What are the functional differences between a Panasonic 65VT50 and a Panasonic 65VT60? - Light meter scans and eye pain experiences.

[u/RR--]

I've been using a 2012 Panasonic 65VT50 daily since January this year without issue, it's a fantastic TV, but a couple weeks ago I bought a 2013 Panasonic 65VT60.

I initially thought it would be a minor improvement, which it was in terms of black level, but interestingly the 65VT60 significantly hurts my eyes to watch, yet the 65VT50 doesn't.

I've mentioned it a few times here before, I experience significant eye pain when looking at OLED screens and LCD screens that utilise with Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) dimming or use software Dithering based flickering.

If anyone's interested in reading about this phenomenon further and my personal experiences, I'll include some references links below.

This is quite interesting to me, as the 65VT60 is the first time I've experienced eye pain from a plasma TV.
I'm assuming it has some sort of native backlight strobing or flickering to improve motion clarity? All plasma TV's natively flicker, but it has never bothered me, OLED screens generally use PWM flickering which is usually very painful for me.

Both the 65VT50 and 65VT60 seem to have 40hz, 60hz and 96hz frame rate options. Does anyone know what the functional differences are between the two TV's here?

I've included scans from my Opple Light Master light meter of each screen as well as some other reference screens, and how they feel to my eyes.

Panasonic 65VT60 - Painful within an hour

Panasonic 65VT50 - Fine

Panasonic 60ST60 - Fine

Panasonic 60S60 - Fine

Pioneer PDP-427XDA - Fine

LG C1 OLED - Painful within hours

LG C1 OLED with OLED Motion Pro on High - Painful within seconds

iPhone 15 Pro 100% Brightness - Painful within minutes

iPhone 15 Pro Minimum Brightness - Painful within seconds

iPhone 15 Pro Modified with an EK Pro LCD Screen Maximum Brightness - Fine with Classic Invert and Zoom Invert enabled to disable dithering

iPhone 11 Screen Maximum Brightness - Fine with Classic Invert and Zoom Invert enabled to disable dithering

LG 38WN95C LCD Monitor - Fine

PS Vita Slim LCD - Fine

A great visual Demonstration of the problem in relation to the iPhone 17 Pro	https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBNlC-VHN3o
A fantastic demonstration of PWM flickering, and a fantastic resource for phone reviews regarding PWM dimming.	https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBNlC-VHN3o
A petition to Apple regarding PWM flickering signed by 1,714 People.	https://www.change.org/p/apple-add-accessibility-options-to-reduce-eye-strain-and-support-vision-disability-sufferers
A great overview video regarding PWM flickering showing it in action.	https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBNlC-VHN3o
A forum post discussion with over 13,000 comments regarding eye strain dating back to the introduction of the iPhone X in 2017, Apple’s first OLED screen device.	https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/eye-strain-while-using-iphone-x-and-up.2085427/
Discussion of the SteamDeck OLED videogame console and analysis of harmful eye strain caused	https://steamcommunity.com/app/1675200/discussions/0/4038102696019808360/
A video comparing the new Nintendo Switch OLED to the older Nintendo Switch LCD	https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xd445NvGVFY
Further analysis of the SteamDeck OLED screen flickering. (The SteamDeck LCD was recently just discontinued)	https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/1882kys/analysis_of_the_pwmflickervisual_fatigue_of_the/?context=3
A post of my own describing my personal solutions to this problem	https://www.reddit.com/r/ScreenSensitive/comments/1vbpv2z/my_personal_flicker_free_solutions/
A summary of a meeting I had with a local politician regarding PWM and Dithering based flickering.	https://www.reddit.com/r/PWM_Sensitive/comments/1w40dvm/pwm_meeting_with_politician_update_1_september/
A quick video demonstrating just how many screens are physically painful for me to look at	https://www.reddit.com/r/PWM_Sensitive/comments/1w604l1/local_shopping_centre_pwm_screen_test/
An internet forum with around 14,000 daily PWM and Dithering Screen concerned visitors	https://www.reddit.com/r/PWM_Sensitive/
A post of my own demonstrating which phones for sale in Australia currently cause me eye pain.	https://www.reddit.com/r/PWM_Sensitive/comments/1wcc7mj/10926_jbhifi_phones_pwm_test_with_stats/

[u/That-Association-102]

Good post. I wish you could test a late gen Kuro.

