Samsung PN58A550 58-Inch 1080p Plasma HDTV

I had my eyes set on the Pioneer 6010 or the 6020 but never pulled the trigger because it was over $4200.00. Then came the Samsung PN58A550. Had some good features and was very affordable. So much affordable that I ended up buying it from Amazon with their 12 months no monthly payment/no interest offer and had so much money left over that I bought a PS3 for Blu-Ray, a 5 year extended warranty, and a new sound system.

The carrier was Eagle and two guys unpacked the Samsung and they were in and in and out about 15 minutes. They did stay while I hooked up a HD-A35 player to the TV to check if it works. This TV is huge! I mounted it on a Salamander Triple Mount Stand and have it tilted down 7 degrees. It took 4 guys including me to mount the heavy thing. The TV faces a large window across the room but due to the TV at an angle there is barely any glare/reflection at all. Now if the TV was not tilted I would experience some glare/reflection. A550 doesn't have the best glare filter vs their top end models like the A650 which has Ultra Filter Bright.

Black levels and picture quality looked great to me. Now some people say that plasma TVs produce too much buzz or too much heat. There is some heat coming off the screen but it's not HOT. Just a bit warm. Sitting about 10ft away there is no audible buzz from the TV. When I was behind it though doing the wiring there is some humming but it's nothing to complain about.

Please check out the pictures that I added on the product image.

The TV speakers are nothing special but I have mine hooked up to an Onkyo TX-SR705 receiver with BIC Acoustech Home Theater system. Other devices that I have for entertainment are Toshiba HD-A35, PS3 for Blu-Ray, and a Xbox 360 for games.

I am very happy with the Samsung 58A550 and I highly recommend it for medium to large living rooms. I don't recommend this TV for a small or medium size bed rooms.

PROS:
1080P. Great picture quality. Great black levels. Great value for a 58 inch plasma. No buzzing noise that some plasmas are plagued with. Decent glare filtering. 3 HDMI inputs. Supplied TV stand swivels and is very strong.

CONS:
Screen does give off noticeable heat and will increase room temperature a bit. May not be friendly to your electric bill depending on your Energy Savings setting.

This plasma HDTV has everything you need to look for in a plasma tv. Picture and sound quality are great. I was looking at pioneer PDP_6010fd at first,(a great tv also) but after doing some research I found the two tvs very similar,except the price. The Samsung is almost half the price of Pioneer PDP-6010fd. All together I'm so happy with my purchase and I do recommend this tv.Samsung PN58A550 58-inch 1080p Plasma HDTV

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/RG9IF23SLBMVE First, buying from Amazon is the BEST! Delivery came a week early and with NO problems or hitches.

On to the TV, I was going to get the Viera 2008 model but realized that its specs were the same as this Samsung [...]. Slightly deeper blacks are not worth that...

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The TV is large, but surprising not as bad as I thought. It is thick on side width. Swivel stand is very functional.

The picture, is superb. You can opt for a High Black setting that really pops the picture. I use an upscaled DVD (OPPIO) and TW HD DVR. Digital Cable (SD) looks great. HD is superb.

I recommend against the DYNAMIC picture setting, sadly this setting is only one that allows DNIE to be used, since it causes severe color bleeding with SD TV.

The audio is good not great. The surround effect is spotty.

The glare issue for me, since our condo is fairly dark, is not an issue.

Remote is MUCH improved from my last Samsung PMDP

Best VFM (value for money) deal!

