With the software's flexibility, it's easy to get lost. Thankfully, Sony has included a self-diagnosis function to help bail you out if you've programmed several of the functions incorrectly. Don't feel too bad about using this function. For me, the screen-size settings were confusing at first. The display has an automatic aspect-ratio-detection feature with two separate settings. The first setting is very aggressive. If you set the screen to wide, when the program goes to commercial, the screen size will change back to 4:3, so you have to select the wide mode to stretch the picture back out. The second setting only changes the screen when you change inputs—say, from TV to DVD. It won't remember the aspect ratio you used when you switch back to TV, though.

The KZ-42TS1's white-field uniformity wasn't as uniform as I would've liked: There are a couple of red and blue spots throughout the display, but this may only be noticeable with images that have large areas of solid colors.

The technology behind a gas plasma is similar to that of a CRT display in that the image consists of a lit-phosphor coating. A CRT uses an electron gun to ignite the phosphor, while a plasma uses gas. The phosphors are red, green, or blue pixel-sized spots. The downside is that the phosphor coating is much thinner on a plasma than it is on a direct-view CRT display, so phosphor wear occurs much faster. However, the KZ-42TS1 has both a picture inverter and an orbiter mode to protect it from uneven phosphor wear. The inverter mode imperceptibly reverses white to black and black to white, thus oppositely wearing the image to help reverse the effects of uneven panel wear. The orbiter mode also helps prevent noticeably uneven wear by moving the picture around in a circle. The picture only moves a few pixels, but it's enough to keep fixed horizontal and/or vertical images from burning into the phosphors in one spot. The orbiter's revolution time is adjustable from 10 seconds to five minutes.

Even though only a few companies make the panels that are sold to display manufacturers, not all gas plasma panels are alike. You need to ask about life expectancy and burn factors when you shop for a plasma panel.

The KZ-42TS1 flat-panel TV is a good concept. It's made for someone who just wants to throw a TV in his or her bedroom without having to use a whole host of auxiliary equipment. In terms of image quality, though, the KZ-42TS1 faces some stiff competition in its price range. This model works better with widescreen and high-definition images than it does with NTSC sources like broadcast TV and cable. Ironically, the latter signals are the most likely viewing choices for someone in the market for an all-in-one display.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Standalone plasma TV
• Flexible setup menu

HT Labs Measures: Sony KZ-42TS1 42-Inch Plasma TV

The gray scale of the KZ-42TS1 TV relative to its color temperature at various levels of intensity, or brightness (20 IRE is dark gray; 100 IRE is bright white). As you can see, the gray scale as set by the factory, in the most accurate menu setting, measures 9,700 Kelvin with dark images and leans more toward 10,500 K with brighter images. After making adjustments using the Philips PM 5639 color analyzer, the gray scale measures within 20 degrees of D6500, the accurate setting, across the entire range. The gray scale (or color temperature) relative to the color points of the display's red, green, and blue phosphors. The color points match those specified by SMPTE, which means that the display will show the colors available in the system. The gray scale is way off before calibration and is truer afterward. The light output was approximately 35 foot-lamberts. The KZ-42TS1 has a decent color decoder that leans toward red.—RW