Digital Projector question

[hockey2112]

I know this isn't really a DVD player, but I was not sure where else to post this.

I am interested in obtaining a digital projector, to use as a movie projector from my computer and DVD player. I would be projection on either a white wall or a white pull-down canvas.

Does anyone know anything about these things? What are some good models? How much can I expect to pay? What does the quality look like? A friend of mine borrowed one from our college a few years back, but I can't really remember how well it worked. Any info would be greatly appreciated.

[BJ_M]

I know a lot about them ....

the quality today on them is great and the prices are very low for great quality ..

do yourself a favour and project on a proper screen though ...

there are 4 price points in projectors and its pretty clear cut

$1000 - $5000 some projectors in this catagory are superb, looking better than some higher priced models - home or transportation use mostly. don't be put off by "low" light output as light output is meaningless to a degree anyway. DLP and LCD both in this price range.
Hot market segment.
Best of this market is : InFocus X1 @ $1500 - unbeleivable good picture
also to be considered:
Panasonic PT-L300U
Boxlight Home Cinema 20HD (made by Sanyo)
NEC HT1000
Sony VPL-HS10 Cineza
SharpVision XV-Z90U
Piano Avanti (good only for smaller screens but great picture)

$5000 - $15,000 - better quality construction and in some cases also more features , better cooling , and sometimes better picture. more used in rental companies and fix install. lot of home and bussness projectors in this catagory. DLP and LCD .. slow selling right now at the higher end. some real higher end home projectors at the top of this price point (marantz VP12S2)

$15,000 - $60,000 good stuff
$60,000 - $150,000 great stuff

[hockey2112]

That is some really great information. Thank you.

What would be considered a "proper screen"? How much would one cost?

Do they make projectors with CD drives and an internal hard drive that you could play a burned DiVX movie from? I guess the hard drive would hold the various codec. I know this is kind of reaching, and I'm sure they probably cannot do this, but figured I would ask anyway.

What is the different between DLP and LCD, and what do they stand for?

The InFocus X1 sounds like a good model for me. I'll look around for that one now. Can you recommend a good website or store?

Also, what would be some of the models closer to $1000?

Thanks again!

[BJ_M]

closer to 1000$ -> not much at all , maybe used on ebay but you have to shop carefully ...

screen 8 feet wide -> really good one $800 , good one $400 , still usable one $280 ... you want one that is high contrast and total flat ..

projectors with internal drives and such -> no (some with flash and pcmcia slots though is it) .

DLP and LCD -> see here http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,3973,10084,00.asp

google search on the x1 will show a lot of places selling them

here is one place http://www.projectorpoint.com/infocusx1.htm

click on this link to get more quotes
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=InFocus+X1&btnG=Google+Search

[BJ_M]

a good place to go is boxlight (carries all brands plus thier own and have screens and such)

http://www.boxlight.com/products/hometheater.asp?X=1

they have a deal on a epson projector in the $1000 range but you have to call them and ask about it or click here and fill in the form ..

http://forms.boxlight.com/EmailBid/EmailBid.asp?VertMarket=lkbxatwvwvue&ProductName=Ep...Brightness=700

[p_l]

Anyone have any experience with the Canon and the Hitachi here? The prices are in Canadian dollars.

[BJ_M]

they are both poor quality for video .. very poor ..

[p_l]

because?... (other than the fact that they are sold by Future Shop)

[BJ_M]

nothing wrong with future shop 8)


they both have large amounts of "screen door" effect , use cheap video proccessing engines, have bad lens w/ plastic elements, use old types of tft lcd panels which are outdated now , are designed primarly for computer boardroom type display and video is an after thought .
the display is slow to respond, poor color response, ringing of Hf video info .. ghosting on fast motion ..

need i go on ?

[p_l]

OK, I get the picture ...well actually I won't get a good picture, according to what you say. Now I know why they don't have a demonstrator model running, this from a store famous for showing off walls full of TVs.

