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Best Projector for HDTV Movies

I'm also happy with how my 4805 displays 720p and 1080i content. Anything else was basically too expensive.
 
Circuit City has the 4805 + a 76" screen by mail for $999 now 🙂

I got the screen and a 30' s-video cable out the door when I got mine for $999 five months ago, but I think this is a hot deal right now too :thumbsup:
 
How is the 76" screen. Is it portable? Good quality?

I'm tempted to get the 4805 and move my X1 to my upstairs bedroom or living room. It wouldn't be much of a upgrade but it's cheap and I'm thinking about putting projectors in all my TV rooms.
 
If it's the same Infocus screen I got bundled with it from Costco, it's pretty nice. It's a pull down screen with black boarders.

I have a pics of it
here
and
here
 
Dont jump the gun on a projector just because of the price. Sub 1000 projectors usually have slow color wheels.

Visually see the projector in use. A lot of us are sensitive to what is known as the rainbow effect usually most seen on dark areas with light characters. Star Wars Space scenes with the destroyers is a good one to put in. With that look around at various parts of the screen and if you can see the Red Green Blue in a rainbow from your eye movement then your sensitive to this. As a couter newer projectors have color wheels that run twice as fast but usually cost a little more.

Also price out replacement bulbs as projector bulbs usually only last up to 2000hours depending on use, cooling, etc. Bulbs can price from 250-500.00 each. You will probably replace it every 2 years. Bulbs also lose their brightness too so bulbs also have a half life also where they still work but are not nearly as bright as the day you bought it.

But please try the projector first or make sure they have a good return policy if you are one who is sensitive to rainbow effect.
 
The 4805 bulb is rated at 4000hours MTBF in eco-mode I think.

I do notice rainbow effect when there's bright objects or writing against a black background, but only when I'm very rapidly moving my eyes from side to side.

The color wheel on the 4805 is faster than the wheel on the very popular X1 though (4800).
 
YOyoYOhowsDAjello, thx for the picture of the screen. It looks decent enough and looks like it would fit well in my bedroom.

As for sub 1k projectors and rainbow effect, it doesn't bother me. I don't suffer from rainbow effect. Don't see it with my X1. So it's not a problem. The only projectors that interest me at the moment are Panny AE700, Sanyo Z3, Sony HS51, and Infocus 4805. I'm more bang for buck guy when it comes to electronics so these projectors interest me. Out of these, 4805 is the cheapest with the lowest res but that's ok because it will mainly be used for DVD movies. 4805 is perfect for DVD movies so I'm leaning towards that. I don't want to spend too much right now because I know affordable 1080p LCD & DLP projectors are right around the corner.
 
Originally posted by: Naustica
YOyoYOhowsDAjello, thx for the picture of the screen. It looks decent enough and looks like it would fit well in my bedroom.

As for sub 1k projectors and rainbow effect, it doesn't bother me. I don't suffer from rainbow effect. Don't see it with my X1. So it's not a problem. The only projectors that interest me at the moment are Panny AE700, Sanyo Z3, Sony HS51, and Infocus 4805. I'm more bang for buck guy when it comes to electronics so these projectors interest me. Out of these, 4805 is the cheapest with the lowest res but that's ok because it will mainly be used for DVD movies. 4805 is perfect for DVD movies so I'm leaning towards that. I don't want to spend too much right now because I know affordable 1080p LCD & DLP projectors are right around the corner.
Click to expand...

Cool.

Yeah, it looks great for DVDs due to basically playing DVDs at its native resolution.

The only time I'm sending my 4805 "HD" is when I have my computer hooked up to it, but the 720p I've sent to it looks amazing still. Text is not so sharp anymore, but video and games look excellent.

The screen is also a pretty decent weight. The white case the screen rolls into is all metal. The bar at the bottom is a good weight to keep the screen from moving around. The mounting options are screwing it into a wall or handing it from above (it has holes for either type of mounting). I have it against some concrete walls, so I actually just ran a piece of lampcord through the holes and have it suspended from some nails that I managed to wedge inbetween some bricks that are covering up an old area for a window. It's not the sturdiest way to hang it, but it's been up for about a month so far and I leave the screen down all the time so it doesn't get jostled from rolling up and down.

If you want some more pics of the screen (including macros since I can get pretty close to stuff) let me know.
 
