JVC DLA-RS10 and DLA-RS20 projectors have arrived!
January 19th, 2009 Art Feierman
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Both the JVC RS20 and RS10 - officially the DLA-RS20, and DLA-RS10 - have arrived.
Note also that these two home theater projectors are from JVC’s Pro division. Similar models - with almost no differences - are available from their Consumer group. The DLA-RS20 projector’s equivalent model is the HD750, while the DLA-RS10’s almost identical twin is the HD350.
I have spent a couple of hours with the RS20 last night, but Mike has it now for calibration. He’ll bring that back to me tomorrow afternoon and pick up the RS10 for calibration. Tomorrow (Wed.) I’ll be doing a lot of viewing in my theater, as well as in the testing room.
I’ve already put the RS20 up against the Epson 6500UB and the Sony HW10 (even though the JVC isn’t calibrated yet). Only a little surprise:
The Epson 6500 really does come pretty close to the RS20’s black levels. Let’s just say that the while the JVC definitely bests the Epson, the Epson is much closer to the RS20 than to the Sony, which wasn’t even in the ballpark in terms of black level performance.
It will be interesting to see the RS10 vs. the Epson in particular, but also against the Panasonic PT-AE3000 and Sanyo PLV-Z3000.
JVC fans, fear not. It is immediately obvious to me that the RS20 is the more refined projector. You know - film-like, natural skin tones, etc., and that’s BEFORE it’s been calibrated.
That’s it - no more for now.
Most likely a First Look blog for the JVC RS20 will publish Thursday, and the one for the RS10 on Friday or Saturday.
Look for the full RS20 review next Monday night, but probably Tuesday, and the RS10’s review 3-4 days later.
Oh by the way. the RS20 definitely does seem brighter, than the RS2. That’s what I personally need. I’ll be trying to fill my 128″ Firehawk with the RS20’s image tomorrow night. It will likely be a close thing. -art
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January 19th, 2009 at 10:33 am
Hi:
I just saw a screen innovations Black screen that seemed superior to the eye then Stewart…What are your expert thoughts?
For a medium lit living room of 15ftX20Ft,
what projector in the $3,000 range do you recommend?
Thanks a million lumens,
Steven
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Sorry Steven, never have worked with it. I did take a close look at one of their older extremely high contrast screens, a year or so ago. I just don’t know enough to comment, other than “black” screens are really good in terms of dealing with ambient light. There can be trade-offs, as some, at least of them are tuned specifically to Red, Green, Blue. I imagine that will trip up any of the DLP projectors that use four color wheels (ie. RGB + dark green, or RGB + yellow color wheels).
I’ll get black screens one of these days. -art
January 20th, 2009 at 11:03 am
Hi Art… a bit OT, but have you requested a review sample of the new Optoma HD8200?
Also, last NOV/DEC there was discussion of a “new” 1080p offering from Infocus…, but I have not heard anything since… have you?
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I met with Optoma at CES, and they were going to send one out, sometime around this week. I haven’t followed up, but will today or tomorrow. I’ve got both the JVC RS10 and RS20 here now, so the Optoma will have to follow that. I told them that if they get it to me by early next week, it can get reviewed, and considered in the 2009 1080p Projector Comparison report that will publish next month.
No, haven’t heard anything about an InFocus - will look into it. -art
January 21st, 2009 at 9:34 pm
Which iris position was the rs20 set to when you compared it to the 6500ub?
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I had the manual iris almost all the way closed, and the lamp on low, Cinema 2 mode, I think (the one that defaults to 6500K, the other Cinema is 5800K for black and white movies. The Epson had it’s dynamic iris on, lamp on high, calibrated TheaterBlack 1 mode. The two were about even in brightness that way. The dynamic iris on the Epson does compress the whites a little on dark scenes, resulting in very good black levels, but the whites jump out more on things like those night time city scenes in The Dark Knight.
I have great hopes that the RS20 can handle my 128″ Firehawk, something that the RS2 did not have the muscle for. Mike’s still calibrating it, I get it back tomorrow. So far just a few hours watching it uncalibrated. “It do look good”! -art
January 22nd, 2009 at 9:12 pm
Steve - for maximum contrast and to see the RS20 at its best, try running it in HIGH lamp mode and then stop the iris down to the minimum you feel is needed for your screen. Depending on your throw I’d say high lamp with iris around -10. Enjoy!