Mitsubishi HC3800 Home Theater Projector “First Look”

UPDATE: The Mitsubishi HC3800 projector review has been posted.

Oh, I like this one!

And I’ve been working with an engineering sample of the Mitsubishi HC3800.

Angle photo of Mitsubishi HC3800 home theater projector

With an engineering sample,  that means it’s so early, that many things don’t even work.  Case in point, only HDMI works on this projector, not composite video, component video, etc.  The color tables (while close), I’m told are also not quite finished.

That said, the one I had here (just shipped it back to Mitsubishi, yesterday) so those of you at CEDIA later this week can see it), is really impressive for the $$$.  Let me start with a comment relating to the Mitsubishi HC3800 compared to the just reviewed HD20 from Optoma.

OK, the HC3800 MAPs at $1499 (or is it $1495?), so it’s $500 more than the Optoma HD20. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in New Projector Reviews, Opinion, Products | 25 Comments »

New Home Theater Projectors I won’t get for my Birthday

I’m back.  Should have included this in the last blog.

While BenQ, Sony, Optoma, and others have sent me projectors for my birthday (yeah, I have to give them back), here are a couple of folks who won’t be enriching the celebration: Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in New Projector Reviews, News, Opinion | 3 Comments »

Optoma HD20 Projector “First Look” - 1080p for under $1000!

UPDATE: The Optoma HD20 Review has been posted.

The Optoma HD20 home theater projector is one of three announced 1080p projectors with a price tag under $1000!

That alone is cause for some celebration, however, the big question is, how good a projector will your $999 buy, and should you spend more?   Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in New Projector Reviews, Opinion, Products | 11 Comments »

Samsung SP-A600 1080P Projector - Round 2

UPDATE: The Samsung SP-A600 Review has been posted.

OK, the first SP-A600 which arrived a couple of weeks ago, was an early engineering sample.  After much debate, Mike and I decided not to review it.  My initial impression was that the color tables were not “finished”, and some minor communications issues with the HDMI port (only on occasion).  If we did the review based on that unit, I feared all of our calibration settings would be worthless to folks buying production units.

Now for the good news.  A replacement A600 (actually two Read the rest of this entry »

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Epson Ensemble HD 6500UB, 6100, and new pricing

UPDATE: The Ensemble HD Review has been posted.

Greetings all,

This blog will be short (well, short for something I write)!  I’ve already posted an article on the new configurations of the Ensemble HD, and the new pricing.

The long and short of it is this:  The Ensemble HD continues to be the only fully integrated projector based home theater system on the market.  And one designed for a quick and easy installation!  As such, what are now three different models, have no direct competition.  They do, however, “compete” with systems put together by folks piece by piece, making separate decisions on projector, AV receiver, Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in New Projector Reviews, Opinion, Products | 1 Comment »

Sharp XV-Z15000 Home Theater Projector First Look!

UPDATE: The Sharp XV-Z15000 Review has been posted.

Greetings all,

I’ve been playing with the XV-Z15000 for more than a week now.  The Sharp XV-Z15000 projector is Sharp’s low cost 1080p DLP home theater projector.  When first announced it had an MSRP of $2999, but it seems to have dropped to $2499.  Either way, online pricing tends to be around $2000, mostly a little more, though I have spotted a few prices just below $2000.

I often talk about projectors that are particularly enjoyable to watch, regardless of details relating to color accuracy, black levels, etc. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in New Projector Reviews, Opinion, Products | 4 Comments »

Sony VPL-VW70 Home Theater Projector - First Look

UPDATE: The Sony VPL-VW70 Review has been posted.

Greetings all!

The VPL-VW70 supposedly replaced the VW60 at the end of last year, although VW60’s still seem to be available.   I’ve had the VPL-VW70 here for a couple of weeks now, and have logged a good 20 hours of viewing, almost all of it after Mike calibrated the projector.

Let’s start with what the Sony VPL-VW70 represents.  It is the big brother of the Sony VPL-HW10 which we reviewed back in December.  (Both projectors were announced at the same time, at CEDIA last September.)

The MSRP of the Sony VW70 is $7999, which is Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in New Projector Reviews, Opinion, Products | 1 Comment »

Epson Home Cinema 6500 UB - CFI - Creative Frame Interpolation Final

Greetings all,

OK, I’m a bit late on this one, but finally ready to put the CFI issue to rest.

For those new, I’ve written a number of blogs on creative frame interpolation, and some of the issues.  Of the four projectors we’ve seen with CFI, Epson had some problems, which have been discussed. Epson has just released their new firmware, to deal with the issues. This blog looks at the performance of the new firmware in terms of creative frame interpolation, and also talks about the process of upgrading.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in New Projector Reviews, News, Opinion | 24 Comments »

New CFI fix for Epson Home Cinema 6500 UB, Pro Cinema 7500 UB

Greetings all,

Epson has just emailed me the new 1.09 firmware, with “fixes” to their creative frame interpolation.  This is just a heads up.  I’m going to try to get around to installing it tomorrow, and see how much better it is.

I had hoped that Epson would send it to me in installed in a Pro Cinema 7500 UB.  That would have let me run Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in News, Opinion | 4 Comments »

New Epson Ensemble HD 1080 systems announced

UPDATE: The Epson Ensemble HD Home Theater system Review has been posted.

Greetings,

As many of you know, I don’t blog very often about new projector announcements, but today is an exception.  Earlier today I received a press release from Epson, announcing two new versions of the Ensemble HD Home Theater system.   One uses the Home Cinema 6100, and has an MSRP of $6499, while the other has the Home Cinema 6500UB, for $7999.

What I really like about the announcement is that there will be two versions, one with Epson’s entry level 1080p projector - the Home Cinema 6100.  Of greater interest to myself, and many potential buyers, however, is that the other projector available in the Ensemble HD is the Home Cinema 6500UB, their higher performance, ultra high contrast projector. Read the rest of this entry »

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