Strengths:Color, Contrast, Inputs, Price
Weaknesses:As with all plasmas, burn-in can be a pain but can be avoided easily, the speakers also are pretty basic
Posted 1 year ago - First Impressions:
After lugging the 90 or so pound behemoth up a flight of stairs by myself, I set it on the TV stand and was up and running within a few minutes. The TV has a wealth of inputs (3 HDMI turned out to be the perfect number for me) for you to plug all your gadgets into. The remote was pretty basic, its backlit so you can see what the heck it is you’re trying to press, however it’s not universal so it won’t be able to control anything other then the TV.
Cable:
Currently I have Time Warner Cable, which is only capable of 1080i so I’m not getting the full use out of the TV, however it still looks great. Football games have a lot more depth, documentaries (Planet Earth for example) look absolutely mind blowing, and all your favorite prime time shows just are much easier to appreciate with the increased clarity that comes with HD. Standard Definition channels are watchable, but you’re really missing out. You run into things like artifacts from where the content has to be scaled up to fill the screen. You can’t blame the TV for a source that’s lacking, and it does a decent job scaling the content to make the best of it, but I’m actually switching from cable to an all HD lineup from Dish Network because I simply don’t care to watch shows in SD anymore, perhaps I’ve been spoiled.
Gaming:
I have a PS2 hooked into the component inputs, and a PS3 hooked into an HDMI input. The PS3 games look great, as they are either 720p or 1080i so while their resolution is lower then what the TV can handle, they still look exactly as they were intended to. There were no issues of ghosting/motion blur which had me slightly concerned when I bought the TV. The PS2 games still look decent, however because a lot of them are formatted for standard definition television, there will be some blockiness/artifacts where the TV has to scale the content. Progressive scan games certainly look better, but this TV was made for HD content.
Using as a monitor:
On another one of the HDMI inputs (thank God there are three), I have my computer hooked in. I was slightly curious how the screen would look, as I have a laptop with a 17 inch screen at a resolution of 1680 X 1050, and the A550 is a 50 inch with a resolution of 1920 X 1080. Well it turns out the resolution on my laptop was overkill, and the TV once again looks great. I’ve played a few games on it (BF2 and Team Fortress) and they take advantage of the real estate and really immerse you into the game when they’re played on such a large screen.
More features:
The TV has some screen burn protection features, where it will shift the pixels every 1-4 minutes depending on your set, it has energy saving settings, and a multitude of color adjustments. It also has some sound adjustments, however you’ll find that if you were looking for a TV that has great speakers, this isn’t it. They are perfectly fine for the casual tv/movie watcher, but if you consider yourself some sort of audiophile you will more then likely complain about the built in speakers, even though you more then likely have your own system already.
Final Word:
It's a great TV, I shopped around for almost a year while I was stationed overseas and got a good vibe from this model. The price is aggressive for a brand name 50 inch, I bought mine from sears for 1600 (I didn't mind paying 100 or so extra to have it right then instead of letting the post office screw it up). It was definitely worth every penny I spent.
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Rated 
Outstanding Plasma TV
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Don't buy this Samsung
