[KeriVit]

I know we have discussed the pros and cons of the different technology...

But has anyone actually bought a front projector (say infocus or optomo)
and had regrets afterward... such as no HDTV, needing dark, etc?

We are considering up an exclusive Home Theater and though I own a DLP- that is not part of this setup. My friend feels the projector is the way to go. Just wondering if anyone has experienced these systems?

[Paco500]

I have not set one up, but did help my brother with his. The centerpiece is the projector, obviously, a Dell 2300MP, a DLP model with pretty good stats. He chose this one as the company he works for does a ton of business w/ Dell and he got an amazing deal- over $600 off list. So it may not be the best in the world, it was the best for the price.

It, as do many others, supports HD, so no worries on that.

Pros: The big one- he has a 7-8 foot diag screen. It's beautiful. The picture is shard and bright, with nice contrast. It has a good collection of inputs, including component video. It's quiet and unobtrusive. It takes up a lot less living space than a conventional TV, less even than a plasma or LCD. Cost/performance ratio compared to most any thing else is great.

Cons: I forget what it's called, but the rainbow effect. Occasionally, flashes of color appear on the screen. It's noticeable, but not horrible. This is, as I understand it, universal to DLP projection systems, including the rear projection. As for the necessary darkness- it' perfectly watch-able in normal lighting- but it's in a basement with little to no natural light, and it obviously looks better in lower light. I suppose it would be nicer for it to have the same quality picture in all light, but it's not really a detriment to his application. It's a home theater- they don't use it to watch the news, they have other TV's for that.

So, in a nutshell, he loves it and I don't think he's nuts for feeling that way.

[Severed Hand of Skywalker]

I have a rear projector DLP and it is much better picture than anything else I have ever seen.

[KeriVit]

Originally posted by Severed Hand of Skywalker:
I have a rear projector DLP and it is much better picture than anything else I have ever seen.

I agree with you on that- I've seen your tv and it is exactly the same as mine. I also appreciate that I can watch HDTV on it.

But, my buddy thinks for this home theater that the projector, screen, etc. give you more bang for your buck. I think what I'm actually asking is how can I convince him that a 62" DLP will be better than the projector he is looking at- if it actually is. Yes, he will save $2000, but is it worth it? Or is he being deceived by the "authentic" idea of the projector?

Keep in mind- this is strictly a theatre room.

[Severed Hand of Skywalker]

Originally posted by KeriVit:
I agree with you on that- I've seen your tv and it is exactly the same as mine. I also appreciate that I can watch HDTV on it.

But, my buddy thinks for this home theater that the projector, screen, etc. give you more bang for your buck. I think what I'm actually asking is how can I convince him that a 62" DLP will be better than the projector he is looking at- if it actually is. Yes, he will save $2000, but is it worth it? Or is he being deceived by the "authentic" idea of the projector?

Keep in mind- this is strictly a theatre room.

I normally don't like projectors as the image quality isn't as bright or sharp as it shoots across a dust filled room but you do get the largest screen for the cost.

Also you have to watch them in totally dark rooms.

[finboy]

After spending some time looking at the various types, we just bought a 50" Samsung DLP. It's incredible thus far, and we've had no trouble with it. And it looked better than the others in the store (not why we bought it, but it looked better). We'd heard all kinds of wives' tales about the different types, but DLP works best for us.

For one thing, it's much easier to see at extreme angles. And it doesn't suffer from "burn in" as some of the other large screens do. And it weighs 70 lbs. In fact, our flatscreen (tube) 27" weighed more.

And it was $1000 less than anything comparable. We're happy with DLP.

[kikkoman]

Yes, I had a projector exclusively for about two years. However, I recently sold it a bought a plasma mostly because I wanted the convenience of not having to turn off the lights and wait for the projector to warm up just to watch tv. However, if I had a dedicated room like a basement, no question I'd get a projector again and keep the plasma for casual viewing.

[Freeflyer]

I've had my Infocus 4805 for about 6 months and you can have it when you pry it from my cold dead fingers!

