Panasonic Laser-Disc Entry Highly Impressive

I knew that the age of the laser-disc player had arrived when I saw players from nearly every international manufacturer on the shelves of my local audio/video dealer.

Although for the last 10 years Pioneer has been the predominant brand name found on these high-performance machines, times have changed.

The point was reinforced when, at this summer’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Panasonic, part of giant Matsushita Electronics, announced its intention to enter the field with two laser-disc (LD) units.

At June’s CES, I was impressed by the picture produced by Panasonic’s best (Prism line) player (model LX-1000), and for the last several weeks I’ve had the opportunity to test one in my home. I think I’ve fallen in love.

I currently own an excellent “combination” LD player. In fact, it is considered “state of the art.” In direct comparisons against my machine, the Panasonic more than held its own, even though it costs $500 less.

The LX-1000 is a combination player, which means it plays all the laser-read audio and video discs currently available. It can handle the 12-inch and 8-inch videodiscs, as well as 5-inch CD-Video discs and 5- and 3-inch compact discs.

When playing the two-sided 8- and 12-inch varieties, it can play both sides automatically--no need to get up out of your chair to turn the disc over. In addition, the time required to perform this function (about 10 seconds) is nearly 30% quicker than my “world-class” player.

The on-screen displays delivered by the Panasonic are excellent, especially those available during compact disc (CD) play. While many units can show playing times available (and remaining), the LX-1000 offers several other displays.

In addition to total disc time and number of tracks, there are read-outs for every permutation of disc and track remaining and elapsed times. There is also a unique bar-graph display of stereo sound modulation, to help set input levels on a surround-sound decoder or tape recorder.

The audio performance of this player is first rate. It uses Panasonic’s MASH digital audio signal processing and has an optical output terminal.

On the video side, on-screen displays keep you apprised of side play (A or B), disc-drive functions (play, pause, search, etc.), running time, chapter number, and frame count on those discs containing that information.

While playing a movie, when side one ends, the machine holds on-screen the image of a recently played frame, while it searches for the beginning of side two.

I like the way this Panasonic player chooses to freeze on a frame from very close to the end of the side, as opposed to other products that pull frames from as much as 15 seconds back. As mentioned above, the time it takes to change sides is substantially shorter than any other LD player I have used.

The face of the player is not too cluttered. Most control buttons are housed on a tilt-down panel that opens with the touch of a button. A jog/shuttle wheel is located on the right end of the face plate to control rapid or very slow forward/reverse movement of discs; another is included on the wireless remote control. A read-out panel on the face plate duplicates most on-screen displays.

The nicely sized, shaped and weighted remote control contains all the buttons a “vidiot” like me could want to play with, and their location and functions are logical and easy to learn.

Like many top-of-the-line machines, the LX-1000 has several bells and whistles that are less than useful, such as strobe image and “art playback,” a sort of solarization/electronic manipulation of the picture that no one will ever use. Other, more worthwhile high-end features, like still-frame and slow motion or frame-by-frame play (even on “standard play,” CLV discs), are executed flawlessly by this Panasonic machine.

For those interested in performance specifications, the LX-1000 offers 430 lines of horizontal resolution, its own comb filter and Y/C output, a video signal-to-noise ratio of over 51 dB and a digital audio signal-to-noise ratio of 110 dB.

The audio frequency response is rated at 4 Hz to 20 kHz. The only laser-disc player I know of that can beat those specs can only play 8- and 12-inch discs, can’t play both sides automatically, and costs $3,500.