Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I did lots and lots of research before I settled on this TV. I am not the type of person who buy a TV only to find issues with it then do the old swapperoo with another one only to find another thing I dislike about it. I bought this only after very extensive research and due diligence. What I look for in a good TV: great picture quality, great side viewing quality, accurate colors, bright and punchy whites, high contrast, black blacks, great SmartTV features, Netflix, media streaming, good enough input lag to play games, and as future proof as possible. It looks like I'm asking a lot right? There couldn't possibly be a TV that fit all these criteria could there? Fortunately for me, there is! When it comes to great picture quality and side viewing, LCD/LED TV's are quickly eliminated. Winner Plasma. That was quick! I absolutely hated the faded contrast from side viewing, uneven brightness, and graish blacks on the LCD/LED TVs. The problem with most Plasmas are that they look faded during the day. Some of the top modern plasmas have done fairly well in that area. I narrowed my TV's down to the Samsung F8500 and the VT60/ZT60. I did comparisons of the TV's at a brick and mortar store and found that I'm drawn more toward the F8500 with each comparison. Every single reviewer out there claims "black blacks" as if that is the epitome of great picture quality. Do I buy a TV to stare at a black screen? I tried as hard as I could, but I just could not see the differences between the blacks of the ZT60 and the F8500 in a normal lit area. I'm sure in absolute darkness, I can probably see a difference. However, this TV will be my main TV in my living room with windows all around and 4 recess lights above it. I do not have a "man cave" like some lucky few out there. Next comes the comparison of the whites and color production. In a normal viewing environment, there's no contest in my eyes. The almost LED-like brightness of the F8500 trumps the VT60/ZT60. The contrast, the pop, and the blinding whites (for a plasma) makes the picture jump out. The problem with most plasma is that the picture is usually washed out during the day. The F8500 seems to have solved this problem. The goal of many plasma makers were always to go as black as possible, but no one ever thought about going the other way--make whites as white as possible. Why is darkness more important than brightness? Why is a .002% difference in black level make one TV superior to the other when the other TV has 30% better whites and deeper contrasts? Am I going crazy here? I don't understand why the "experts" think that makes one TV "better" than the other as if black blacks is the single defining criteria for picture quality. The SmartTV features of the F8500 seems to be better than the Panasonic as well. The F8500 has a built-in camera which allows for the use of Skype and gesture (something I don't use and think it's a gimmick). However, being able to video call on your TV is a pretty cool added feature. The camera on the Panasonic is an extra added cost. The F8500 offers HVEC (.265) which future proof it. This may not be important now as .265 is not wide spread, but once it's adopted, better quality streaming will be available through Netflix, Youtube, and home streaming. It's good to know that this future technology is available right now on the TV you purchase. The TV may produce great picture quality, but if you have a low quality stream, then the picture quality will be bad. Garbage in, garbage out. The one thing that this has going against it is the input lag. This is the pitfall of the excellent Samsung video processing algorithm. I believe the VT and ZT has a slightly better input lag of 47ms. On PC mode, the F8500 averages around 53ms. This is not great, but it's absolutely playable and I don't notice much of a difference when I game. Another thing to consider is that when playing over the network, the 60ms lag for the screen is far faster than the 120-400ms ping lag for your packets going over the network. How often have you played a game and you swear up and down you shot the guy but missed and ended up dead? That's network lag spike. The biggest killer of your K/D ratio (besides your skill of course) is the spike in the network and not your TV. I think input lag is overblown unless you're playing over a LAN. In that case, a nice 24" LED monitor would be your best bet, not this beast of a plasma that you use for movies and sports. CONS - I don't like the remote and the sensitively of the touch pad. Often times I scroll down, and the thing goes left. What-The-F. I'm purchasing the keyboard for this TV to eliminate messing with the remote more than I have to. - Speakers. Not a con for me as I don't use it. If I can afford to pay for this TV, I can afford an AVR with nice speakers or at least a decent soundbar. - The finicky ARC port. I think this is due to the HDMI implementation rather than