Of course this TV is great for any home, the picture quality is amazing and if connected with an HDMI cable, the sound improves considerably.
A sorround sound stereo system or a home theater sound system will nicely complement your purchase, but it is the HDMI cable that makes the difference with the sound.
Reflection of light on the screen is not at all a problem.
Captions don't work through component or HDMI cables, only through the coaxial cable, but this is common to all HDTV's up to now. As you all know, movies exagerate special effects sounds, like explotions and the like, while conversations are a whisper, actors these days seem to be telling secrets to one another. If you live in an apartment building, you risk upsetting the neighbors just to try to hear what they are murmuring to each other. I resolved this by changing the setting up on the screen/menu equalizer of the TV (especially the 300 MHZ control) and by turning the Captions ON when needed at the cable company box. Then Captions will show even when receiving the TV signal and sound through component or HDMI cables. The TV has also a "speach" setting to help on this a bit.
I may be wrong, but I don't think this TV has Picture in Picture. It's an option in the Menu but I coundn't make it work so far.
Finally, HDMI cables are a must also for a better reception of the image. With HDMI cables the TV will give you 1080i lines even with regular channels, with non High Definition channels, and it may do it by making the image somewhat smaller, not using the whole screen unless the channel is really coming on High Definition.
This is an excellent HDTV, for the price you will not find anything better. Careful: the weight is 138 pounds, you need two or three people to handle it.

Let me start out by saying that I was really, truly impressed with amazon.com's handling of this TV. Ordering was a breeze (May 1st), quick and easy, and within 2 days of ordering CEVA contacted me, and set an appointment for Wednesday May 7th (which happens to be today). I received a call last night around 730pm and it was the CEVA driver. He was assigned to deliver my TV, and told me that he lives in Fairborn, OH (where I also live), and that he was coming home from Cincinnati and wanted to drop off the TV on his way home, rather than have me wait until my scheduled appointment which was Wednesday May 7th at 8am. I was BLOWN AWAY by this, and of course agreed. He showed up around 8pm, and by 830, we had unpacked the TV, had it on my TV stand and up and running. He cut off all the serial number tags off the box, and took the box away for me.

I have everything set up through a component HD source selector as I don't have any need for HDMI yet. [...]. My HD cable box, and upconvert DVD player has HDMI, but through research I found that only Blu-ray benefits from the HDMI cable over component. The 1080i from my cable box, 1080p from my Xbox 360, and 1080p from my upconvert DVD player work just fine over component, and they are all crystal clear.

The HD from my cable box through Time Warner is amazing. After a quick setup on the TV (which is very easy as every setting has a "tooltip" description down at the bottom of the menu), I set the TV to "Just Scan" which auto scans and adjusts the exact resolution being transmitted to the TV, and used the "Movie" setting with a warm2, to give a little color to Bones' cheeks. The show looked really amazing, true HD. I sit about 8-10ft away from the TV and it is the perfect size and resolution. I also have pretty dark paint in my living room, and double blinds with heavy drapes over my windows, so even during the fading daylight last night, I didn't notice any sunlight glare at all. I like a dark environment, and rarely watch TV or play games with any lights on.

I have been taking the precautions to avoid burn in, as most of the channels I watch don't have any static logos or tickers. If there are, I usually won't watch that channel for more than 1 hour, or 42 min at a time. Also I haven't really noticed any significant heat coming from the TV. There is some heat, but not as much as this older Samsung I have in the lobby at my office. The one at my office you can feel from about 2 feet away from it. The new 58 inch at home, starts to feel warm at about 6 inches. That I hope will save on some power consumption.

I am also an avid gamer and played Grand Theft Auto IV till about 3 in the morning. (Coming in to work at 7am this morning totally sucked, but was so worth it). After each hour of game play, I would switch to my cable and watch some Discovery HD Theater for about 15 min to avoid burn in. The game looks absolutely incredible over the component cables! I could read all text on the screen without any problem and everything in the environment looked rich and vivid. Discovery HD Theater is amazing; there was some show on last night that was showing world environments. It honestly felt like I was there, looking through a window.

One final thought, just before going to bed I tried out my Phillips upconvert DVD player with the movie 300. Of course it's not an HD source, but it still looked really amazing. Just slightly clearer than playing 300 on my Xbox 360, and I am sure most people wouldn't notice the clarity difference, and I may be nitpicking, but regardless both played a regular DVD with really good quality.

This is my first HDTV and I couldn't be happier. Anyone looking for their first HDTV or an upgrade from an older HDTV, let me tell you, this one gets it done right. I give 5/5 stars and 2 thumbs up. WAY up!