Optoma H31 16:9 Home theater Front Projector $499 AR FREE S&H! Review with screen shots inside

[STotaro]

$499 after $100 rebate and free shipping!

 

[funboy6942]

Originally posted by: STotaro
$499 after $100 rebate and free shipping!

TY I updated the thread a little.

 

[STotaro]

I am about to buy this. I guess you would say it is a no brainer for $499 and free shipping right? What about the bulb insurance? Go for it also?

How about the rebate, any problems getting it?

 

[STotaro]

Now how should I pay? They take PayPal so I can get the $15 rebate or put it on amex and get points plus extended warranty.

 

[funboy6942]

Originally posted by: STotaro
Now how should I pay? They take PayPal so I can get the $15 rebate or put it on amex and get points plus extended warranty.

Well if warranty is a thing for you I would think it would be worth the $15 you lose not going with paypal, and as for the rebate, I got mine no problems there and I actually bought my PJ from Tiger Direct.

As for the Bulb insurance, YES, get it! I am still kicking myself in the ass on that one. If the bulb blows under 3000 rated hours your to get 2 new ones under that plan and it only cost $100 for it when the bulbs are $300 a pop each. So as long as they go in under 3000 hours and you use the plan you get $600 in bulbs for $100.

My next PJ is from this place and I am buying that insurance and the 120" screen for $79 for sure next couple years when I am done with this PJ. But I have had it now for a good 6 months I think and it trully kicks so much ass, I and my family just love it. The only reason I would even consider getting rid of it later is if it broke or to upgrade to HD when they finnaly get the format straightened out and everything has gone that route.

 

[STotaro]

Do you have to send the burned out bulb back?

 

[kenji4life]

I have the 106" gray wolf screen and will testify to it's quality. It is a manual pull down, which doesn't matter to me as I leave it pulled down. This doesn't seem to effect the screen at all.

As for the optoma, I can't say much as I went for the Infocus SP4805 almost entirely because Infocus is based right near me. I figured warranty etc would be easier with a local company.

However I did strongly consider this optoma as it was (along with the infocus) one of the best 480p projectors out at the time I purchased (a year ago).

If you read all of the reviews available (i'm sure they've been posted) you'll see that this is a good projector.

For the doubters out there, you have to see one of these to believe it before you put it down for not being high definition. These have the quality of picture of the best 480p TVs out there, period. Except about 2 times as large. I can't ever say enough about how amazing it is watching a DVD on this screen. (Paired with a really awesome DD 7.1 system of course) I will upgrade to a 1080p unit in the future.. but it might be a while, as I don't see the prices too much below 5-10k in the short run. Perhaps they will drop once 1080p tv's are the standard high def instead of 720p.

All in all.. if I had the option to do it all over again, I would be more than happy to pay 500 for this projector. I paid double for a proj+screen+mount a year ago.

That reminds me. I got my mount off ebay. It's an all metal mount with left/right rotation, up/down vertical rotation, and horizontal up/down adjustment. I think I paid less than 30 dollars and it works a charm, and fits my projector perfectly.

 

[Spelvin]

Not to thread jack but Tiger has the Infocus in72 for $449 after the Infocus $200 rebate. So yeah, I do not care for tigerdirect, but the rebate is done right through Infocus and they are good for it.

If you are looking to get started in front projection on the cheap the H31 or in72 both rock. They both have very similar specs and I am not going to even attempt to say one is better than the other, just that they are both a great deal.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications...m-details.asp?EdpNo=2168974&CatId=1755

One of these paired up with one of the Onkyo refurb DTS units, some cables from Monoprice and an inexpensive mount from ebay and you have a heck of a DVD watching WII PLAYING system...

Yeah the Wii rocks on these!

 

[STotaro]

Yeah, I already have the Onkyo HTIB, I am teetering on either buying one of these projectors or a plasma/LCD

 

[dud]

FWIW, I have an NEC projector that I use in eco-mode (3000 hours) at 1,100 lumens (1,500 in non-eco mode). I do not believe that 850 Lumens is sufficient to fully enjoy the view unless you are in a totally dark room. I can barely get that with a unit throwing 1,100 lumens.

Boy, are the price of projectors falling or what?

 

[STotaro]

Just about to submit my payment info and then i read the above! I will not be using it in a totally dark environment.

Can the NEC you speak of be found for a similar price point?

