Is it worth buying a second hand plasma TV

Grumpysally

Ive seen a 42inch Panasonic plasma TV in the local British Heart Foundation shop.
Its £100. http://www.soundandvision.co.uk/tv/plasma/panasonic-tx-p42s10b

I've looked it up online and it's about eight years old.
Would I be better off saving my money and putting it towards a new LCD TV, hopefully in the after Christmas sales?
Thanks

debitcardmayhem

Panas are quite reliable, unlike my heart, so I will support the bhf , however I will say get a lcd but you do realise there are no longer after xmas,black friday sales, must end Sunday sales, price after sale is 399 etc the whole of tech is on sale somewhere.

John_Gray

"Would I be better off saving my money and putting it towards a new LCD TV?"

Depends on what features you want from a TV. If you want 8-year-old technology which proved to be a dead end, go ahead and buy it, but you will be emulating Betamax.

Look at Richer Sounds or John Lewis for 6-year guarantees for new LED TVs, and buy when cheapest.

Undervalued

John_Gray wrote: »

"Would I be better off saving my money and putting it towards a new LCD TV?"

Depends on what features you want from a TV. If you want 8-year-old technology which proved to be a dead end, go ahead and buy it, but you will be emulating Betamax.

Look at Richer Sounds or John Lewis for 6-year guarantees for new LED TVs, and buy when cheapest.

In some ways, is that a bad thing?

Betamax was a vastly better VCR system than VHS and if you only wanted to record programs to time shift it was the one to get. However, VHS caught on as an inferior system simply because of commercial reason as a wide variety of manufacturers were allowed to use the system. Eventually it was refined to a point that it was nearly as good as Betamax was in the beginning! However because there were 20 or more VHS recorders sold for every Betamax, pre recorded tapes were largely only available in VHS format.

Likewise Plasma, in the early days of flat TVs the picture quality was far better than most LCDs. Gradually they have caught up so a Plasma screen would need to be very cheap to be appealing unless you have an interest in old technology.

getmore4less

If in good condition that plasma will still be better quality picture than most LCD at that size for regular TV viewing

Depends if you are interested in the picture benefits that Plasma and can tweak settings to get them.

Checking it out won't be easy without some knowledge and research to check for faults.
Like how to access the no. of hours

One big issue is they are stupid heavy the makes them a bit impractical as a punt epecialy at £100 with little/no warranty.


There must be loads of sets around that size as people upgrade to bigger ones.
Ask around check the free sites.

BigAl94

I agree that £100 for a tv that probably cost £600 8/10 years ago is too much. I have a Panasonic Plasma that is now 10 years old with Sky HD and 4K Amazon Firestick and the picture quality is superb, much better than an LCD and I will keep using it till it (or me) dies!

onomatopoeia99

A Panasonic plasma that age will at least match and probably better pretty much and 1080p LCD/LED TV you can buy today, particularly on blacks. Some 4k OLEDs may give a better viewing experience, but you won't get one of them for £399 in the sales. Plasma was not abandoned due to picture quality but cost, power consumption and weight.

Some can have problems with the capacitors in the internal AC to DC converter, which show up as the screen being "reluctant" to wake up from standby.

Owain_Moneysaver

Power consumption is a thing - that's 175 watts when running.

A newer LED might be about half that.

I think there'll be a glut of newer, cheaper, tellies after christmas on gumtree etc after people have got new ones. £100 sounds a bit pricey to me.

RumRat

Compared to a new LED TV it'll look hideous....IMO.
Expensive to run in comparison, but, it will probably save you on heating.

Belenus

I have what is probably a similar model, TX-P42G20B of similar age.

It has been faultless and still has a very good picture. It is rated at 290 watts so it does chuck out a lot of heat.

What do you plan to feed it with? Sky HD? Freesat? Freeview?

£100 is a lot of money for an 8 year old TV of unknown history. It might have years of life left in it or it might fail within a week. That is a gamble.

Have a look on eBay and other sites for alternatives.

Or ask the BHF if they will offer you your money back if it fails within say 3 months.

chrisw

Belenus wrote: »

Or ask the BHF if they will offer you your money back if it fails within say 3 months.

The BHF are pretty good, there's a 6 month guarantee on all electrical items.