Les B - Blu-ray won all 52 weeks of 2007, that was the consumer's decision - they were the ones purchasing all those Blu-ray discs...over twice as many as were purchasing HD DVD's; how much more time did the companies like Wal*Mart need to realize that either they pick the winning side, or let HD media continue on its path to nichedom like SACD and DVD-Audio? Honestly bud, either the companies had to pick sides (most had already picked Blu-ray from the get-go) or the studios would have seen continued palty sales and gotten out of the game whatsoever, which is exactly what Microsoft was counting on so we'd all be stuck with VC-1 720p dolwnloads with 5.1 dolby digital.
Plus Wal*Mart's decision did nothing whatsoever to influence the format war, it was over the day Warner Brothers, observing in 2007 that all their major releases were selling 2:1 on Blu-ray, pulled the plug on HD DVD on January 4th, 2008.

Maybe you would have been happy by 2010 picking through the occasionally released title on either format by some independant or specialty studio like we do now with DVD-A and SACD, but not me. Blu-ray was the only smart way forward, the consumers decided it for over a year straight and the studios listened.

Well whatever it is I hope the 2010 plasmas use the same finishes they have this year, gorgeous sets.

The April 2009 Panasonic show had the following slide which shows they're intending on getting out an 8mm plasma in 2010 with true infinite contrast using the new NeoPDPeco panels which were not features on any of this year's models - this is the panel designed in conjunction with Pioneer Kuro technology.

http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/4663/vieraevolution.png

Should be awesome.

Okay John I did a google search and found this:

Need For IPS ALPHA PANEL In Plasma Television

http://www.plasmatvreviews.org.uk/articles/need-for-ips-alpha-panel-in-plasma-television/

Hopefully by the time they show off the next-gen IPS Alpha plasma's at CES they'll have matte screens.

Why do I think the format is struggling? Well, it isn't! Facts are key in a discussion like this, not personal opinion.
Monika asserts that in 1999 she was walking around Blockbuster wondering how they could claim it would soon be 100% DVD and then "in the blink of an eye" it happened.
In reality it took 7 years for DVD to outrent VHS. It happened in 2003, four years after Monika wondered when it would happen. Is that "the blink of an eye"?
Blu-ray has beaten DVD to all the markers so far - DVD took 2.5 years to move a million copies of a single title, that was "The Matrix". Warner actually held off the sale of The Matrix on VHS for 11 weeks (it was only available for rental in this time) after the DVD was released.
Blu-ray's first million seller was The Dark Knight. It did it in less than 2.5 years. In addition Warner did NOT hold off the DVD release of The Dark Knight.
Considering that Blu-ray was involved in a format war for the first 18 months of its lifetime with HD DVD AND that we're in economic difficulties it's amazing it's doing so well!
Recent blockbusters like "Wolverine" have seen 30% of unit sales in the first week at retail.
In the 3rd quarter of this year the Digital Entertainment Group (DEG) has shown Blu-ray up 66% over the same quarter of 2008, while Rentrak shows that Blu-ray rentals are up 44.5%.
By contrast digital distribution sales were only up 18% in the 3rd Quarter over the previous year.

DrXYm - no plasma needs to be "left on for a week" to be broken in.
The plasma breaks itself in every time it is on.
The warnings with plasma to avoid damage to the panel are basically to not use it as a florescent light in your kitchen!
Honestly, with any viewing habits that can be considered normal, there is no danger of burn-in on a plasma and the "acceptable" levels you're speaking of must be a lot different than mine. LCD is bearable when you're watching in a brightly lit room, but as soon as you're watching a movie in low lighting it's simply ghastly.
Common sense would tell you not to crank your contrast and brightness to 100%. Does not taking a car up past 5,000rpm's during its first 5,000km scare people from buying a new car?

CharlieX - a properly calibrated plasma blows away a properly calibrated LCD, every day of the week. Calibration cannot help at all with LCD's shortcomings which are black levels, motion resolution and contrast. There's nothing you can do on an LCD to make black bars disappear while maintaining the OAR of any 2.39:1 movie.

Doesn'tMakeSense - excellent points. With LCD's available in 19" sizes, of course LCD is winning the global market. But, look at sets in the 42" and up market and that 8:1 figure will look resoundingly different.

Plasma is still cheaper than LCD in a price per inch 50" and up and a far better picture.

http://www.hometheatermag.com/lcds/208hdface/

These are the seven sets tested:

Samsung HL-T6187S LED DLP RPTV
Sharp LC-52D64U LCD HDTV
JVC LT-47X898 LCD HDTV
Mitsubishi WD-57833 DLP RPTV
Sony KDS-60A3000 SXRD HDTV
Panasonic TH-50PZ750 Plasma HDTV
Pioneer PDP-5080HD Plasma HDTV

Now the Pioneer won this match-up, but it was both the Pioneer and Panasonic plasmas that were rated as being in a league of their own over the other sets. You can read all the opinions on the last page of the article. Here are some highlights:

But there was no doubt about it—plasma is king.
~David Birch-Jones

Deep blacks and a viewing angle that allows more than one viewer to watch are big sellers for me, which explains why I was drawn to both the Pioneer and the Panasonic. Go with either, and you'll be happy.
~John Higgins

I kept going back and forth between the two plasmas: Pioneer and Panasonic. I knew they both looked the most natural and pleasing to me, with excellent blacks as well. I couldn't decide which I preferred.
~Maureen Jensen

What this Engadget article fails to mention is that during Q1/08, the same time span being discussed here, global plasma sales were up at an all time Q1 high, up 53% from Q1/07

Samsung and LG saw their global plasma sales jump over 10 times what they were in 2006 as a whole.

DTS press release lists April 15th as the date.
http://www.dts.com/company/press/press-article.php?ID=1601180336&cID=1&yID=2008

Ben - I agree about the specs comment on televisions..and I'd choose a 720p plasma from Panasonic or Pioneer anyday over any LCD.
But with a 1080p panel there is no scaling involved with a 1080p24 source, so my ultimate choice for HDTV would either be one of the Pioneer PDP 1080p sets with 72Hz refresh rate or one of the new 800 and 850 1080p models coming out from Panasonic with 48Hz refresh rate.
Those plasma's own.

Great article! It's painfully obvious that all the analysts like that hack Rob Enderle are paid to HAVE an opinion, because that's the only way they could come up with such stupidity time and time again that Blu-ray's time is already done and downloads are on the way.

Sorry, but Blu-ray will see the type of success that DVD saw and this sort of widespread adoption will be evident by the numbers at Christmas 2009, if not this year.

Sorry, but the consumers did decide the war. They bought more Blu-ray Disc players in December 60/40 over HD DVD. They consistently bought more titles on Blu-ray Disc than they did on HD DVD, over 60 weeks straight, and consistently bought more copies of titles released on both formats on the Blu-ray Disc format, particularly the big day and date titles like The Departed, 300, Harry Potter 5, etc.

The only people that think the consumer didn't decide and that it's so unfair that HD DVD lost are people who allowed themselves to become emotionally attached to the HD DVD format. You should have paid attention to reality and not the propaganda merchants like Amir Majidimehr and Rob Enderle. It's your own fault.