Thanks for the info.

[p_l]

OK, so now I'm torn between the InFocus X1 and the Sanyo PLV-Z1, mostly because the local dealer says the InFocus X1 will be out of stock for "several weeks." I know I could order it online, but I'd rather get it from a guy in a shop I can "visit" if a problem arises. So, should I wait for the InFocus X1 (I don't mind waiting a little), or should I go ahead and get the Sanyo PLV-Z1 if it's just as good? And which is better, LCD or DLP? Any experienced insight is welcome.

[BJ_M]

DLP will give you a better picture most of the time (due to closer pack of the pixels) and the chip doesnt fade like a lcd panel , DLP also has better contrest ratio ... but lcd will ussually give you a slightly brighter picture at the same $$ level .. the latest generation of lcd are very good and w/ some of the latest lcd's you get native wide screen.

I think the X1 has a better picture - but i also can say that the sanyo is not bad at all and is also highly rated ..

[BJ_M]

Also - infocus has a 24 hour replacement warrenty -- 5 year , best in the bussness .. if you get in on-line you are very well covered also ..

[$ponge]

I have a LP340b I am looking to sell for 650. I just bought it and decided to buy a big screen instead.

http://www.projectorcentral.com/projector_details.cfm?part_id=1320

anyone interested please email me at yellowtale@hotmail.com
I will be listing it on Ebay soon.

[BJ_M]

I have a LP340b I am looking to sell for 650. I just bought it and decided to buy a big screen instead.

http://www.projectorcentral.com/projector_details.cfm?part_id=1320

anyone interested please email me at yellowtale@hotmail.com
I will be listing it on Ebay soon.

thats a very good deal for someone .. you can get an update for this projector here http://www.infocus.com/service/lp340B/software.asp?soft=system

[JGDragov]

Hi.
I am in the process of getting my room for my home theater ready. The size of the room will be 11.5' x 16.5" with the image being projected within the 11.5 space( likely a 10' throw distance). I would very much like to use a front projector but very few stores in the area display them so I will very likely have to buy one online. Here are a few questions I am hoping someone might answer:
1. What projectors offer the largest yet still very good picture within the 10' throw space?
2. If and when we switch to digital transmissions which projectors will accomodate these signals?
3. Finally, what if any projectors for $2,500 can work within these guidelines?
Any response would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.

[BJ_M]

1. What projectors offer the largest yet still very good picture within the 10' throw space?
2. If and when we switch to digital transmissions which projectors will accomodate these signals?
3. Finally, what if any projectors for $2,500 can work within these guidelines?

InFocus X1 ($1900)
Infocus ScreenPlay 4800 ($1500) - very new model (like today) - superb picture quality .
Digital Projection Inc iVision HD (16:9 native) - a bit more money but much higher resolution and really good picture. (may be a bit avove 2500$)

all of the above include Texas Instrument's DLP™ technology and Faroduja's deinterlacing technology. all can display up to a 12' image but i would limit it to 8-9 feet wide max..

all meet your criteria and have higher than 1000:1 contrast ratio


get a good screen really helps the picture - stewart greyhawk is very good as are some others ..

[JGDragov]

Thanks for the informative response.
I've been leaning towrds the budget friendly NEC LT460 as I am trying to get the largest yet best picture quality possible. I never even looked into the 4800 but I'm looking into it right now.
It seems you've had some first hand experiences in front projectors as mine have been limited to the Sharp XVZ90U(not overly impressive) and it's better but overpriced brother XVZ9000U on display at 6th Ave. Electronics. If you could point me in the direction of a site that offers a back view of the InFocus 4800 I'd be grateful.
Thanks.

P.S. Do you have a front projector in your home/work?

