furthermore, tilt could only be adjusted by physicaly adjusting the yoke which
was another issue for me.

The panasonic offered a non distorted immage as well as the ability to perform geometric correction without entering the service mode. This was a compromise for the superior image of the Toshiba. On the otherhand, this set has far too much red saturation which makes it very difficult to achieve good color balance on a picture. Also, all non HD signal weather viewed in standard or expanded image mode display a grainy characteristic to the picture. Almost like setting the zoom and enlarging the picture too much. This make viewing the majority of broadcast an unpleaseant experience. I may have something set up wrong on this set but I have experimented with most settings and still cannot achieve a good image. I remember my Philips going into 16:9 flawlessly without any loss of image quality.

I hope that later this week when I purchase the TUHDS20 high def reciever from panasonic, it will improve my image quality OR that I have something configured wrong.

Any feedback on calibration will be greatly appreciated. I can be reached via email at jorge.torralba@intel.com

Similar Products Used:

Toshiba CW34X92, Philips 34W560C

Great Size and Picture for a small room

none so far

This tv is amazing...We got it mainly because we love to watch movies and the 16x9 aspect is fantastic. We choose this one over some projection televisions because the tube makes it that much sharper, but at 34 inches the picturer is still nice and big. We are waiting on a new satelite box that combines with and HD set-top box with component inputs..I hear a couple of months on those. We just moved into our house and have no basic cable so I couldn't tell you how that picture looks. We did get a progressive scan dvd player with it(toshiba sd5109. The only drawback that I can find is with dvds that don't have 16x9 tvs in mind and I will assume these become less prevelant in the future. To fill the panasonic screen you can change the aspect to zoom and get rid of the black bars...it does stretch the picture a little but it isn't that bad at all. ALL in ALL, I LOVE IT

Similar Products Used:

never had a tv more than $150

Incredible picture, user adjustable, 2 component video inputs, good line doubler

cost

Incredible image with prog. scan DVD. Fits nicely into smaller spaces that a projection 16:9 HDTV won't fit.

Similar Products Used:

Sony 36XBR, Toshiba 34", Toshiba 40" projection

I failed to mention in my review that the price of
this TV includes $800.00 for my trade-in. That's why
the price looks so good. $3500.00, minus $800.00 for
my Sony XBR. That is why I paid only $2700.00 for the
Panasonic TV. Sorry for any mix-ups. I'm still waiting
for the decoder box.

Overall picture clarity/sharpness is SUPERB. Fantastic line doubling. Lots of inputs. Quickly navigated menu system.

Difficult to balance brightness and black level with standard user controls. Somewhat over-saturated and red-heavy colors.

After researching and testing 16:9 direct-view products from Sharp, Sony, Panasonic, and Toshiba I settled on the panasonic for its superb line-doubling, extremely clear picture, and of course price. At a retail price of $2000 less than the top-notch Sony HD1, the few weaknesses the CT-34WX50 exhibits can be forgivingly overlooked (for now.)

The picture on this unit is incredibly sharp and detailed without displaying noisy edges or unpleasant textures in solid-color images (as were evident in the Sharp and Toshiba units.) Even solid white characters on a black background exhibit no visible bleed or edge distortions.

This was also the only unit I found that will allow its line-doubling circuitry to be switched off. Fortunately I have found this necessary only once--while watching a poor quality NTSC signal of a local TV station. In fact, the line-doubling on NTSC sources doesn't soften the picture to the point of unwatchibility as it does on many other TV's, even on slightly noisy signals. Very noisy signals, or pictures with excessive ghosting don't fare to well in line-doubled mode however.

Line-doubled DVD sources off of a Sony DVP-S300 (sorry, I don' have a progressive-scan player yet) look absolutely spectacular. Here, the Panasonic beats the Toshiba 34X92, completely destroys the Sharp WF5H, and is neck-and-neck with the Sony HD1. Line-doubling technology has come a loooong way and Pansonic has done it right, if not perfectly. Every once in a while I do notice edge distortion on certain DVD material but can find no rhyme or reason as to the cause (similar scenes on other DVD's do not present any artifacts) and suspect the source is slightly flawed. In any case, the line-doubling is far supoerior to Sharp's hackneyed efforts, and definitely better than Toshiba's. Now if only I could do a side-by-side with the Sony HD1...

I have not yet purchased an HDTV receiver for the unit, so I can't give a detailed review of HD source material on the set. I did have the chance to watch the "Texas Wild" segment on the unit and was QUITE impressed with the results of 1080i.