I have the Optoma H31, it's got fantastic contrast and it's outstanding with HDTV.
I feed it HDTV from a cable box via component, it's truly outstanding.
With my HTPC I connect via DVI and play DVD's with Zoomplayer Pro using ffdshow.
I do a 2.5x resize with ffdshow and the dvd's are beautiful - however you really can tell the difference between a good dvd and a bad dvd.
Bad dvd = Star Wars ep1 - this copy of a movie looks like broadcast tv, truly crap
good dvd = Fifth Element superbit or ultimate edition - that is a beautiful copy

The only issues with the H31 are when being connected to an HTPC:
1. tearing
a vetical line that appears and sometimes moves up & down the screen
this can be "fixed" by tweaking the drivers, adding custom refresh rates etc
2. DVI-D connection issues
some owners can connect with an HTPC via DVI-D and some can not - in my experience I get a signal over DVI-A but never with DVI-D, after trying everything suggested by Optoma and several other things I came up with on my own and three different HTPC machines I've never been able to connect over Digital RGB. The Analog looks outstanding though, so I will only RMA this thing with great reluctance.

The 4805 also has a few issues of it's own. But those who own them do seem to love them.

THe 480p issue really isn't that big a deal. The worst thing is the SDE and that is solved by sitting @ 2x the screen width. If it does not bother you then you can sit closer.

I got my H31 with a 92" pull down screen shipped 2nd day FedEx for $1100 four months ago. I'll be there are deals as good or better now & the 4805 is a steal with a screen for the prices you can see out there.

Still, if the 480p issue is too much for some then think about the Matterhorn DLP PJ's out there. The Optoma H57 is a very good example. These fit between the 480 & the 720's and sometimes can be found at a good price.
 
A buddy of mine got the verion befor this projector:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16824187026


I think the only difference is that his came with a DVI port instead of the HDMI. I helped him mount it and after we did we watched some Episode V and it rocks. It pretty good for movies and hours of Halo 2 fragging.

But I must say I don't own it so I don't have hours of time to notice the little flaws that it might have.
 
The AE700 is a good LCD projector. It's got the 16:9 ratio and is bright with good contrast.
It's also $2K.

There's a big difference between $1K - $2K & $3K PJ's however that difference is being offset constantly by the increased performance for lower price in that competitive market.

My plan is to hold onto my H31 until the 720p DLP PJ's get cheap enough and then sell the H31 to partially fund the upgrade. Until then I have a good PJ that shows outstanding PQ.
 
I'll put in my obligatory recommendation for the Sanyo Z3 being that I just got one myself.

For $1500 or less you can get the latest in 720p LCD projectors.

I personally prefer the sharper pixels and more vibrant color that LCD provides for gaming and graphics. Rather than harp on specs I'll just put up pics and you can judge with your own tastes:

http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/pj4.jpg

Finding Nemo: a must for LCD projector demo as it flexes LCD's color vibrance to the limit

http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/nemo3.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/nemo4.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/nemo5.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/nemo6.jpg

Gladiator, probably not the best for displaying video since its compressed so bad...

http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/glad1.jpg (CGI tiger, note the fur shader artifacts)
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/glad2.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/glad3.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/glad4.jpg

Some 4:3 anime (plain wall before I got the screen)

http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/escaflowne1.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/escaflowne2.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/escaflowne3.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/escaflowne4.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/escaflowne5.jpg
http://members.cox.net/csbaker-az/escaflowne6.jpg

 
hehe, I took some gladiator pictures the other day from my projector too (4805) and a couple of them look like the exact ones you posted.

Let me host them 🙂
 
My canon powershot A40 didn't do such a great job picking up the darker stuff (the shadows in these pics look uniformly black in my photos almost while the real image has a lot more detail)

Maybe next time I should mess around with the exposure setting until I get some pics that look accurate 😉

For what they're worth:

<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6334_IMG.JPG">https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6334_IMG.JPG</a>

<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6342_IMG.JPG">https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6342_IMG.JPG</a>

<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6361_IMG.JPG">https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6361_IMG.JPG</a>

<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6364_IMG.JPG">https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6364_IMG.JPG</a>

<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6367_IMG.JPG">https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/spmclaughlin/web/Random/163-6367_IMG.JPG</a>
 
Hah the last two pics are the same. No coincidence of scene choice, those are some of the highest contrast scenes in the movie.

What I do is set the camera on a steady surface with a timer, and set it for night mode without flash, and get as close to possible to eliminate as much black area around the screen.

I have the opposite problem as you it seems. I think it's the light level meter averaging the large amounts of dark/black on the outside of the image and artificially over exposing. I've experimented with camera distances to try to hit the lens with as much screen light as possible and the pics I posted are pretty much spot on, maybe a tiny bit over done on the highlights. Not much can be done with a 16:9 screen and a 4:3 camera without cropping.
 