[BJ_M]

yes, both at home and work (many) and we install 100's of them -- but mostly BIG ones (like on 25-60 foot screens) - we are not even a infocus dealer but non the less for a small budget they have a great projector

http://www.infocushome.com/projectors/product.asp?proj=4800&lang=eng

InFocus’ Newest ScreenPlay Projector Makes Superior Home Theater Affordable for Consumers

New InFocus ScreenPlay 4800 Delivers Bigger, Sharper Image for Home Theater

WILSONVILLE, OR, May 20, 2003 – Home theaters with front projectors were once the bastion of only the most well-heeled home entertainment aficionados. Now, thanks to InFocus® Corporation (Nasdaq:INFS) (OSE: IFC) the worldwide leader in digital projection technology and services, ScreenPlay digital projectors optimized for home theater will become as common as plasma or big screen TVs, only with sharper and significantly larger images at a fraction of the cost. InFocus announced today the launch of the ScreenPlay 4800, the third in its line of home theater projectors, and the first to break the $1,500 price barrier. With access to an affordable home theater projector, more consumers can now experience cinema-quality images at home.

Perfect for projecting larger-than-life images from DVDs, home movies from digital cameras or camcorders, televised events such as football and video games, the ScreenPlay 4800 can project images up to 12 feet with crisper, higher-resolution images than plasma, big screen TVs and many other projectors.

"If you want the true theater experience in your home, front projection is the only way to get amazing image quality in sizes more than twice that of other display devices, and InFocus' ScreenPlay Series is designed to offer a superior home theater experience," said Scott Hix, Vice President and General Manager of InFocus Business Development. "With the ScreenPlay 4800, InFocus has extended the ScreenPlay Series to make truly impressive home theater available to customers looking for great value and performance."

InFocus has integrated advanced technology from Texas Instruments and Faroudja into the ScreenPlay 4800. Both Texas Instrument's DLP™ technology and Faroduja's deinterlacing technology, DCDi, are featured in the projector. Together, these technologies, blended with the projector innovation that ScreenPlay by InFocus is known and awarded for, make the ScreenPlay 4800 adaptable to most broadcast technologies, including High-Definition broadcasts, while still remaining light, bright, and quiet.

"The ScreenPlay 4800 continues our successful partnership with InFocus," said Bharath Rajagopalan, Manager, Home Projector Business Unit, DLP™ Products at Texas Instruments. "We see a significant - and very exciting - opportunity for front projection systems for the home, and the ScreenPlay 4800 appears to be extremely well positioned to take maximum advantage of that opportunity." Weighing only six pounds, the ScreenPlay 4800 can be easily placed out of view following use. Unlike plasma and big-screen television systems that need large, cumbersome furniture to house them, ScreenPlay projectors give you your room back when you are finished watching the latest blockbuster or the last field goal of the biggest Bowl games. The projector also comes with an unmatched set of ease-of-use features and connectivity to with televisions, DVD players or satellite receivers. The unique home theater onscreen menu and home theater remote includes controls for aspect ratio, overscan, user settings, in 12 languages, multiple pre-set modes for film, video, and PC as well as extensive image controls for color saturation, contrast, tint, and brightness.

The ScreenPlay 4800 delivers native SVGA (800 x 600) resolution, 1100 ANSI lumens, a 2000:1 contrast ratio and 16.7-million color wheel. The projector can throw an image between 2.7' (0.8 meters) to greater than 21.6' (6.5 meters) wide from distances of 1.5 meters to 9.8 meters. The ScreenPlay 4800 will be available on May 19. For more information, customers can visit www.infocushome.com.

The NEC 460 is not a bad projector (it is a lcd vs. DLP) but it doesnt have great contrast ratio (can not display blacks very well) and the ones ive seen always had a green tint to the image .. they are pretty bright though and NEC service is great -- they are also sold online for just over 1000$ so they are pretty good bargin ..

[BJ_M]

BIG news on these projectors today -- big price drops and a review ...

review states pretty much what i thought ..