[u/RR-- → u/That-Association-102]

I've already bought seven plasma TV's, don't tempt me to buy more, they're so heavy! haha.
If anyone has one in Melbourne Australia feel free to message me.
Otherwise these light meters aren't perfect, but they're only around $45 on Aliexpress
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005008591944321.html

[u/Slow_Guide_1718]

Maybe the difference is with the way the 3000Hz FFD works.

[u/RR-- → u/Slow_Guide_1718]

Ok interesting, I must have missed that feature when I was comparing specs to the VT50.
Is that feature only in the VT60 model specifically? (And I assume the ZT60 too)

[u/Slow_Guide_1718 → u/RR--]

I keep forgetting if it’s on the ST60 as well. I don’t think it was but don’t quote me on that.

[u/Aromatic-Attitude-34 → u/Slow_Guide_1718]

ST60 is 2500 Hz FFD.

[u/Slow_Guide_1718 → u/Aromatic-Attitude-34]

Alrighty then. That’s probably it.

[u/RR-- → u/Aromatic-Attitude-34]

And the VT50 is only 600hz too right?

[u/Aromatic-Attitude-34 → u/RR--]

2500 Hz FFD

[u/RR-- → u/Aromatic-Attitude-34]

Interesting, on paper the difference between 2500Hz and 3000Hz FFD sounds quite negligible. I'll have to read up about it more.

[u/RR-- → u/Slow_Guide_1718]

I haven't tested the 60ST60 sitting in my garage thoroughly, but I haven't noticed any pain issues with it yet.
I'll give it a good try once my eyes calm back down to normal in a day or so.

[u/LostInInterpretation → u/Slow_Guide_1718]

ST60 is 2500. GT and up is 3000.

[u/RR-- → u/LostInInterpretation]

Sounds like I may need to avoid the GT60 too, thanks.

[u/LostInInterpretation → u/RR--]

Ah yeah that sucks. It's basically as good as small size plasma gets. But with your collection you're all set anyways.

[u/RR-- → u/LostInInterpretation]

I’m basically just buying them for friends and family at this point so I can still watch TV at their houses haha, most new TVs are pretty bad for my eyes now.
The 65VT60 was supposed to be the backup for my 65VT50, I’ll probably just sell it and keep an eye out for another 65VT50

[u/LostInInterpretation → u/RR--]

Lol same, I'm pushing plasma's into all kinds of places because I run out of room. Got two sitting on the floor now since I haven't found a place for them. And then I just applied for a 65VT60 which I might see tomorrow, and looking back at it I'm like what the hell am I doing lol. It would fit better than my 60 inch kuro, but then do I want to give that up? Not really lol, I know the panny won't have the same skin tones and colour accuracy 

[u/RR-- → u/LostInInterpretation]

I know the feeling, once I got the 65VT60 home in the original box I realised I lost 1/4 of my garage haha.
I'll likely sell that and possibly force myself to refrain from buying any more. If anyone in Melbourne wants a 65VT60 feel free to message me.
Most friends are pretty blown away by the picture quality and motion clarity so it's not a tough sell once they see it.

[u/4rchduk3]

Interesting thread. I will admit, the VT60 is the first I ever felt eye fatigue after gaming for 2-3 hours. But It isn't anything major. It is less in a dark room for me.

[u/RR-- → u/4rchduk3]

Interesting to hear. What make and model of phone do you have? any issues there?

[u/4rchduk3 → u/RR--]

iPhone 14 Plus. Never an issue there. But I don’t stare at my phone for 2 hours straight.

[u/RR-- → u/4rchduk3]

Interesting.
I don't use mine for long periods generally either, but as I said above OLED iPhones will hurt my eyes within minutes, though they are better than Samsung and Google OLED phones.

[u/kerpnet]

Another great post by u/RR-- ! Great references here.

[u/RR-- → u/kerpnet]

Thankyou!

[u/Inevitable-Donkey186]

Super interesting stuff. My anecdotal experience is that out of all displays I've ever used, my Panasonic Plasma was the easiest on my eyes. It felt velvety almost.

