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Pioneer now shipping the Elite PureVision PRO-FHD1 1080p plasma

Pioneer's much anticipated 50-inch Elite PureVision PRO-FHD1 1080p plasma is now shipping to retailers, they announced yesterday. Complete with 2,073,600 .576 mm-sized pixels and a high quality scaler this is the first 50-inch 1080p plasma screen on the market. The MSRP of $10,000 (retail around $8,000) comes in at around twice the price of the merely 1080p-compatible PDP-5070HD 1366x768 HDTV. Also unlike its value-priced cousin, this doesn't come with any tuners, just the (beautiful) screen with 3000:1 contrast ratio, and 1000cd/m2 peak brightness as well as two HDMI rear inputs, one DVI and one component input. They're touting the effect of all that pixel density as creating a near-3D effect that you just can't get with other TVs, and even without one here to view, we're almost inclined to believe them.

Do you think all those extra pixels and true-1080p display for your Blu-ray (or HD DVD) and other high definition content are worth the extra cost?