InFocus Screenplay 4800 vs. the X1
Evan Powell, May 27, 2003

Last week InFocus announced that estimated street prices on their hot-selling X1 projector were being dropped to $999—down from $1,599 just six months ago. Almost simultaneously InFocus released the Screenplay 4800, a new model with identical specifications, at an estimated street of $1,499.

This has produced an avalanche of email from confused consumers…is the X1 being discontinued? Is this a fire sale? Is there something wrong with the X1 that was fixed in the 4800? Is the 4800 an improved version of the X1? Is it worth the extra $500? What is the difference between them?

Well. The short answers are these…the X1 is not being discontinued and it is not a fire sale. The price reduction is in response to general competitive movements in the industry, including most notably the recent release of the Epson PowerLite S1 (1200 ANSU lumens, SVGA, 7 lbs) at a retail of $999. The X1 is a popular unit, and there is nothing at all wrong with it. It is still on our Highly Recommended list for home theater projectors, as at $999 it is more of a value than ever before (see original X1 review.)

So what is the Screenplay 4800?

Quite simply the 4800 is the X1 repackaged for home theater distribution. Physically they are the same projector. However, there are differences in software settings. When you power up the X1, the factory default setting out of the box is for 4:3 mode of operation. When you power up the 4800 out of the box it defaults to 16:9. However, on either model you can easily change the factory default to whatever aspect ratio you want via a menu selection.

Gamma tables have been adjusted to optimize video on the Screenplay 4800. A new remote with home theater-friendly features is included also. As far as functional performance goes, the X1 will do everything the Screenplay 4800 will do. But the 4800 is, according to InFocus product management, preprogrammed for optimal video performance, while X1 owners may want to do some calibration to get it tuned to its best for video.

Both the X1 and the Screenplay 4800 come with a VGA 15-pin computer cable, by which you can feed HDTV and component 480p into the VGA port. However, in addition the Screenplay 4800 comes standard with an S-video cable. It also comes with an RCA to VGA cable adapter. This is handy if you want to use an RCA component video cable you already have to connect an RCA output to the VGA port. However you can accomplish the same thing with the X1 by ordering the adapter as an optional accessory, or buying an RCA to VGA cable and thus eliminating the problem.

The X1/4800 is designed with a special seven-pin S-video connector that lets you input a component interlaced (480i) signal into the S-video port. InFocus provides an adapter that interfaces an RCA component cable to this special port. This adapter used to be shipped standard with the X1, but is no longer. It is now standard only with the Screenplay 4800. However, if you buy the X1 and you want this adapter, you can buy it for $22.99 from Belkin Corp (1-800-223-5546, Part No. F8V3006b). So the fact that this adapter no longer ships with the X1 is not a good reason to spend $500 more for the Screenplay 4800.

Why the two models?

In today's world there are several types of resellers of projectors. First there are professional audio/visual dealers ("Pro AV"). Typically these dealers sell a wide range of projection systems for commercial, education, and government, as well as home theater use. They are high volume dealers that operate nationwide or internationally, and many of them sell on the Internet. They may offer installation services where they have offices, but quite often they sell products without any other services. The Pro-AV dealer can supply you with projectors, screens, ceiling mounts, cables, etc. You can then either do the installation yourself, or hire a local handyman service to do it for you.

In addition to Pro-AV dealers, there are home theater specialty dealers and installers. These folks usually concentrate on home theater solutions exclusively. They operate locally, often confined to territories assigned by the manufacturers they represent. Thus they typically do not advertise or conduct business via the Internet. They offer design services as well as full installation. They tend to carry higher end brands that are restricted in distribution and not sold on the Internet. Typically the buyer contracts with a specialty home theater dealer/installer for a full installation of audio and video components and the dealer/installer is responsible for everything from A to Z. This is the more expensive route to home theater. However if you have the funds to invest, it may be (relatively speaking) no muss no fuss, and the easy way to do it.

There are also retail chains that offer home theater projectors along with installation services at extra cost. They usually do not have the expertise in product knowledge that the Pro-AV or specialty dealers/installers have, nor do they offer the same quality of design and installation services.

