Why Would You Select Commercial Grade Over Consumer Plasma?
You've undoubtedly seen plasma TV's in various commercial applications like airports, banks, and sports bars. And you've seen plasma TV's at your neighbor's house, in commercials, and at the store. Have you ever wondered about the differences between the units in commercial use, and those that are marketed for household use?
We used to install consumer plasmas only, until one unique experience changed my mind. I found out that a vice president in one large plasma 3rd party logistics company installed commercial grade plasma in his own home. This guy had access to every brand and type of plasma television; why did he choose commercial grade televisions?
So I started looking into this phenomenon. I knew that commercial grade plasmas were not available in stores and I knew they often had funny video connectors called BNC used in commercial applications. I knew that to connect them, I had to buy these BNC-to-RCA adaptors for $4.99 at the local electronics part retailer. Well if you need 6 connectors, that was $30 for what I was sure cost about tiny_mce_marker.24 to make. And that was the extent of my knowledge.
As I researched more about the differences between commercial grade and consumer plasma, I gradually fell in love with the benefits found in the commercial alternative. Since many of those exploring the plasma option don't even consider commercial grade (mostly because they aren't exposed to it as a possibility) I've summarized 5 of the main benefits below. I hope you find this information useful. I sure did...now I recommend commercial grade plasmas in most of my installations!
Commercial Units Don't Come With Stuff You Don't Need
When you're installing a completely clean-looking home theater system, you're almost certainly looking forward to the well-concealed surround sound in-wall speakers. Why would you settle for anything less than the high performance acoustics that come with audiophile quality front, rear, and center channel speakers? Those little "afterthoughts" that are attached to the sides or bottom of the consumer plasma sets will hardly get the job done, and all they'll really do is take up space. On commercial grade plasma sets, the speakers are optional. Without them, you have a nice narrow bezel which allows for a larger TV in space limited applications like in an existing cabinet designed for a 4:3 television. When you're trying to fit a 16:9 widescreen into that space, you need every inch you can get. Here's a nice comparison stat: the typical 42" consumer model is about the same dimensions as a 50" commercial grade plasma.
And what are you going to do with the standard definition tuner that comes packaged in your consumer plasma? You're not exactly going to screw your 200 lines of resolution basic cable signal into a new high definition widescreen TV. You'll be using some kind of high def cable or satellite receiver. Including that standard definition tuner simply makes the consumer models thicker. Some of the commercial units are only 3.8 inches thick, with a very discrete 1.5" bezel around the edges. Oh yeah, and forget cable cards; it sounds good until you learn that many cable companies do not activate them, that you lose your cable guide, pay per view, and on demand programming along with DVR capabilities.
Commercial Models Simply Look Better Installed
Think about it...how does a manufacturer draw your attention to their consumer plasma product in a big box retailer with 100 models on display? They employ a dazzling array of bezel colors, materials, and even multi-color backlighting. The focus of commercial plasmas is to keep the picture itself as the most prominent feature. They maintain a sleek look, with a narrow bezel and matte black border. Trust me, they look much nicer than a gaudy consumer model displayed over your fireplace or in a cabinet.
Commercial Shows a Better Picture
Shopping for a consumer plasma entails countless hours of sorting through various propaganda. But how much of it contains useful stats to compare between different models? Whether or not the manufacturers admit it, a flat panel television is a glorified computer monitor. And while a PC monitor seems a lot less glamorous, that type of device has published specifications like resolution, brightness, contrast ratio, refresh rate, etc. The top rated commercial plasmas boast WXGA 1366x768 resolution, over 1 billion colors, 1,300 cd/m2 brightness, 10,000:1 contrast ratio, 6ms refresh rate, etc.
Commercial Lasts Longer and Comes with the Best Warranty
The best commercial grade plasmas are rated with a half life of 60,000 hours; or 27 years at 6 hrs/day of viewing. The half life is basically how long it takes until the millions of lamps in a plasma TV start to measurable lose their brightness. How do they do this? Designed for endurance and longevity, the commercial grade plasmas have silent thermostatically controlled cooling fans that reduce operating temperature under continuous use conditions; thereby extending semi-conductor life. Commercial models typical have higher retail prices their consumer counterparts, but thousands of hours of worry-free operation are worth it.
Typically the commercial manufacturers back up their published estimated lifetime with a warranty that exceeds consumer models. For example, the Samsung models that we install most frequently come with a 2 year warranty. And the most special part of it is that this is an on-site, not just parts-and-labor, warranty. Imagine the time and effort it would take you to uninstall your TV, load it into your car (if it even fits), and cart it over to the service center. Then repeat the process when you pick it up after a couple weeks with no TV set! Samsung shows up at your house and fixes most problems right on the spot.
The Cost of Commercial Models is Lower
No, you don't have to reread what I've written above. I did say that retail price is higher on commercial plasma TV's vs. comparable consumer models. But here's a little retail secret for you...the cost is actually lower! Authorized resellers, whether on the internet or at your nearest mall, are limited in the way we advertise pricing on our products. If we want to sell brand name products and keep the manufacturer's warranty intact for you the consumer, we adhere to a MAP agreement (minimum advertised price). We can not advertise price is if it is below the minimum threshold. The main reason manufacturers do this is so that little guys like us can't undercut their bread-and-butter big box retailers, though they refer to it as "ensuring the brand integrity". There's no way a large retailer can match our pricing, with all their overhead to cover real estate, elaborate store displays, vast amounts of inventory, and legions of [helpful] sales people.
Another benefit that the larger retailers have is big volume discounts which help them stay competitive on CONSUMER plasma televisions. But those guys don't sell COMMERCIAL grade. The volume discounts available to smaller discount retailers, like DIGITAINMENT, for commercial grade televisions are much more competitive. And we're able to pass that savings on to you; we just can't advertise it in print, on TV, or through the internet. But we can talk about pricing freely during a personal on-site consultation, or in an individually designed quote for you. I think you'll be very surprised!
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