Originally posted by: exdeath
I'll put in my obligatory recommendation for the Sanyo Z3 being that I just got one myself.

For $1500 or less you can get the latest in 720p LCD projectors.
Click to expand...

Nice pics. What model of screen is that? Also, what are the best vendors to check for the lowest prices on the Z3?

(I read AVSForum, but they don't allow price/deal discussion.)

 
Originally posted by: manko
Originally posted by: exdeath
I'll put in my obligatory recommendation for the Sanyo Z3 being that I just got one myself.

For $1500 or less you can get the latest in 720p LCD projectors.
Click to expand...

Nice pics. What model of screen is that? Also, what are the best vendors to check for the lowest prices on the Z3?

(I read AVSForum, but they don't allow price/deal discussion.)
Click to expand...

Pricegrabber will get you a quick idea of how much things cost.

As for "hot deals", I actually found the hot deal on my own projector at AVSforum.
 
Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello

Pricegrabber will get you a quick idea of how much things cost.

As for "hot deals", I actually found the hot deal on my own projector at AVSforum.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Yeah, I've used the price search engines and checked some of the vendors links from AVS, but the lowest listed prices on the Z3 are high $1600-$1700 on up.

I was wondering specifically which stores are actually offering the "under $1500" prices on this model (Sanyo Z3).

Most of mentions of specific prices I've seen on AVSForums are regularly removed by moderators. I assume that's because they don't want to start price wars between their site sponsors. "Please as per forum rules do not post pricing or sales related links."
 
I got mine on ebay new in box for $1520 or so including shipping.

If you don't mind a Japanese version, I think you can get those for like $1300 from an import website that I don't remember at the moment. The menus are in english and I think the only difference is instead of two component video inputs, one of the component inputs is a D4 connector that is kinda like HDMI physically but is basically a 720p component analog signal.

The screen I have is a DaLite DaMatte perm wall screen 52" x 92" (106" diag 16:9) with 1.0 gain. Price for screen and frame was about $520 shipped, also on ebay from a seller that drop shipped direct from DaLite.

As far as screens, going lower gain helps with contrast at the expense of dimmer highlights. But on the Sanyo Z3 or Panasonic 700, and most DLP projectors, it's not really necessary since these projectors have great contrast as is and you need a dark room anyway. (This goes for any projector, as even with a $30,000 projector your black is only as dark as the screen when the projector is off) Going too high gain over 1.0 (called positive gain) could wash out your blacks and show hot spots in the center of the screen depending on installation. I chose to keep it simple and stick with 1.0 unity gain to see only what the projector produces (no negative or positive gain). You want to pick a screen that disappears when the projector comes on.

For screen size, the smaller the screen the better the contrast and brighter the image. If the primary focus was gaming and real time graphics, which are naturally bright with powerful color, you can get away with larger screen sizes since the absolute peak contrast doesn't make a difference here like it does in video. The resolution of the projector and the seating distance is also a factor in screen size when it comes to how much visible pixelation you are willing to accept.

The total cost for my setup:

Sanyo Z3 projector: $1520
Dalite 106" screen: $520
25' component cable: $50
HDMI+Component+S-video wall plate: $80
projector mount: $100

Spending 2 hours in an attic drilling through a double top plate and fire blocking further than the drill can reach without a 36" extension, and finding out later that it was a record 111 F day: $priceless

Total: $2,270

The wall plate was from dvigear.com. A rip off really, but nobody else has them that I have found and I didn't want to deal with custom making one. Also the cable cost is variable depending on the quality of cable and what types of cables you need. I will add s video and HDMI shortly as I finish. I need svideo for SNES, Dreamcast, etc. and I wont bother with HDMI until PS3/XBox360 come out. Upconversion between formats is possible, but the equipment is costly and you get better image quality just running the signal over it's native connection over a $15 cable.

 
Thanks for all the great info, exdeath. I may give a few dealers a call and see if they are willing to go down to the $1500 range. Thanks for the tip about the Japanese models too. I don't mind importing, but I do wonder about internationl warranty coverage.

You've got a very nice looking screen and mount setup in the picture. I'll probably start out with a cheap DIY screen and see how that works out.


In case anyone's interested here's one of the Japanese import places. The site says the warranty is only valid in Japan, so it has to be shipped back there at the customers expense for service.

http://www.pricejapan.com/PriceJapan_com.htm
 
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