 

[Spelvin]

The brightness is such a subjective call. I do have complete light control in my living room, it is also all dark wood, Like barn board and track lighting so I can also really adjust where I have the light shining. That being said, I almost always have the lights on when I am using the projector. I am using an Infocus SP4805 that is "rated" at 600 ANSI lumens in Econo mode, which is what I run, and it is plenty bright. Mind you I am running a 72" diagonal screen, 66" wide, so I am going smaller than a lot of people. There is plenty of light in the room, you could most definately read a book anywhere. This was very important to me since it now gets a lot of use with the Wii and I do not want my guests tripping over things or falling over each other in the dark.

If you can get it dim in your room you should be fine, the big thing that they talk about on the AVS forums is if you can get your walls to be a darker color...this helps dramatically with reflected light. PM me and I can get you some pics, though they are not great...

 

[funboy6942]

Originally posted by: dud
FWIW, I have an NEC projector that I use in eco-mode (3000 hours) at 1,100 lumens (1,500 in non-eco mode). I do not believe that 850 Lumens is sufficient to fully enjoy the view unless you are in a totally dark room. I can barely get that with a unit throwing 1,100 lumens.

Boy, are the price of projectors falling or what?

The rating lumens is NEVER what they truly do, I have mine in my room and I watch it with lighs on, with some sun, and sometimes when its completly dark. It wont matter what PJ you buy ALL of them will look their best in a dark room no matter what but I can assure you the H31 with a little light still have a great piture and I have the pictures to back it up :

These pictures were taken in the middle of the day with the lights on above me, sades down but light still coming through.

Pic 1

Pic 2

And finally a backed off shot of what the room was like when I took the above shots.
Only diff being is I turned off my beer signs and Pachinko machine for the close up 5th Element shots, but the room was that bright when I took all 3 of those shots that day.

The Infocus PJ is one I was going to get, it was a toss up between this one and the other. The difference is though the bulb cost for me, the H31 was $299 where the Infocus 72 is $450 per bulb and Im not sure if the place I listed at sell the infcus or not at the low price with the bulb warranty. tigerdirect doesnt sell as good a warranty as this place does HENCE why I posted this up and not TG where I bought my PJ from in the first place.

As far as lumens go, do a look on google at any review place and all of them will say NEVER go by what is writen on the box by the manufacture, they are all wrong. I did a hard 3 months studying about projectors on every HD and SD one in the sub $1500 price range and read everything there was to read about them and the diff between DLP and LCD type as well before making my choice. I didnt jump in this with cold feet and shoot a dart, I read everything I could find and bothered anyone that would give me the time for I knew nothing about DLP or LCD projectors. I knew everything about CRT but since this was going to be my first major large PJ purchase I wanted to be sure for the money I had to spend I wasnt going to get screwed. Read every little detail, every spec, and nothing can be touched in the price range of $500 other then the infocus 72 and the H31, major diff between them is the Infocus uses HDMI and is rated at 3000 hours in ECO and STD mode but bulbs are $100+ more VS the Optoma uses DVI (HDMI Adapter does work), and bulbs are $100 cheaper, aside of that picture quality between the two are pretty much 100% spot on and either one will be a good choice.

OH and my picture you see there is shot on a cheap $59 Tiger Direct Special Screen, if it looks that good on that screen bet your ass it would look better on real screen material like a Grey Wolf II with a 1.8 gain and glass beads and not my 1.0 gain plain o POS

 

[MattUNI2001]

For what it is worth... (If this is too long for you, scroll to the last paragraph because it is what matters)

I have the H31 and had just recently bought a ceiling mount from Ebay. Before I did the final hanging, I decided to plug it in to move the picture around to where I wanted it. As soon as the power cord touched the projector "prongs", half of my house shorted out and the inside of my projector started on fire for about 2 seconds....

Needless to say, the projector did not work once I flipped the breaker. The reason I think this happened was because the screws I used were too long. The mount came with a very large variety of screws, so I used 12 mm ones because they fit perfectly.

After the projector shorted, I finally read the manual to see that it said, "Never use greater than 4 mm screws." Oops.... I'm assuming the 12 mm touched an internal wire or something.

Anyways, to make a long story longer, I sent the projector back to Optoma, claiming warranty, after owning it for 10 months in a regular, crappy box with the receipt. Exactly 1 week after I had the confirmation that Optoma had received my projector, I got it back in the mail. I honestly thought that they just shipped it straight back to me without checking it out. I plugged it in, and it works like a dream! The point: It was amazing customer service and I was only out a projector for about 10 days.

p.s. I mounted it with the 4 mm screws and it has been working well for 2 weeks now!!