Originally posted by: BaNzaiDags
Originally posted by: Kaido
Ouch, you could get a projector for that price...a nice Infocus X1 or something.
tru, but aren't good screens expensive also? - do they come with projector? i thought i saw on the HSN that the screens usually doesnt' come with projector...
No, none that I know of come with a screen. You have tons of options for screens, however. You can buy one, either manual, electric, or fixed. You can build one, out of a cloth material or a hard material and paint it. Or you can just use your wall.
I just bought an Optoma EzPro 745 for business/home use. Mostly business, with PowerPoint. But I do use it occasionally for watching DVDs. The wall in my living room happens to be painted white, so I've been using that. Here are a couple shots:
http://www.kaido.net/projects/hometheater/optoma1.jpg
http://www.kaido.net/projects/hometheater/optoma2.jpg
Looks great! I am planning on building my own screen soon. I found a guy on ebay who sells screen material and plans for about $20, planning on rigging up a nice 110" diagonal screen in the next few months. I also have a custom widescreen I've been working on, about 53" wide, made out of wood. Not nearly as big as what I have on the wall right now, however. I'm going to paint it with a Behr mix called SilverScreen. More info at avsforum.com if you're interested
The two downsides to projectors are cost of bulbs and light control. Bulbs can run up to $450 for a good home theater projector. My bulbs are "only" $250, and the last a lot longer than average (about 5,000 hours instead of 3,000). It's basically a special light bulb for projectors...it burns out like any other light bulb. The other issue is light control. Unless you have a powerful projector, and even if you do, the picture won't look very good in daylight. You need some serious shades or else limit watching movies with it to nighttime. I just hang blankets over my windows, easy and cheap solution. A projector works by projecting light, so if daylight or lamplight is interfering, it's going to have problems. Try turning on a flashlight outside at noon on a sunny day, you'll see what I mean
I think televisions are more or less a need/want-based thing, rather than a one-answer-fits-all. Projectors are great...if you have the money to buy and maintain them (replacement bulbs!), the room (need room for a big image and need enough horizontal distance to project it), and the light control. Televisions are good, easy solutions that last forever. LCD televisions are especially sexy. I was doing a shutter installation at a lady's house at my old job...she had a huge, thin plasma or LCD on the wall with Bose cubes all around. While I'm sure you know the (informed) public opinion of Bose speakers, it was undeniably cool. My speakers and television take up tons of room in my living room compared to that setup! So it just comes down to what you really want.
For me, I needed a projector for business use and being able to use it as a big-screen tv at home was a plus. It's HD-compatible, has DVI, VGA, S-video, and composite inputs. It also takes component with a vga adapter cable (got one on ebay
). So it fits my needs nicely - I rarely watch television, mostly just a DVD movie now and then. Looks awesome, has a major "wow" effect, and is fun overall. But for anything else, I just use the old tv.
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