Picture geometry on the unit is very well adjusted, presenting an almost perfect rectangle. Bright scenes don't tax the power supply enough to alter the geometry (even with the power-saving brightness reducing feature switched off)--a problem that plagaued my Sony Trinitron.

As nice as the set is, it does show several flaws. I suspect that several of these flaws can be corrected via patient asjustment through the service menu, unfortunately I have not been able to discover the magic combo to get into said menu (hint hint--if anybody knows how to enter the service mode drop me a line ;)

First off, even in the 'Cool' color temperature setting most pictures are extremely red-heavy. In Panasonic's world, EVERYBODY has a sunburn. With the TV default settings even the folks in the intentionally red-deficient "Saving Private Ryan" look like they've spent 2 weeks on a Carribbean beach. Fiddling with the basic 'Color' and 'Tint' controls corrected the problem, but can cause a washed-out effect on poorly mastered video sources. If perhaps there were a few places to save user-selected color settings...

Brightness v. Black Level, the classic battle. Darks are REALLY dark on the Panasonic--too dark. In order to bring out even coarse details in dark scenes the brightness and contrast need to be cranked WAY up, turning your blacks into the 'been through the wash 75 times' dark grey. Also, the unit displays a disturbing band of brightness in the center of the screen if pushed too far (which, sadly, isn't far enough.) This however, may simply be a flaw in my particular unit, only a service call will tell the truth. Again, maybe this is something that a few hours with Joe Kane and the service menu can correct (any Panasonic service techs out there?)

Overall I am extremely happy with the purchase and enjoy movies on it immensely. They'll probably offer this same set for about $2000 next year and I'll kick myself for not waiting. I think I'll go watch The Abyss now...

Great picture in a unit that fits where other HDTV's don't. Dimensions are much smaller than comparable Sony or Toshiba 34" units. Picture quality (once adjusted) is terrific. Combines nicely with progressive scan DVD's and HDTV receiver. Internal line doubler works great and significantly improves even regular NTSC signal viewing.

Requires Y, Pr, Pb component inputs, therefore it won't accept RCA inputs from first generation HDTV satellite receivers. Waiting for 2nd generation Sony/Panasonic units to be available.

For those of us who can't use front or rear projection units due to lighting or size limitations, this is a great way to get into HDTV. The improved clarity even on regular DVD's is amazing over non line-doubled NTSC units. Because there is still limited true 720P or 1080i material available over the air (and because this unit doesn't match up with the RCA outputs of the first generation DirectTV HDTV receivers, I have had only limited experience with true HiDef signals.

The unit did require quite a bit of adjustment to get the colors and brightness right (but it is worth the effort).

Similar Products Used:

Sony, Toshiba and Lowe 34" units

I'm interested in buying this product and would appreciate if the reviewers could list where they purchased it from (especially if it was and e-tailer), how the purchase went and most importantly how much they paid! I, like many others are skeptical on spending that much cash over the internet but hate to pay hundreds or even thousands more at the B&M dealers.

Great picture, nice size if you can't fit a projestion set, has a lot of adjustments so you can get picture to yur liking.

Heavy, not cheap.

Great set, it takes a little while to get it adjusted as the reds are too bright, but once you do - look out, you won't want to stop watching.

The blues in this set are incredible! The line doubler is one of the best I have auditioned and the split screen picture in picture is a wonderful feature.

You have to set the geometric correction to the correct level to get the picture right - i had a little purplepink in the bottom right hand corner until I set the correction to 10 (your setting will probably differ). Watch what happens to the blue background screen as you change the setting up and down and you will find whats best for your location.

I find the color setting at about -3 to be the best and I use the advanced settings to tweak the picture futher - experiment and you will get the results that will please you very much.

Similar Products Used:

Loewe planus, Sony XBR

BEAUTIFUL PICTURE, GREAT DESIGN,

MOVING IT IS NOT AN OPTION

Wow! This set provides STELLAR performance, the picture is outstanding, colors are rich without blooming, blacks are deep. After firing up my Avia test disc and tweaking it a bit it was just plain eye candy. Think long and hard about whwere you are going to put it because you waont want to move it afterwards. I highly recommend this set to anyone who is serious about home theatre.

I got a great deal @ J&R MUSIC WORLD www.jandr.com I was reffered to Todd at 800 221 8180 ext 1039 as a good guy to deal with, The delivery guys brought the set in, unboxed it and set it where I wanted it, not a scratch and all I had to do was open the door. A+

Similar Products Used:

SONY XBR400