Did you hear? Panasonic is extending their successful line of entry-level and standard display panels to include more sizes, more features, and more versatility. This growing line of panels are reliable, and come from a well-established brand like Panasonic – a staple in the audio-visual industry. You will notice Panasonic’s display form factor has not changed much, if any, over the decades – and that design decision is purposeful. Simply put, it makes swapping out an older Panasonic display for a new Panasonic display quite easy. Panasonic is a tried & true brand and a go-to supplier for many, many resellers and integration firms. Here are some of our favorite go-to models.
Oh yeah, they also have touch displays and video wall options – but I will save that for another blog write-up for now. I must share that their product finder is also an excellent tool to find the size and display type needed for your next project. Check it out.
2. THE FEATURES
Let’s talk features! There are so many great features, but I am going to touch on the ones that I think are more important and show why Panasonic displays are in a league of their own.
Quality
Many Panasonic displays employ 4K picture quality to render intricately detailed images. For example, the SQ1 Series features the “12-Axis Color Management function” for ideally faithful color reproduction of digital signage content, and “HDR” compatibility to express a wide brightness range from dark to bright. Equipped with the new Intel® SDM specification slot standard, the SQ1 Series can be combined with an interface board for simple but wide system interoperability.
Versatility
Here’s a quick summary of the best applications for Panasonic’s multi-series professional display lineup. SQ1 Series is ideal for signage – portrait or landscape. The EQ1 is designed for and has features that are ideal for conference & meeting spaces, and this model is budget-friendly, too. And finally yet importantly, the CQ1 Series is ideal for bars and restaurants. Click here for a rundown of all features and specs.
3. THE WARRANTY
One of the best warranties in the Pro AV industry comes from Panasonic. Their flat panel display products come with a three-year limited warranty with advance replacement. Yes, 3 years – that is awesome! To further delight resellers and their customers, Panasonic adds a higher level of protection to their displays with extended support options available for purchase. In addition, if you or your staff require product training or equipment deployment assistance with any Panasonic products, they provide on-site consultation packages. Here are the details.
Flat Panel Advance Swap Program
Professional displays mission critical application are backed up with an exchange program (Hot Swap) included in the standard warranty. This includes:
• Reducing repair turn-around time on your defective display
• Replacement unit sent with two-day expedited shipping
• Shipped anywhere within the continental states
• Applies to all display models purchased after April 2018
• Replacement units are inspected and conditioned at our Panasonic National Repair Center
• Warranty for replacement unit will be a continuation of the defective one being replaced
What you can expect:
• Two Business Day Delivery
• Support 5 Days a Week (Monday-Friday)
• Free Shipping and Delivery on each instance for the flat panel swap
• Technical Support available 8AM-8PM EST (requests must be received by 12:00PM EST to meet shipping deadlines for delivery
• Same or comparable model provided
• Transportation times for larger display sizes (above 55 inches) may vary due to handling requirements
Panasonic Tech Support experts will manage the logistics of getting the replacement unit to your customers’ locations as well as to pick up the defective unit.
Please reach out to me if you have any questions about the Panasonic panel lineup or any or any of their professional equipment. I am here to help!
Have you heard about the new Panasonic CQ1 series of Professional displays? Panasonic announced this new series of six (6) narrow bezel size options from 43, 50, 55, 65, 75, and 86 inches. They’ve integrated a unique feature such as, forward-tilting design (up to 20-degrees) for maintaining legibility when mounted in high places. They have no-signal power off function in which power is turned off (standby) automatically when there is no signal for 10 minutes. The Button Lock/RC control lock function prevents tampering and hijacking of the display. This is can be a big plus when installed in public environments. They do have brightness of 400cd/m2, 4k resolution and capable of supporting 4k/60p signals.
They are designed for 16-hours of continuous operation and support LAN, RS232C, and HDMI CED control to integrate easily into any environment. These displays include built-in ATSC/NTSC/QAM tuner and integrated speakers, making them an ideal solution for corporate, education and sports bar applications. Panasonic has backed them up with their 3 year Advance Swap Replacement standard warranty, too. We have some already in our warehouse with more hitting at the end of September and larger sizes in October! Contact meor your sales rep for pricing and promotional offers.
