Panasonic TX-L55WT65 review

Usability

For the most part, the Panasonic TX-L55WT65 is exceptionally easy to use considering how extensive its feature count is. The main reason for this is My Home Screen: Panasonic's inspired new on-screen interface, designed to make it easier to access all the many content streams the television has to offer.

My Home Screen provides a selection of themed content hub screens right out of the box, but also brilliantly enables you to set up multiple new hubs of your own.

This effectively means that different members of your household can all have their own hubs providing shortcuts to exclusively the content types they're interested in.

The ease with which you can create your personal hubs is exceptional, and also laudable is the lengths Panasonic goes to to make sure you always know where you are in the menus and where to go if you need a little help.

The Panasonic TX-L55WT65's installation menus are impressively in-depth too, and they crucially introduce you to Panasonic's new Viera Remote 2 app for your iOS or Android smartphone or tablet.

With this brilliantly designed app you can easily 'cast' content from your smart device to the TV or vice versa, just by swiping your finger across your smartphone or tablet's screen.

There's room for improvement, perhaps, with the menu system that Panasonic uses to deliver its countless picture adjustments, but in most ways the Panasonic TX-L55WT65's operating system is a template for rivals to learn from.

Sound

The Panasonic TX-L55WT65's sound is OK, but it's not quite as assured as it could do with being, given the set's flagship status and high price.

It manages to produce a fair amount of raw volume, and can do this without its speakers starting to phut or distort. It also reaches higher treble levels than many TVs, without sounding thin or harsh.

However, even the addition of a rear-mounted woofer speaker doesn't help the Panasonic TX-L55WT65 to produce enough bass to stop soundtracks from feeling a little lopsided and unconvincing during action scenes.

Value

Some of the other £2,000-plus 55-inch TVs that we've seen this year have been spectacular in almost every way.

This £2,250 (around US$3,490 / AU$3,845) Panasonic, though, isn't entirely convincing with its black levels, its sound or its online video services. And these shortcomings all added up ultimately make it look unduly expensive.