After doing some research, this is what I've come up with... Thoughts?

For the first 100-200 hours:

• Keep the contrast turned down
• Eliminate all 4:3 material by stretching the programming
• Limit static logos on the display for no more than 1.5 to 2 hours at a time
• No pausing of live TV
• Channel Surf - Vary the types of programs that are watched

What else?

 

No statics period. If you are going to turn the tv on, be sure there is a signal. No signal for prolong period of time is not good for the screen.


Do not use as monitor for computers.

 

That pretty much covers the major things. Considering that's how I watch TV anyway, I really didn't need to alter my habits for the break-in period....

 

Set the contrast to a "normal" setting. Not too dark, not too bright. Don't set it so dark that the picture is crappy.

I've never had a problem pausing TV to go take a piss or get something from the kitchen.

 

yeah, you can pause live TV even during the break-in period. Just don't do it for an extended period of time. Short pauses to take a leak or something should be fine...

 

Ever? Or just during breakin? What about a game console?

 

During break-in especially... but it's highly recommended to NOT use a plasma with a computer or game console....

 

Never.

If the intended purpose of the TV is to be used as monitor only, or game console only. Then it can be.

But if used as monitor then used as a TV, picture will suffer.

 

You pretty much have it all down. After the first 100 hours, you can slack off - but still try to watch it until it gets to 1000 hours. Panasonic has a very good white paper that covers lots of plasma myths. Their discussion on the subject mentions pretty much the same things you listed.

My summary:
*Keep the contrast at 50% or less (shouln't need to me much more inside your house anyway unless you are missing a roof or something)
*Completely fill the screen with the image, stretch or crop 4:3 sources to fit
*If you can, change the color of the 4:3 bars to grey instead of black so that incase the display is operated in 4:3, there is less chance of image retention
*Don't keep it on the same channel for an extented period to prevent logos, etc from being displayed too long

Panasonic has a cool feature in their units that shifts the image 1-4 pixels every so often to keep the same image from being displayed for too long. I have it enabled on my rental plasmas, plenty of hours on those with just computer sources hooked up and no image retention yet...