Angie Greene Business Development Manager, CTS, DSCE
Hi All! First-time blogger here! As I’ve been pondering what I wanted to share with you, it occurred to me, spring is here and the Education season is right around the corner. Of course, the other reality hit me “where did Jan., Feb., Mar., and Apr. go this year”…time really does fly.
It’s timely that Panasonic recently introduced a new line of LCD Laser portable projectors specifically designed to support a wide range of education and business applications. The PT-VMZ series of products offer PT-VMZ40U – 4500 lumens and currently shipping, and
PTVMZ50U – 5000 lumens and just beginning to ship. The next on its way to begin shipping in June (just in time for Education) is the PTVMZ60U – 6000 lumens. They feature 20,000-hours of consistent brightness and color accuracy. These lasers feature 1.6x zoom lenses great for short throw-distances and support wide vertical/horizontal lens-shift to achieve flexibility for various installations to include small classrooms, meeting rooms, and limited spaces with multiple projectors. Panasonic’s DIGITAL LINK connection, based on HDBaseT, transmits video, audio, and control signals through a single LAN cable for distances p to 492’ for Full HD & and 164’ for 4K video. It makes for a simple and cost-effective installation while delivering consistently high quality video! If it’s 4500 – 6000 lumens project, Panasonic has a solution for you with this series. I’ve only given you a sampling of the features on the VMZ series. There are a lot more bells and whistles worthy of your time to check out! Panasonic is running a mail-in rebate program to receive the wireless module (AJ-WM50) for FREE when purchased from Panasonic authorized dealer. Please reach out to me if you are interested in learning more about this Panasonic product or others!
Contact our Panasonic Specialist, Angie Greene, to learn how to grow your business with cutting edge technology that excels in any application.
An integrator came to us asking a familiar question. His customer, a small church, was asking for a way to live stream their services to homebound parishioners. After a site survey, the integrator priced the project, which came in way over budget, mainly because AC power had to be run to the camera positions, needed a code inspection after the AC was run, etc. He came to us looking for an alternative solution. We introduced him to Panasonic’s new NDI cameras, which provide all connections via one cable. The integrator re-worked his numbers, came in under budget and won the job.
Integrators are becoming increasingly familiar with audio over IP networks and offering it as a solution for their customers. Audio buses like Blu-Link allow devices to talk to each other over local area networks. It’s a great way to transport audio across the campus or enterprise. With the introduction of New Tek’s NDI (Network Device Interface) in 2015, getting video across the network has become much easier as well.
Why NDI?
NDI is a flexible solution that supports low-latency, high-quality frame accurate video over standard Ethernet networks. Multicast support was added in 2017, allowing group communication to many destinations simultaneously. Multicast is a bandwidth-friendly solution.
Let’s geek out for a minute: To deliver high-quality video, NDI relies on its own proprietary compression algorithm that reduces streams at a 15:1 ratio. Measurements in the lab show 16 video scan lines latency, while most real-world implementations show one field of latency. The NDI encoding algorithm is resolution and frame-rate independent and supports resolutions up to 4K and beyond. Gigabyte Ethernet is required to successfully implement NDI across the network. More information can be found here.
NDI Technology… now in PTZ cameras.
Panasonic has included NDI technology across their line of PTZ cameras. Models include the AW-HN38,AW-HN40,AW-UN70 and AW-HN130. The cameras are available now. With NDI, the cameras are automatically detected to become available for use in NDI-based production environments, negating the need for additional configuration.
Delix Alex, Product Manager for PTZ Camera and IP Networking Systems says, “A single cable enables simplified video production without sacrificing quality or feature-set, in addition to the inherent features of Panasonic’s PTZ line-up including a family of controllers, image quality and smoothness in movement.”
