Panasonic 58 Inch Plazma TV Review and Price Tip

Christmas came early for me. We had the extended family Thanksgiving celebration at our house this year, and we decided since my Christmas present was going to be a new big screen TV, I could get it early and everyone could watch the Cowboys on a large screen Thanksgiving day. I did a lot of research the two weeks prior, finally settling on a 60 inch DLP Sony model for $3,000. However, when I ended up at the store to actually make the purchase my wife finally put her foot down and insisted on a plasma that could be wall mounted above our fireplace.

Since I was not willing to give up much screen real estate and she had a fixed budget for this item, we finally compromised on the Panasonic TH-58PZ700U 58" plazma. I'd already done some research on this model and set it aside, assuming it would be too expensive. The store we were in had it marked at $3,799.00, about $800 more that the 60" DLP I had been planning to buy. A quick search on the web via my BlackBerry found an in-store price of $3,699.00 at a competitor so the sales manager sold it to me for $3,699 and informed me there was also a 30 day low price guarantee.

The Panasonic TH-58PZ700U weighs in at 168 lbs, and comes in a cardboard box that filled the length of my pick-up bed and was about 20" wide. It took me and two store employees to load it into the truck, then I spent a good thirty minutes tying it down since it couldn't slide into the bed of our Avalanche far enough to close the tailgate.