Seriously though, the wow factor when people see it is just amazing. It took me 2 years to talk the wife into letting me get one and 10 minutes for her to turn round and say how good it was. Neighbours and friends are all considering getting them, and I should get commision for the number I've sold.

You don't need complete darkness, but the darker it is, the better it looks. I have an 80" wide screen that I built, and hang in place when we want to watch a movie, for regular tv I prefer the 32" widescreen tv.

I'm totally sold on front projection, it makes it true home cinema.

J.

[starman]

I have a front projector, but it's HDTV and I have no regrets whatsoever. It's in a dark room. Yamaha LX-500.

Mike

[Socially Awkward Solo]

Originally posted by kikkoman:
Yes, I had a projector exclusively for about two years. However, I recently sold it a bought a plasma mostly because I wanted the convenience of not having to turn off the lights and wait for the projector to warm up just to watch tv. However, if I had a dedicated room like a basement, no question I'd get a projector again and keep the plasma for casual viewing.

Bingo, if you want to watch nothing but a movie in a dark room a projector is perfect.

[Mithras]

I'm about to have some friends over to watch a movie with the projector I've "borrowed" from the work conference room. Sshhhh!

It's a one-night ghetto setup, with my Powerbook and the projector balanced on a bookshelf, and a sheet nailed to the far wall. But I'm totally in love with it, and so is the wife.

Now, to scrape up $1200 to have one of my own...

[olePigeon]

Maybe it's just me, but 1/2 the reason I'm planning on getting a front projection system is that it's more theater-like. Adds to the atmosphere having the projector in the back and a big white screen.

[sideus]

Originally posted by olePigeon:
Maybe it's just me, but 1/2 the reason I'm planning on getting a rear projection system is that it's more theater-like. Adds to the atmosphere having the rear proejctor and a big white screen.

You mean front?

[alligator]

I spent $1k on an Infocus X1, and while the projector was nice, I returned it after one day's use. I couldn't stand the "rainbow effect" from the spinning wheel. I guess I'm an LCD guy. Of course, I never bought another projector since it only took about a year of convincing my wife to let me get the first one. I'm just happy now with my 16x9 CRT TV.

[olePigeon]

Originally posted by sideus:


You mean front?

Err, yeah.

[kikkoman]

Originally posted by Socially Awkward Solo:
Bingo, if you want to watch nothing but a movie in a dark room a projector is perfect.

Most ht projectors with 1000 lumens should be watchable in a sightly lit room. Perfect for something like sporting events where images tend to be bright. If you're getting a projector for special events or occasional use and you have the appropriate environment, I think you would be happy with it. It's just not practical for everyday use.

[dialo]

I've had a number of projectors over the past couple of years. I like them a lot and will continue to use them until I can get a massive plasma TV for a reasonable price. The things to look out for:

• dlp rainbows can be bad. I, too, returned an x1 because of them. That said, the contrast with be much better with dlp than lcd and some have faster dlp speeds, making the rainbows less of a problem. I suggest trying one out first or buy it from some place like projectorpeople.com who, last I checked, allow you to return it no questions asked.
• fan noise can be bad. make sure to get a good projector with low fan db
• contrast ratio needs to be high.

I've never seen a situation where dust is a problem. The only other thing that may be a concern is that a dark room is needed. Personally, I only watch films at night so it works perfectly for me.

[Kilbey]

Originally posted by kikkoman:
Most ht projectors with 1000 lumens should be watchable in a sightly lit room. Perfect for something like sporting events where images tend to be bright. If you're getting a projector for special events or occasional use and you have the appropriate environment, I think you would be happy with it. It's just not practical for everyday use.

Or video games, which is probably what he uses a TV for 90% of the time.

[dcmacdaddy]

To get a really bright image without the need for blacking out a room go for nothing less than 1500 lumens, preferably 2000 though if you can afford it.

But almost as important as brightness is contrast ratio (full on/full off). You want something with at least a 400:1 ratio.
35mm film projectors are roughly 1000:1 and decent DLP's should be in the 300:1 - 600:1 range.

Proxima (AKA InFocus) are pretty good but the best DLP projector's come from Europe, like a Projection Design or a Barco.