Three key benefits of NDI:
NDI will transform video workflows.This technology will enable the integrator and end user to do more on a smaller budget. For the integrator, that means more budget can be allotted for additional AV products or services to support those products and provide ongoing revenue opportunities.
New equipment is not necessary. Customers who already own Panasonics’ lineup of PTZ cameras can visit New Tek’s website (tk/ndi_panasonic) to upgrade and enable NDI functionality.
Only one cable is needed. One cable connection is the gold standard and with a POE switch—no AC power is required. Control over IP is possible with NDI. One can connect to a control room’s switcher or control and monitor PTZ operations via PC, MAC or mobile terminals. This allows for control across the campus or across the world. NDI also carries multichannel uncompressed audio and bi-directional metadata.
Interested in NDI? Contact me at [email protected] for more information or join us at our fall E4 AV Tour coming to Boston in September and Nashville in October. Panasonic will have NDI cameras and the new AV-HLC100 switcher on display.
Steve Alexander, CTS, PCVE, CCNA Business Development Manager
In December of last year, I had the opportunity to visit Panasonic’s Harrison, NJ technical research and training facility. It was a fantastic opportunity to peek behind the curtain, as it were, to see the technology that continually sets Panasonic apart from their competitors.
Let’s start with projectors. Panasonic has been manufacturing projectors for over 35 years. Their new Solid Shine series projector has done away with the traditional lamp and replaced it with LED and laser componentry that gives the user 20,000 hours of maintenance-free operation. So, if you used this projector ten hours a day for a year, it would be over five years before one even thought of a component failure.
The units feature a reliable cooling system and dust resistant sealed optics. The unit runs cooler as well and has an eco-save option that will cut power consumption by almost 30%. The instant on/off capability of the unit increases productivity – no waiting for a lamp to come to full brightness.
The most impressive moment of my projector tour was the shootout against a well-known competitor. Both had optimal settings configured (I checked). The results are below, taken with my lowly cell phone camera. It clearly shows the distinction between one company’s idea of white vs Panasonic’s. Also, notice the edges of the competitors’ screen as the brightness fades at the edges.
Panasonic is a major manufacturer of broadcast-grade studio cameras and monitors. The technology that Panasonic incorporates into those cameras shows up across their lines. Their new AW-UE70 is one example. It can deliver 4K image quality via HDMI, USB or over IP. The four-drive lens system enables high image quality zooming in the 4K format. Absolutely stunning results for a PTZ camera!
The coolest thing I saw while I was there was Panasonic’s Link Ray technology (not to be confused with the unsung hero of distorted guitar, Link Wray). Using your smartphone camera and Link Ray app, the user points to a light source (e.g. display), the app reads the information, connects to the Link Ray platform, and imports content destination info – usually a URL. The app then connects to the destination content server and downloads the information to your phone. I watched a Panasonic engineer put together content for display that included pictures and text. When the file was uploaded to the display, I used the app and instantly the information was provided to my phone. I see this technology transforming retail, wayfaring, transportation centers (airports, train/bus stations), and municipal applications – the list is endless. If configured, the user has the ability to view the information in multiple languages. The technology is effective at a distance. You don’t have to be directly on the light source for the app to receive the information.
Last but certainly not least was my visit to the display lab and looking at the quality of Panasonic displays. Panasonic also manufactures very cool touchscreen displays. What sets this display apart from its competitors is that the built-in whiteboard does not require an external PC to run the whiteboard software. There is a floating menu bar that makes the operation of the unit easy and intuitive. One can even annotate on an external device and it will show up on the display. It can share still images, video and audio with included Wi-Fi-Certified Miracast technology. The display has the ability to extend, duplicate or set up a second screen from your computer as well. Full HD 1080p resolution is supported. The user can even bring a USB storage device for playback directly from the display. The unit also supports DIGITAL LINK, Panasonic’s connection system based on HDBaseT technology that supports the transmission of HDMI, uncompressed 4K, HD video and control commands via CAT5e and Cat6 cabling.
I wish I could have had a week at the Panasonic facility instead of just one day. So much cool technology, so little time…
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