The truth about Plasma screen burn-in and gas recharging

Plasma screen TVs have had some bad publicity thanks to the ignorance of some salespeople at national retail stores. This page is dedicated to giving you the true facts about plasma burn, so you can make your own choice about buying a plasma TV screen.

About plasma screen pixel burn-in and dead pixels?

A lot of people worry about pixel burn-in when researching Plasma screen TVs. Screen burn-in is when an image stays on the screen for a long period of time, and appears to get permanently burned into the screen itself. Screen burn-in can potentially happen, when running a computer presentation that has fixed blocks of solid colour.

However, for most plasma owners, screen burn-in will never be an issue, and you are much more likely to upgrade your Plasma TV before anything goes wrong. To put your mind at rest, most newer plasma TVs have a feature called white flash·that provides correction if screen burn-in ever occurs. There is also a calibration tool called PixelProtector that makes sure your plasma TV is always set up to combat screen burn.

Very occasionally LCD and plasma TVs suffer from dead pixels when a pixel is either always on (lit up when the screen is black, for example), or the pixel is always off (black when it should have colour or be white). A few dead pixels here and there are not noticeable, and manufacturers normally state that a small percentage of dead pixels are allowed.

The best way to avoid any problems with dead pixels is buy a plasma screen made by a reputable manufacturer (such as Sony, Panasonic, NEC and Sharp), as the build quality of the plasma panels is higher you are less likely to have problems, and if you do, the screens will have a guarantee/warrantee enabling you to get the problem repaired or the screen exchanged.

Do you have to "re-gas" Plasma TV screens?

This is one of the most common, and the most wrong myths about Plasma TVs. All plasma screens are completely, permanently sealed when manufactured. Each individual pixel in a plasma panel is sealed, and therefore cannot, and does not ever require any refilling, or recharging.

Next time some salesperson tells you about "re-filling" the gas in a plasma TV, ask them how long it takes to manually insert three different types of gas into every single pixel in the screen, and then slap him.

Someone told me that Plasma TVs don't have a very long life-span, is this true?

If you buy your Plasma screen from a quality brand you will get a TV with a rated lifetime of around 30,000 hours. What this means is if you watch TV for five hours, every single day it will last over 16 years. I'm guessing that you'll be looking to replace your plasma TV long before that happens, and on average most people buy a new home TV every eight years anyway! The lifetime of a plasma TV is measured by something called it's "half life" (this is the industry term for the period of time it takes for the display to appear half as bright as the day it was first used). All different types of TV screens, including LCD lose their brightness over time, but because it's so gradual, it's practically impossible to notice.

Well you've told me all about the myths, what about the benefits of buying a Plasma TV?

Check out our page about the benefits of buying a Plasma TV for more information.