Next week at work we are getting one of these bad boys, a Christie CP-2000H.

[MaxPower2k3]

Originally posted by dcmacdaddy:
Next week at work we are getting one of these bad boys, a Christie CP-2000H.

mm... how much?

[Oneota]

If you're going to get a projector for home theater, a lot of folks will say you're nuts for getting anything other than a CRT-based projector.

Yeah, they're bigger and pricier, but they have the truest blacks and no spinning wheel effects.

Here's an AVS forum dedicated to CRT projectors (where a bunch of die-hard CRT projector fans hang out - bear in mind they are to the projector crowd what we Mac users are to the computer crowd )

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forum...amp;forumid=16

[jebjeb]

I have a basement setup with a front projection system. There is no other way to have that size screen for that sort of price. Plasma's, Rear projections sets and direct views tv's all have their place but you can't beat a good front projection system in a dark room for impact.

The DLP colour wheel/rainbow effect is very noticeable to me so I went with a LCD projector.

CRT projectors are unreal but huge, noisy and cost a bomb. If you were building a home theatre in the $50,000+ region I would go a CRT (well actually, I would start to look at the three-chip DLP models that are starting to get "affordable"). Other than that, DLP or LCD are the ones to go for.

My LCD projector is a Hitachi TXJ-100. It is something like 1300 lumens and has a controllable iris so you can stop down the aperture which improves the contrast. When I am watching a film on mine, in my completely light-tight Home theatre I stop the iris down to level 4 (10 being the brightest). This puts it in the contrast range of a 35mm projector and blacks are pretty damn black. It is still bright enough at this level to be very punchy and vivid.

I have this projecting on to a home made screen painted with a projection screen specific paint called ScreenGoo. This is available in white, light grey and dark grey. I have the light grey. This helps to increase the contrast levels even further. Ends up being much cheaper than buying a decent screen. Mine is a 100" 16x9 piece of MDF with two coats of Light Grey base coat and two coats of light grey top coat ScreenGoo. It is then surrounded with 2 inch wide black felt tape. The whole thing cost me around £100 with about £80 of that for the paint. It should be even cheaper in the states as that's where it originates from.

No one should ever kid themselves that a white wall is good enough to project on. I did it for a while in my last place as it was a rental and it does the job, but not well. Stepping up to a proper screen is like night and day.

If I was spending less than say US$3000, I would look at an LCD projector and a screen. Most of the LCD's in this price range (such as my Hitachi) are 1280x720, so can do native 720p HD and also support 1080i HD. Mine has a DVI, VGA, Component, S-video and composite inputs. If I was spending over $3000 I would start to look at the better DLP's which have improved colour wheels and such.

The best thing is to demo them if you can and go with what you like best.

As for light levels in the room, whenever I am browsing the web or most of the time when I am playing my PS2, I have one set of overhead lights on over the top of my seating area. This hardly impacts the image. All I do is just open the iris up a bit so it is a little brighter.

Have a look at it here.
http://homepage.mac.com/jebjeb/PhotoAlbum6.html

[dcmacdaddy]

Originally posted by MaxPower2k3:
mm... how much?

Retail: ~ US$143,000
For us: $0 (we're getting it as a donation)

[KeriVit]

Thanks for the info guys. It was just the kind of feedback I was looking for. I really don't see a reason to discourage him from this now. Yes, there are some cons, but we are ware of them.. He is going for the true home theater and this seems to be a good solution. I just don't want him to try to save a buck as we do this. He is a crazy Star Wars fan and the room will be filled with props, movie lighting fixtures, movie posters, etc. I now believe that a plunking a big set in there would actually take away from his goal. Nut we do have alot of work ahead of us...

Now we research the rest, lighting, distance, etc. Then do the painting and building. Joy. Actually, I'm into this stuff, so I think it will be fun.

Thanks again.

[KeriVit]

Originally posted by jebjeb:
I have a basement setup with a front projection system. There is no other way to have that size screen for that sort of price. Plasma's, Rear projections sets and direct views tv's all have their place but you can't beat a good front projection system in a dark room for impact.

