What native resolution for projector ? (1 Viewer)

[Loic HG]

Hi,

I'm thinking about replacing my 47" CRT rear-projection set by a relatively cheap LCD front projection system. I don't watch TV at all, only DVDs, so that means I will probably only watch 480i/480p sources since HD DVDs seem far off right now and I'm not very much inspired by the costs of D-VHS. Most of my DVDs are NTSC but I also have some PAL. My zone-free player has a bad PAL->NTSC scaling but can do native PAL output so I would likely use the projector's scaling in this case.

My screen is 3m/120in diagonal and I'd like to have as big a pic as possible seating about 7m/24ft from it.

I'm only interested in projectors with a native 16x9. The ideal candidate would be a Panasonic L500U/AE500U with 720 lines of native resolution, however since I'm not interested in HDTV I was wondering if I couldn't save some money by shopping for a projector with a 480 lines native res, even though I don't have a candidate in mind right now. How do upconverted pictures compare to deinterlacing only ? And what about comparing a PAL picture downconverted to 480 lines to one that is upconverted to 720 lines ? How would a 3m diag picture look with a 800-ish lumen projector ?

Thanks for your help !

Loic

 

[Gabriel_Lam]

With a 24' seating distance and a 120" diagonal screen, a relatively lower resolution projector should appear ok, quality & screen door effect wise.

 

[Ian-Fl]

I don't even think there's HD capable FP on the market right now. Resolution doesn't always translate into PQ. There's an article in Home Theater Mag comparing the Benq 6200 , Epson Home 10 and Optima H30. Everyone picked the Optima because of it's Black levels even though it has less resolution than the Benq.
The newest projector out right now is the Infocus 4805. Next month the Panasonic 700u, NEC HT410,HT510 and Sanyo Z3 will come out. So far it would appear the 4805 has a an edge so it might be worth it to wait.
I saw the Sanyo Z2 which has a similar PQ to the Panasonic. The Colours were sharp and vivid and Screen Door was visible at four feet.
I have a 110''diagonal screen and I'm sitting at thirteen feet,twenty four feet sounds far to me.