Viewsonic PLED-W500 Projector - Performance

Posted on August 6, 2013 by

Viewsonic PLED-W500 Projector - Brightness

The PLED-W500 is rated at 500 lumens. As there is no zooming ability, all measurements were taken with the projector displaying a 80” diagonal image with the projector set at a distance just under 8 feet from the screen. Consistent with other reviews, our measurements were taken at the brightest point of the image (in this case near the bottom center of the image).

Selecting the Brightest (the actual name of the mode) picture mode, we measured a high of 427 lumens, 15% less than advertised and consistent with our findings on the Acer K330. Using PC mode, the output dropped to 323 lumens. Movie, Picture and User modes have slightly lower, but similar lumen outputs as follows: Movie=270, Picture=301 and User=283.

In addition to the above picture modes, the W500 also has settings to maintain proper color balance when projecting on walls of different colors. The wall color setting is available in any picture mode and affects the lumen output of the Bright picture mode as follows: White (default mode) – 427 lumens, Light Yellow – 393 lumens, Light Blue – 409 lumens, Pink – 325 lumens and Dark Green – 290 lumens.

The PLED-W500 also has an Eco mode for its LED light source. In Brightest mode, using the Eco setting reduced the lumen output from 427 lumens to 375 lumens, a 12% drop. This relatively small drop in lumen output makes using Eco mode a viable option when less noise is desired.

Viewsonic PLED-W500 Projector - Audible Noise

As the Viewsonic PLED-W500 uses LEDs rather than a lamp, heat generation is kept to a minimum and the exhaust ports keep the PLED-W500 relatively cool. Viewsonic rates the noise levels at 36 dB in Normal mode and 32 dB for Eco mode. This noise level is higher than larger projectors of similar lumen output. The higher level is noticeable, but not objectionably so. The PLED-W500 has a built-in two-watt speaker that can overcome the higher noise level in most cases, but you’d probably want to use externally powered speakers for video presentations.