The DLP colour wheel/rainbow effect is very noticeable to me so I went with a LCD projector.

CRT projectors are unreal but huge, noisy and cost a bomb. If you were building a home theatre in the $50,000+ region I would go a CRT (well actually, I would start to look at the three-chip DLP models that are starting to get "affordable"). Other than that, DLP or LCD are the ones to go for.

My LCD projector is a Hitachi TXJ-100. It is something like 1300 lumens and has a controllable iris so you can stop down the aperture which improves the contrast. When I am watching a film on mine, in my completely light-tight Home theatre I stop the iris down to level 4 (10 being the brightest). This puts it in the contrast range of a 35mm projector and blacks are pretty damn black. It is still bright enough at this level to be very punchy and vivid.

I have this projecting on to a home made screen painted with a projection screen specific paint called ScreenGoo. This is available in white, light grey and dark grey. I have the light grey. This helps to increase the contrast levels even further. Ends up being much cheaper than buying a decent screen. Mine is a 100" 16x9 piece of MDF with two coats of Light Grey base coat and two coats of light grey top coat ScreenGoo. It is then surrounded with 2 inch wide black felt tape. The whole thing cost me around £100 with about £80 of that for the paint. It should be even cheaper in the states as that's where it originates from.

No one should ever kid themselves that a white wall is good enough to project on. I did it for a while in my last place as it was a rental and it does the job, but not well. Stepping up to a proper screen is like night and day.

If I was spending less than say US$3000, I would look at an LCD projector and a screen. Most of the LCD's in this price range (such as my Hitachi) are 1280x720, so can do native 720p HD and also support 1080i HD. Mine has a DVI, VGA, Component, S-video and composite inputs. If I was spending over $3000 I would start to look at the better DLP's which have improved colour wheels and such.

The best thing is to demo them if you can and go with what you like best.

As for light levels in the room, whenever I am browsing the web or most of the time when I am playing my PS2, I have one set of overhead lights on over the top of my seating area. This hardly impacts the image. All I do is just open the iris up a bit so it is a little brighter.

Have a look at it here.
http://homepage.mac.com/jebjeb/PhotoAlbum6.html

Thanks for the pics

[dialo]

Originally posted by dcmacdaddy:
But almost as important as brightness is contrast ratio (full on/full off). You want something with at least a 400:1 ratio.
35mm film projectors are roughly 1000:1 and decent DLP's should be in the 300:1 - 600:1 range.

Actually, even cheap home theater projectors have way high contrast ratio than that.

projector people top selling home theater projectors

Also, for a ton of information on projectors, see projector central

If you have a good wall, a screen in not necessary. If you have the money, go ahead and buy one, but don't worry about it if you can't.

[dcmacdaddy]

Originally posted by dialo:
Actually, even cheap home theater projectors have way high contrast ratio than that.

projector people top selling home theater projectors

Also, for a ton of information on projectors, see projector central

If you have a good wall, a screen in not necessary. If you have the money, go ahead and buy one, but don't worry about it if you can't.

Look at the spec's on some of those models you link to: they show a dynamic contrast of 1500:1 or 2000:1. That is a mathematical calculation based on the theoretical dynamic color and brightness range afforded by the lamp. A contrast ratio measured by a true full on/full off test (all white light/all black light) measures actual contrast, not possible contrast.

[pman68]

I am definately working on my Home Theater this year. Since I'm converting my basement, and light will not be an issue and I'm mostly using it for watching movies, a projector sounds perfect for me. I'm really liking the look of this Panasonic model:

Panasonic

Anyone have experience with it?

[pman68]

Originally posted by jebjeb:
I have a basement setup with a front projection system. There is no other way to have that size screen for that sort of price. Plasma's, Rear projections sets and direct views tv's all have their place but you can't beat a good front projection system in a dark room for impact.

The DLP colour wheel/rainbow effect is very noticeable to me so I went with a LCD projector.

CRT projectors are unreal but huge, noisy and cost a bomb. If you were building a home theatre in the $50,000+ region I would go a CRT (well actually, I would start to look at the three-chip DLP models that are starting to get "affordable"). Other than that, DLP or LCD are the ones to go for.