the TV itself. They need to let people configure how this works. I'm not sure who is to blame, the AVR or the TV. I basically use HDMI 3 (ARC) to output video from my AVR to my TV. However, when I turn on the Smart apps and Netflix, ARC should turn on and have the sound come out of the AVR automatically. It works, except whenever I turn on the TV, it automatically set my AVR to TV/CD instead of leaving it alone. I have to manually switch the input back to Cable/SAT. So in order to remedy this, I have to buy THREE new 15 foot HDMI cables (I run the cables through the wall). One goes in HDMI1 for output from AVR, one goes in HDMI 3 for return audio to AVR for TV apps, and then one goes from PS3 to HDMI 2 for PC mode (sound will go back out through HDMI3). All in all, I cannot wipe the smile of my face every time I watch a movie on this TV. The video processing is astounding. Moving up from an older LN52A750, the picture quality is far more natural with much higher quality coming out of the same Netflix stream and satellite signal. Had the input lag made gaming unbearable, I would've knocked a star off this TV. However, since it doesn't bother me, this is absolutely a five star TV. In terms of features, picture quality, brightness, contrast, and blacks, there isn't a TV out there that's close. Update 7/28: revised input lag from 60ms to 53ms for F8500 and 40 to 47ms for ZT60 as tested by CNET. Update 8/19/13: The TV has performed flawlessly. I watch NFL football and the TV looks great during the day which is the majority of my viewing (50% sports, 30% movies, 20% gaming). This is the perfect TV for sports watching as black level doesn't even come into the equation. I also watch Oblivion at night and the black level is excellent (lots of dark scenes). The quality is superb. Image Retention: There was IR when I watched NFL network initially. The IR (bar at bottom) disappeared within 5 sec after I changed the channel. That was the only time I saw IR. After 30 days of using the TV, I no longer see IR. I can only assume that this plasma is good at limiting IR after the initial break in period. Video games: The difference between 30ms and 53ms is 2/100 of a second. It's up to you if it affects you. To me, it's negligible. Noise: No plasma high pitch sound that I can hear. Tip: I deleted the STB from the TV set up. It's useless and causes the "STB is not powered on message." The guide from the TV is useless because (1) it always start at channel 2, and (2) it doesn't have all the channel information. If you delete the STB, the SmartTV button takes you immediately to apps instead of the guide which is functionality useless and redundant. Since the TV takes 8 sec to power on, putting in a 10 sec delay from the Harmony remote will allow you to use activity to always put the TV and receiver to the correct input, thus overriding the finicky CEC control. Also, if you use an AVR, set the sound delay to 100ms normally. The sound is synched properly if you use the TV speakers. Update 11/20/13: I got a PS4 connected with PC mode and games play perfectly fine. Resogun is a reflex game and I haven't had any lag deaths so I believe this lag hype is overblown. Also, since I have to connect the PS4 to the TV and have the sound return via ARC, it downmixes to stereo even with 5.1 sound! It's a legality issue that does not allow the TV to pass through 5.1 sound via ARC. I will admit defeat and will turn off ARC and use an optical cable instead in order to get Digital 5.1 sound from Netflix and PS4 passthrough back to my AVR. ARC is effectively useless for those with a AVR set up. This will also free up the annoying automatic input change. I recommend just not using ARC altogether as it's broken. This is not a Samsung issue but an ARC issue and affects all manufacturer. Also, Netflix recently updated its Netflix app for many set top boxes. The app on this TV is not updated yet, but the TV should support it as Smart Apps are all upgradeable. I will update this review when Samsung updates the Netflix app. Update: Sure enough, the app is now updated. This TV so far is future proof! Update 3/14/14: If you want to go directly to the Smart Apps screen when you hit the Smart Hub button instead of the useless upcoming shows screen, you can do so by going back to the Set Up menu. Menu -> System -> Set Up. Go to the end where you are asked to enter your TV provider and Zip code. Enter your zip code then Select "My Provider's not here" instead of your normal broadcast location. This will eliminate the shows guide when you hit SmartHub and take you directly to your Smart apps! Update 12/18/14: I just recently upgraded my receiver to a 2013 Yamaha, ARC works perfectly now! I no longer have to use the optical cable to get around the stupidity of CEC. I was able to set the TV to anynet+ and the receiver to never auto switch inputs. No more fighting the technology! The optical cable is finally going away, another relic of the past put to pasture.