Final projector selection round-up (1 Viewer)

[Jack Spencer]

Just a little more advice from you all, and I think I'll have made my selection.

My room specs: 16.5' x 21' x 8-12' vaulted ceiling. Imperfect light control. I can easily read even with all blinds closed during the day. Light does not shine ON the screen, there is just a lot of indirect/ambient light (the blinds "glow" their color).

My desire: 120"+ screen, ability to watch during the day.

My biggest questions: Will 1000 lumens be enough?! And how close will 1000 lumens approach the brightness of my 65" RPTV? Is it going to be "almost as bright", "half as bright", "nowhere near", etc? The RPTV is easily watched during the day if I close the blinds and don't watch really dark stuff like Unbreakable.

The projectors I'm considering:

BenQ PE8700+
InFocus 7200
Sony HS20 (for the 1400 lumens, but I'm not sure because it's LCD)

Please advise. Thank you!

 

[Chris Brock]

hi jack, i wish i could help, but infact your situation is so like mine it is scary. around same sized room and my light situation is basically identical. im also looking to go with around a 120" screen. the only difference is that I think you have a "healthier" budget then I do. I am looking to stay around $2k. but I will defintily be watching this thread!

 

[stephen la]

another person from the forum made this staement a couple days ago, that seems obvious..but its easy to overlook...
turn off the lights.. pull down your blinds..
and look at your wall or screen...
the lightest color you see on the wall, will be your blacks when you turn on your projector..
are you happy with that? ..

 

[Jack Spencer]

Is this accurate, though, when using a decent screen like a Stewart Firehawk?

 

[Chris Brock]

i cant see that being totally true. I know at work i have been in countless presentations and seminairs where the room lights were bright enough to easily make notes with and in some cases the powerpoint slides would have black backgrounds or even light backgrounds and black lettering. They were noticable black, but the slightly washed out because of the light. i have never seen a video image such as a movie in this type of situation though.

 

[SteveCoug]

Jack,

I have an InFocus 4805 in a basement room with the windows blacked out, so it works great. I use an InFocus video screen.

But Stephen LA is correct, look at a white wall or put a pice of white paper on the wall where you will use the projector and make the room as dark as possible. The color you see on the white paper is "black" on your video.

Think about it .. black is a total absence of color. Your projector cannot "project" black, it simply shows NOTHING there to represent black.

Now even though my screen is not truly black, even in total darkness, the blacks still look very black relative to the rest of the picture, so don't freak out about it.

But if you have lots of ambient light in your room, you may not be happy with the blacks on a FP screen.

 

[Neil Joseph]

The screen colour will be representative of your blacks. If you are watching a colourful presentation/movie then the perceived blacks will be deeper although they will still be the same as your screen colour (just an optical illusion if you will). You WILL need either a gray or a silver screen. I opted for silver. The Firehawk was out of my pricerange so I made my own.

Firehawk or no Firehawk, the image will suffer greatly with the amount of ambient light you describe. You must reduce the ambient light if you want to watch during the day, especially with a 1000 lumen projector and a 120" screen. Note that after calibration, you will probably achieve around half that amount (500 lumens) when you factor in screen colour, and if you use the "cinema black" mode or whatever your PJ calls it, and after using a calibration dvd. These all reduce the final brightness of the projector.

 

[Torgny Nilsson]

Even the brightest projectors don't do well with a lot of ambient light. If you can easily read in the room with the blinds pulled, you probably have too much light for a really good FP picture.

Now, if you replace all your blinds with blackout blinds and fully close them every time you want to watch a movie, you would probably do fine with FP.