With that background, let's turn back to InFocus and the two models in question. InFocus currently distributes its commercial line of projectors primarily through Pro-AV dealers. These dealers do not handle the Screenplay models however. Conversely, the InFocus Screenplay models (currently the 110, the 4800, and the 7200) are sold mostly by home theater specialty dealer/installers (and some retailers) who do not sell the commercial models.

In this instance, InFocus wants to sell the same projector through both dealer channels. So two models were created for this purpose. The X1 is sold through Pro-AV dealers, and the Screenplay 4800 is sold by specialty home theater dealers/installers. You will therefore find the X1 distributed on the Internet. Meanwhile the Screenplay 4800 is largely restricted from sale on the Internet due to the nature of these two different dealer networks.

[p_l]

Thanks to BJ_M's advice, I got an InFocus X1 a couple of months ago, and I couldn't be happier with it. A great place (besides here ) for projector discussions is avsforum.com, whose "Digital Projectors - Under $5000 USD MSRP" forum is rife with discussions of the X1. Another good resource is http://projectorcentral.com/. I'd also like to take this opportunity to express my belated gratitude to BJ_M for his great advice.

[shoozleboy]

Thanks for the info, BJ.... That folks is information you can not get in retail stores and even some specialty stores....

My Sharpvision 96u has seen it's better days and I've been toying with either finding another 96 for parts or just getting a new unit altogether. I'm familiar with some of the inFocus stuff from a few years ago (helped a couple of freinds with finding good projectors for their needs and they were both inFocus units.)

I'm going to have to do some looking around for the X1... I'd like to see the picture firsthand, but now I have some better direction to go with. Thanks again!

[BJ_M]

http://www.dlpstore.com/projectors/PPF/manu/InFocus/itmname/InFocus+X1/itemid/1144/projdtls.asp

$999 plus there is a $100 rebate or a free dvd player
which ends on 5.31.03

[hitechjunkie]

bj_m,

- how important is resolution (VGA/SVGA/XGA/SXGA) when considering a projector for home theater?
- is it more important than the contrast ratio you mentioned?
- in ur opinion, what are the absolute minimums for things like lumens, resolution, etc., one should consider in a projector for a home theater?

one more thing,
- could u suggest an xga dlp projector? (is infocus the way to go?)

[BJ_M]

- how important is resolution (VGA/SVGA/XGA/SXGA) when considering a projector for home theater?

not as importaint as you would think - even for HD .. a lot depends on screen size .. some of the nicest projectors are only 800x600 and look great on a say 6-7foot screen


- is it more important than the contrast ratio you mentioned?

contrast ratio and color rendition are key factors in a video projector for showing video vs. computer screen ... also on how well it scales images

in ur opinion, what are the absolute minimums for things like lumens, resolution, etc., one should consider in a projector for a home theater?

first -- the figures quoted for the above specs dont mean a whole lot for a number of reasons -- you can only take them as a guideline .. (except resolution -- hard to fudge that one)

for brightness consider that a good CRT home projector may be only 400-600lm brightness .. and no one much complains .. DLP and LCD brightness is somewhat different but 800 is min i guess to suggest .. depends on screen size and type (some screen surfaces are much better than others and brighter doesnt always mean better) ..


the best is what looks good - and sometimes you just have to follow what people recommend ..

what projector is best today can change like the wind ..

i like the infocus rigt now because its a good bargin and has a great picture .. i like a lot of other projectors also - even more , but they also cost a LOT more

the big names in home theater in terms of quality - price - service seem to be NEC , PLUS . infocus , Sharp
for the lower end ..

marantz and DLP make some GREAT projectors in the little more expensive range (along with NEC and panasonic)

that is -- up to about 12k $


above that -- well we sell projectors in the 50-100-150k $ range

i prefer DLP and also JVC 's system , but ive seen some pretty good lcd lately also . I still prefer the DLP projectors overall ..