BenQ W1200 Projector Calibration and Settings

We calibrate every home theater projector that we review. The BenQ W1200 received the usual treatment. I "played" with the W1200 for a couple of days, passed it off to Mike for calibration and measurements. 24 hours later, I'm back to watching it.

Ours is a pretty standard calibration, there's always more done by some of the "hi-end" calibrators. Our calibrations, including the BenQ W1200, are normally limited to a grayscale calibration, along with brightness, contrast, color saturation, etc. Only in very special circumstances will we calibrate the individual colors, in which case we discuss why.

5/25/11 - Art Feierman

Let's take a look at the numbers:

BenQ W1200 Color Temperature

Before we provide our settings, let's see what we started out with: Pre calibration, these are the color temperatures over the grayscale range:

Color Temp over IRE Range (Various Modes):

                 Cinema             Standard               User 3

30 IRE       5964                6859                     6312
50 IRE       5999                6908                     6350
80 IRE       5961                6903                     6273                           
100 IRE     5972                6928                     6334

Conclusion was that User 3 is the best uncalibrated mode to start a 6500K calibration from                       

W1200 Lumen Output and Color Temp at 100 IRE (mid zoom):

Dynamic= 1008 @ 8775           
Standard= 942 @ 6928
Cinema= 643 @ 5972
User 1= 1152 @ 8163
User 2= 1085 @ 7021
User 3= 975 @ 6334 with Brilliant Color On, with BC off = 824

W1200 Lumen Output (Eco Lamp On, Dynamic): 746

That represents a drop from 1008 lumens at full lamp power. The math says that's full power is 35% brighter than Eco-mode, or, looking at it from the other direction: Eco mode is 26% less bright than full power.

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BenQ W1200 Home Theater Projectors Basic Settings

In addition to calibrating Red Green and Blue for a correct grayscale balance (6500K), there are a number of other settings that come into play. Typically Contrast and Brightness (white balance and black balance), need to be done first. Color saturation and gamma also need adjustment.

Settings for measurements (default values are in parenthesis):

Dynamic Standard Cinema User 1 User 2 User 3
Contrast (0)=
0
0
0
0
3
3
Brightness (45)=
-45
-45
-45
46
-45
-45
Color (0 for all)
Tint (0 for all)


BenQ W1200 Post Calibration Grayscale: Standard Mode

 

Calibrated Color Temp over IRE Range:

20 IRE =            6619
30 IRE =            6486
40 IRE =            6513
50 IRE =            6558
60 IRE =            6457
70 IRE =            6479
80 IRE =            6474
90 IRE =            6453
100 IRE =            6499

Average gamma= 2.29

 

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RGB Settings

 

W1200 Post Calibration settings:

Calibration of best mode:
User 3 with Cinema mode and Normal color temp as starting points.

Gamma is set on 2.2, Brilliant Color On, Color is set to 6
Default settings for Gain is 0, for Offset is -4.

Calibration settings for User 3:

Gain     R = -3                                                           
            G = 1                                                                       
            B = -1
                                                                       
Offset   R = -5                                                           
            G = -7                                                                       
            B = -5

Lumen Output at 100 IRE: 964 @ 6499

Mike provided these additional notes, after calibrating the BenQ W1200 projector:

There’s no reason to do a Quick Cal of the brightest mode (User 1) as User 2 has pretty good grayscale with its default settings while delivering only 70 lumens less than User 1.

If you look at the CIE chart, primary colors are pretty good, but the secondary colors are not.  Cyan and yellow are too green and magenta is too blue.  Adjusting Tint just makes it worse, so calibration using the CMS is necessary for good color.  Of course, most people who buy a projector in this price range are not going to have it calibrated.


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NEXT: Recommended projector screens for the BenQ W1200 Projector