My LCD projector is a Hitachi TXJ-100. It is something like 1300 lumens and has a controllable iris so you can stop down the aperture which improves the contrast. When I am watching a film on mine, in my completely light-tight Home theatre I stop the iris down to level 4 (10 being the brightest). This puts it in the contrast range of a 35mm projector and blacks are pretty damn black. It is still bright enough at this level to be very punchy and vivid.

I have this projecting on to a home made screen painted with a projection screen specific paint called ScreenGoo. This is available in white, light grey and dark grey. I have the light grey. This helps to increase the contrast levels even further. Ends up being much cheaper than buying a decent screen. Mine is a 100" 16x9 piece of MDF with two coats of Light Grey base coat and two coats of light grey top coat ScreenGoo. It is then surrounded with 2 inch wide black felt tape. The whole thing cost me around £100 with about £80 of that for the paint. It should be even cheaper in the states as that's where it originates from.

No one should ever kid themselves that a white wall is good enough to project on. I did it for a while in my last place as it was a rental and it does the job, but not well. Stepping up to a proper screen is like night and day.

If I was spending less than say US$3000, I would look at an LCD projector and a screen. Most of the LCD's in this price range (such as my Hitachi) are 1280x720, so can do native 720p HD and also support 1080i HD. Mine has a DVI, VGA, Component, S-video and composite inputs. If I was spending over $3000 I would start to look at the better DLP's which have improved colour wheels and such.

The best thing is to demo them if you can and go with what you like best.

As for light levels in the room, whenever I am browsing the web or most of the time when I am playing my PS2, I have one set of overhead lights on over the top of my seating area. This hardly impacts the image. All I do is just open the iris up a bit so it is a little brighter.

Have a look at it here.
http://homepage.mac.com/jebjeb/PhotoAlbum6.html

Very nice set up!!

(Anyone else care to post a pic of their set-up??)

[Severed Hand of Skywalker]

Originally posted by pman68:
Very nice set up!!

(Anyone else care to post a pic of their set-up??)

[dcmacdaddy]

Originally posted by pman68:
I am definately working on my Home Theater this year. Since I'm converting my basement, and light will not be an issue and I'm mostly using it for watching movies, a projector sounds perfect for me. I'm really liking the look of this Panasonic model:

Panasonic

Anyone have experience with it?

I would recommend this model. It has a better combination of brightness and contrast, with a similar resolution, as the Panasonic.

[pman68]

Originally posted by dcmacdaddy:
I would recommend this model. It has a better combination of brightness and contrast, with a similar resolution, as the Panasonic.

Looks good too. I definitely have to do more research. I do want to spend under 2K. Projectors sure have come a long way!

[pman68]

Originally posted by dcmacdaddy:
I would recommend this model. It has a better combination of brightness and contrast, with a similar resolution, as the Panasonic.

DELL is selling it for $1,799.00. Not too shabby.

DULL

[Person Man]

Originally posted by pman68:
DELL is selling it for $1,799.00. Not too shabby.

So is Projector People

[dcmacdaddy]

Originally posted by pman68:
Looks good too. I definitely have to do more research. I do want to spend under 2K. Projectors sure have come a long way!

The goal is to find a good balance between brightness and contrast. THowever, the aspect ratio is the limiting factor in this choice as you want something that does both standard NTSC (for those in North America) and various HD (16:9) formats. You can go for a really bright projector (high lumens) without a really high contrast ratio or you can go for a really high contrast ratio--providing richer, more realistic color rendering--without as high a lumes. The InFocus I recommended provides a nice balance of the two variables.

There are plenty of small form-factor DLP projectors that provide a bright image with a high contrast-ratio, but they tend to be expensive. Cheaps DLP's will give you the aberrations common with a low-end DLP color wheel. But where I work we I work we have 7 of these projectors from Projection Design--and they are not much bigger than a toaster--but they cost around US$12,000 apiece.

So, figure out what your price range is and then go from there. Good luck!