Hitachi TX200 (1 Viewer)

[John Menoni]

How come nobody is talking about the Hitachi TX200? It seems to be very similar to the Panasonic AE900 and the Sanyo Z4 but I had to dig to find out more about it. it seems to exceed the Panasonic and Sanyo in certain departments. Does anyone know more about this projector?

 

[John S]

I don't think it is available here in the U.S. is it????

 

[Chris PC]

If its not available right now, it will be. I asked about this projector myself. It is available from Japan as we speak. I have the TX100 which is very very nice. Just for reference, here are some differences with the other models:

The Sanyo Z4 is the only model with 12 bit video processing. No idea what this means overall.

The Panasonic AE900 has smooth screen which some like while others dislike because for some people, it seems to ever so slightly soften the image.

The TX200 does not have 12 bit video processing (nor does the panasonic) and it does not have smooth screen, but what the TX200 has is a very large lens resulting in very sharp optics, ie a sharp picture. The TX200 should also have the incredible adjustment and tweaking flexibility of the TX100. You can adjust colour uniformity across the screen to an amazing degree, bottom line, you can get a great picture even if there is some colour non-uniformity. LCD projectors do suffer from this from time to time and cleaning dust, and/or cleaning or replacing polarizers doesn't always fix it. Also, the TX200 has excellent adjustments to reduce vertical banding, a problem that can crop up in many lcd projectors. The Sanyo also has good adjustments for vertical banding, but I don't believe it has the same adjustments for colour uniformity.

One thing to watch for is the review and possible shootout from the www.cine4home.de folks. You'll need to translate, but its worth it. There is nobody on the internet who tests as fairly and thoroughly as cine4home. And I mean nobody.

Look around, the TX200 should be available in the US pretty soon. Oh, and I think in the US, like in Canada, its called the HDP-J52. I hate to send you elsewhere, but here you go:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=575761

Enjoy...

 

[John Menoni]

Thanks Chris. That is exactly what I was looking at. For me it was between the Panasonic AE900 and the Sanyo Z4. I would defintately go with the Panasonic becuase of the better customer service and better performance without as much tweaking as the Z4. Unfortunately my room requires a signifigant lens shift which would push the maximum shift for the Panasonic which would cause picture distortion. The Z4 has a great lens shift that would be fine in my setup. This is why the Z4 and not the AE900 is one of the finalists in my projector choice. The only other possibility is the Hitachi. If it turns out that the Hitachi has similar features than the Sanyo and is a few hundred bucks more, I will go with the Hitachi because of what I hear about Sanyo's customer service and the fact that people who own the Z4 seem to have a problem fine tuning it.

 

[shelly schachter]

The Hitachi retails for an addtional $1000 compared to the Z4. the best price I have found for an authorized dealer still places it $1000 above the Z4 street price, so it would have to have significant advantage over the Z4 to justify going from the Z4's approximate $2100 to the Hitachi's approximate $3100.

But I am still holding off on my new projector purchase because of the Hitachi's potntial, as well as the unknowns about the Epson 550 and the Sony HS60.
Probably be some new dlps in the mix by the end of the year as well.

Also, I;m not so sure that the Z4 is as problematic as you make it sound.

Check out

http://www.projectorcentral.com/720p_projectors.htm

http://www.hdtvexpert.com/pages/plvz4.htm

Shelly

 

[John Menoni]

Shelly,

Thanks for the links. The thing that scares me about the Hitachi is the flickering from the iris system. If it is an issue at all, I will go with the Z4. I was hoping the Hitachi would basically be an improved version of the Z4. I'm sure I will be happy with either when all is said and done.

 

[Chris PC]

So far it seems that flickering due to the dynamic iris system only occurs in certain settings. I think auto1 is fine and flicker free, but you'll have to research that more yourselves.

 

[Chris PC]

Anybody with a Hitachi J52 / TX200 out there?

 

[Milosh Jovic]

I do not own one, but I have seen them in action plenty of times, most of my customers seem to prefer the Hitachi over the Sanyo.

If you have any questions feel free to ask, I'll give you any information that I can.