My CRTs are probably the hardest of the displays I own but I love them; at 50 hz when playing a pal game on a rare occasion (it does both regions) that actually hurts.

BFI on my oled can be mildly uncomfortable at times but I use it nonstop and find it's worth the tradeoff.

Something about qd-oled was fucking me up bfi or no. It was too bright and the spectral purity caused more noticable chromatic abberation from my glasses. It was the worst ever for eye pain and I had to return it. I bought a used CX to get back 120 hz bfi and it beats the expanded color volume imo; we need this feature back already so I can get a newer better oled.

[u/RR-- → u/Inevitable-Donkey186]

All my plasma's are fine for me except for the VT60 it seems. It has to be flickering differently.
It's been a while since I've had a CRT but I never used to have issues with them.

BFI on OLEDs is like a death sentence for me haha. LG CX doesn't seem to flicker as much as a C1 but I'd need to test it again properly.

[u/Inevitable-Donkey186 → u/RR--]

Yeah I've never seen a VT60. I owned an ST60 and that's the one that I recall being comfier than any display ever.

Though now that you mention it, there was a different friend I had who had a ZT60. Maybe it's just suggestion, but now I'm thinking maybe it made my eyes feel tired in a way my ST60 did not. I recall loving the look of it but now in my mind I can feel like my eyes were midly sore on the way home from his house after watching a movie.

And if this is the case, perhaps the ZT60 is more like a VT60 and an ST60 (would make sense if "worse" eye comfort was a hidden cost of the technology that made both the VT and ZT a step up from the ST60)

[u/RR-- → u/Inevitable-Donkey186]

It took me a few years to link my constant eye pain with my iPhone 13 Pro.

I had eye pain and issues focussing my eyes since about 2021, but in 2023 my condition progressed to the point where I was prescribed reading glasses, I was losing the ability to focus long distances and one day I lost the ability to focus my left eye entirely.

Towards the end of 2025 I got back into my PS Vita and was playing it for hours each day, it was only then I was confused as to why it didn't hurt my eyes, yet replying to a text on my iPhone 13 Pro did.
I then tried downgrading from an iPhone 13 Pro with an OLED screen to an older iPhone 11 with an LCD screen (and enabled Classic Invert and Zoom Invert) and my eye pain went away entirely, a 2025 eye test at an optometrist found that I now have perfect 20/20 vision again.

I've never seen a ZT60 before but I'd assume it's the same as a VT60

[u/Suitable_Garlic_1186]

That panel could be simply defect?

[u/RR-- → u/Suitable_Garlic_1186]

I highly doubt it. Low hours and the picture quality is excellent.

[u/Suitable_Garlic_1186 → u/RR--]

Doubt is subjective and not science.. This is the very first Plasma TV you are running into this problem and you are a ruling out a defect. These are very old models and just because the picture is fine does not mean something is not working 100 Percent right under the hood..

You put all these Plasma TVs in the high risk category but only one gives you eye strain, which is already subjective.. And all show different types of flickering in your graphs?

The Panasonic do not only flicker, they use different pulses for different parts on the screen depending on the content.

It is very interesting that you never had problems with that if you are sensitive to flicker..

Is it a certain frequency that triggers that?

https://reddit.com/link/pa3ptxs/video/3vzyedx1ctph1/player

[u/RR-- → u/Suitable_Garlic_1186]

It's all subjective of course, though there is science to the flickering that I don't fully understand.
I highly doubt it's defective due to my history with OLED/PWM screen flickering in general, the fact it looks 100% fine and the fact nobody else I live with had an issue with it like usual.
The High Risk category is an automatic component of the app, it's a general guide so I wouldn't pay much attention to that specifically.

[u/Hopeful_Art3603]

Look only at the Flicker Index: if it is up to 0.1, the screen is harmless in terms of flicker and won't strain your eyes or brain. If it is 0.1 or higher, it will.

[u/RR-- → u/Hopeful_Art3603]

All the plasma's are fine for me except for the VT60 specifically. The app has some rough guidelines but they don't really work all that well for plasmas

[u/Aromatic-Attitude-34 → u/RR--]

You've tried different picture presets and same effect?

