65VX100E vs KRP500
Well, we have now compared the VX100 in detail against the Pioneer KRP500.
There is absolutely NO question that the Panasonic gives a far better, cleaner, more detailed image. Using the scene at the beginning of Ch 15 from Casino Royale we could see FAR more detail in the picture - the pillars of the buildings and tables in the square looked more like a photo than a TV image, right the way to the far distance of the image.
By comparison, the Pioneer image looked almost SD and out of focus in comparison.
The other really interesting thing is that the better the source, the more the difference shone through. So using a PS3 as the blu-ray source the difference was easy to see, but using a Denon 2500 the difference more than doubled, showing just how good Denon's transport is if you have a screen capabale of showing it.
However, it is not all good news. The Panasonic has the black levels of last year's Pioneer screens - certainly nowhere near the 9G. It also suffers, like all Panasonic screens, from purple and green fringing along edges.
But overall, I definitely prefer the Panasonic, and pricing apart, would choose it any time for better picture detail and way less noise (not to mention buzzing) over a Pioneer.
However, other of my colleagues would still choose the Pioneer because of black level performance.
Nevertheless, I believe that at long last the world can move on - the VX is a truly awesome screen. It really does bring out the full potential of a high-end blu-ray player in a way that makes a Pioneer look like it is playing an SD disc. And if Panasonic start to adopt some of Pioneer's patents (to which they have access now) there will be no need to mourne the loss of Pioneer's screens for the future.
Tony