Panasonic TH42PX70 42-inch Plasma TV Review

Anyone looking at buying a 42-inch plasma wants to know they are getting a good quality picture performance for their money, as it’s going to dominate such a large part of their living area.  That’s why Panasonic’s new 2007 range is already attracting so much attention, almost catching up with the leading LCD and Plasma manufacturers.  

Design

If good looks could kill, the TH42PX70 would be jailed for mass murder.  Honestly, it’s gorgeous, curvy form comes with three mounting options, giving you the choice between the included pedestal, a wall-mount (for an extra £50), or a cabinet (for an extra £200).  The glossy black design is wisely generic, and will suit any entertainment system, in any type of home. 

Panasonic aren’t saying this is the best 42-inch plasma on the market, but they do believe it is offering the best quality performance with the features it has, compared to other 42-inch plasmas with better specs.  It’s entry-level, so we can’t expect too much of the Panasonic TH42X70, and when we saw how basic the spec was, we didn’t expect much at all really.  On the plus side, it has an integrated Freeview tuner, with electronic programme guide, which allows you to choose your favourite programmes from the 1500 pages of fastext, and then opt for them to be recorded 7-days in advance.  If you’re looking for the latest multi-media specialities, you can forget it.  There is nothing to mention here, not even an SD card.  With 720p support, it’s not full-HD, but the image engines claim to offer a picture described as the next best thing to 1080p.  Two features the spec list had a big red tick against were the V-real picture processing engine and the 10,000:1 contrast ratio.  Panasonic haven’t gone beyond the extremes with the sound ability either.  With a measly offering of two 10 watt speakers and Nicam stereo, it might not even loosen your earwax.

Connectivity

Compared to the smaller TH37PX70’s, the larger 42-inch screen does stretch the quality on offer that little bit further, and subsequently offers a slightly impaired performance.  Apart from that, the SD and HD performance offered by this little beauty is second to…..maybe Samsung’s Q7 42-inch plasma, but apart from that - none.  The 720p support means that the TH42PX70 has to downscale 1080i content, like Sky for example.  As a result of this, it usually means you normally lose picture quality, which isn’t evident in this case.  If you put the Panasonic TH42PX70 next to a 1080p supporting plasma, you’ll struggle to notice a difference. 

We normally look out for black levels, contrast, motion handling, noise, colours, and any other aspects that allow flat screen TVs to shower themselves in glory, or not.  And in this case, the Panasonic TH42PX70 ticked all our boxes.  The performance could only be described as magnificent.  With an overfull colour capacity, and superb motion handling, there are no annoying distractions to take your eye off what is actually happening on the screen. Black levels are just as fantastic as those reported on the Panasonic TH37PX70.  We hooked up the PS3, and so far, it’s the best motion handling we’ve had the pleasure of experiencing.  We’re not sure if the audio failed to impress simply because we know what the top-end plasmas have to offer, but we did think the audio offering was slightly void. 

If you were given this TV and told it had a spec twice as impressive as the one it honestly owns, you wouldn’t be any the wiser.  This TV’s (integrated as a pose to connectivity) spec doesn’t give it the credit it is due.  It’s a fantastic TV, with all the bits and pieces you could want, apart from an SD card, but in all honesty, who uses one of those on a regular occasion? Not us.  Before going ahead to purchase the Panasonic TH42PX70, you may want to consider the slightly smaller, but better performing Panasonic TH37PX70, this will mean you can save a few quid and go for the wall mount, or maybe even the cabinet to give it that professional finishing touch.