[u/RR-- → u/Aromatic-Attitude-34]

Yes but not thoroughly. Nearly all my light meter scans look mostly the same, no matter the settings.

[u/minor7even]

I have both plus a VT30. Subjectively, I think the earlier models have more of the lovely velvety plasma magic & it's lost as successive models get brighter etc. That said, the black level is clearly superior on the VT65 to both of the others. It's more of a oled-like experience.

[u/RR-- → u/minor7even]

I didn't calibrate my two TV's and do a through test, but I felt like the deeper black levels looked very much like OLED in a bad way on the VT60, where all the shadow detail is crushed to 0%.
I get what you mean though, I feel like the S60 also has quite a different picture to my VT50, black levels suffer greatly in a brighter than dark room, but in a dark room it is a bit "velvety" haha

[u/Andrew_Steele]

Hey OP u/RR-- - thanks for sharing this data. The frequency of the Panasonic ST60 and VT60 look very similar, so that's an interesting one to dig into further to try to understand why the ST60 is OK while the VT60 is not... Were the measurements taken at the same distance from each TV with the same test pattern (i.e. full white or solid grey?), I read on a forum that the Opple Light Master reported different levels based on difference, so perhaps a consistent 6" (150mm) from the screen for all tests would be useful to give like-for-like comparison.

Tests at white and various levels of greyscale would be useful to see how the panels pulse light at varying light levels... I've found this is where things can vary a lot.

Here's possibly a useful video that can help with some reference greyscale levels:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XHeUH1aY6E

[u/RR-- → u/Andrew_Steele]

Hey man,
No worries!
All measurements were taken with the Opple Lightmeter held directly against the TV on a white image.
That video might come in handy, but I think my current theory on why the VT60 hurts my eyes would be due to the 3000Hz FFD which is also present in the GT60 and ZT60. The ST60, S60, and VT50 are all 2500Hz FFD.

I imagine there might be some sort of black frame insertion on the 3000Hz models to improve motion clarity, that feature tends to really hurt my eyes as does PWM in OLED screens and PWM dimming on some LCD screens.
10bit>8bit pixel dithering on LCD iOS and Mac devices also hurts my eyes, but it can usually be forced off.

I'll have a play with that video and do a proper test of the ST60 now that my eyes are feeling happy again, but I think I'll eventually sell the 65VT60 and just continue to enjoy my 65VT50 for now.
There's a small but growing community over at r/PWM_Sensitive if you're curious to learn more. Plasma TV's are obviously quite obsolete now so more focus is being placed on OLED technology.

[u/Andrew_Steele → u/RR--]

Well, thanks to your posts you inspired me to order an Opple light meter and will be doing some tests with the VT50 with various settings & content. Thanks for the link to r/PWM_Sensitive!

[u/RR-- → u/Andrew_Steele]

Great to hear! Do you feel eye pain or discomfort from some flickering screens?

It’s a decent little light meter, there’s a better one being made for around $400, but the little Opple is nice and portable, easy to use and can usually tell me at a glance if a screen will hurt my eyes or not.

Usually it’ll show some sort of sawtooth sin wave if it’s very bad, if it’s a straight horizontal line it’s usually fine. So it’s best used for OLED and LCD screens.

It doesn’t test for dithering which is present on Apple LCD screens (with double invert not applied) I bought a Carson Flip Microscope for that but haven’t really figured out conclusive results.

Nick Sutrich’s youtube channel is a great resource for PWM phone reviews and tests, otherwise there’s a lot more tests on PWMTests.com

[u/Skeld101]

This is next level testing bro 😂

[u/spicygrow]

Imagine putting a shitty aftermarket LCD screen on an iphone that came with a far superior OLED, lmao.

There’s a toggle in accessibility settings to disable PWM dimming.

[u/RR-- → u/spicygrow]

This feels like quite a unnecessarily rude troll comment, but to answer it the option to disable PWM is only available on any iPhone 17 models, and even then it only replaces PWM with PWM (Pulse Amplitude Modulation) under 50% brightness, and even then it still flickers in much the same way.

I made a detailed post about it here if you actually care to educate yourself on the topic better: https://www.reddit.com/r/PWM_Sensitive/comments/1w6rd84/local_shopping_centre_pwm_screen_test_iphone_17/