Panasonic Viera TC-P42S1

Color Temperature (10.0)

The color of whites on a HDTV screen is described by a measurement called the color temperature: if this varies as the intensity of the shite changes, you'll see a color cast to the shades of whites. In this test we look at how consistent the Panasonic TC-P42S1's was as the whites go from the peak (the brightest white) down to close to black.  You can see that it is rock solid, with no major visible deviations(the green line on the graph below shows the minimum difference that would be visible by most users). This means you won't have to worry about getting a color cast in the whites on the content you watch on the TC-P42S1.

Color Temperature
Compare the Panasonic TC-P42S1 to other HDTVs
LG 37LH55 37 inches	Sony KDL-40S5100 40 inches	Panasonic TC-P42X1 42 inches

RGB Curves (7.61)

All the colors that your television produces are created by mixing three colors: red, green and blue. Here we look at the accuracy of thos three colors. Below you can see the resonse of all three colors as they go from dark to bright. You can see that all of the colors rise constantly, which is important, but there is more bumpiness in the curves than we'd like to see. This means that in some cases you won't get the exact color you might expect; subtle color changes in the signal won't be visible on the screen.

RGB Curves

Below you can see the three colors compared to an ideal and three comparison televisions. The first color strip is an ideal response; if this looks bumpy, then there may be an issue with the device that you are reading this review on.

Red Response Comparisons
Ideal Response
Panasonic TC-P42S1
LG 37LH55
Sony KDL-40S5100
Panasonic TC-P42X1

Green Response Comparisons
Ideal Response
Panasonic TC-P42S1
LG 37LH55
Sony KDL-40S5100
Panasonic TC-P42X1

Blue Response Comparisons
Ideal Response
Panasonic TC-P42S1
LG 37LH55
Sony KDL-40S5100
Panasonic TC-P42X1

Color Gamut (3.98)

In order to ensure that you get the same colors on every television all HDTVs are supposed to adhere to an international standard for color gamut known as Rec.709. Below you can see the color gamut of the Panasonic TC-P42S1 graphed against this standard. You can see that there are some serious problems here, with the TC-P42S1 innacurate in all colors. Specifically the colors of the television are all oversaturated compared to what they should be, particularly with the greens and reds. This means that the colors you see on the Panasonic TC-P42S1 will be slightly different than the colors the producer of the content wants you to see.

Color Gamut

For those who like to see the numbers in the table below you can see the exact color coordinates we measured for the Panasonic TC-P42S1 compared to the standard.

Other Models in the TC-PxxS1 Series
This is a review of the Panasonic TC-P42S1. The other sizes of HDTVs in this series should be similar in terms of performance and usability. For details about any differences, click on the image to jump to the Series Comparison page.
TC-P46S1 46 inches	TC-P50S1 50 inches	TC-P61S1 61 inches	TC-P65S1 65 inches