September 27th, 2010 Art Feierman
Greetings, back home now.
Catch up tie starting with the new Sony VPL-VW90ES. The flight back to the west coast, was long enough, and a full flight. As soon as the guy in front of me is allowed to put back his seat, there went my chance to get any real writing done on the plane. There simply wasn’t enough room to use my MacBook. My thanks to Delta for such generous seating room.
The $9995 Sony looked pretty good in 3D and great in 2D. I was just a bit spoiled, though coming from seeing Runco’s $49K exceptionally bright 3D projector, (plus any fancy accessories). When I saw the Sony, it was looking pretty good on 3D, on a smaller screen, I don’t recall now, but probably less than 100″. Despite the significant loss of brightness for 3D (figure a minimum 60% drop in most typical designs when compared to 2D), the image was bright enough. Of course we’re sitting inside a true “cave” made of flat black everything, the only thing reflecting light were the dozen or so people watching the demo.
The VPL-VW90ES, (the ES is Sony’s new top of the line series of Receivers, Projectors, LCDTVs), has new 240hz SXRD (LCoS) panels, double the usual 120. That’s likely an excellent move, on several levels. Afterall, we now need more frames per second – for the creative frame motion smoothing, and again for left and right with 3D… 240 isn’t critical for anything to my knowledge, but allows for advantages, that can be exploited. One of those, according to Sony, is to reduce crosstalk for 3D. Sounds good to me. Bring it on.
Rated 1000 lumens, the Sony isn’t going to be handling any large screens in 3D. Before I forget, for the anticipated $9995 price, it includes two pair of active shutter glasses. I was concerned with the new JVC’s being only 1300 lumens for 3D, and therefore I’m even more concerned with the Sony’s 1000. (But then I like a 128″ screen in my room.) Well, typically the JVC D-ILA projectors have been brighter than the Sony’s SXRD projectors, year after year.
From the brief demo, it’s a real nice machine. Black levels looked really good too, Dare I say it? ”Blacks popped” I know the black cave room is a factor, but it did look impressive. Can’t wait to lay my hands on one of these. This Sony, like its predecessors offers good connectivity, and more control of the image than any other brand I’ve reviewed in the price range. It should be a delight for integrators, calibrators, and installers. Sony provides a long list of major room and home control systems its compatible with, from AMX and Crestron to Savant and Vantage.
The Sony VPL-VW90ES will ship in November. I hope to have a review unit in simultaneous with first shipment, so I can get a review out quickly. I’ve volunteered for an earlier unit, but I don’t know if they will lend one of the pre-production VW90ES projectors out for review.
I will keep you posted, as I learn more as to when a Sony will arrive.
Sony also introduced a second, (expected price $3395) projector but I didn’t see it demo’d. Lori’s already posted the press release of the VPL-VWPRO1, just a couple items before this blog entry. That will give you the basic info. Primarily it looks to be the VW40 replacement, and strictly 2D. It has a new iris configuration and 1300 lumens. A potentially brighter than average projector, which would be very welcome in the Sony line up. Gotta review this one too!
Runco and SIM2
Ok, I’m a little out of my normal space looking at projectors that cost a $50K or more by the time they get plugged in.
The Runco 3D projector demonstration was the single most impressive 10 minutes of the day. I should have noted the screen size, but it was a large screen. The projector was Runco’s just announced 3Dimensions Series D-73d, with a base price if $49,995. Options include different throw length lenses, anamorphic lens and sled, and outboard processors (their DHD4 ships with the projector for the $49,995 price). It uses a LED lightsource, rated 480 watts.
The Runco projector claims 20,000:1 contrast, and 1400 lumens. If I understood them correctly, though (I will confirm), in 3D they are putting out 1400 lumens to each eye (less what the passive glasses absorb). As you can see by the image, the D-73D looks like a stacked pair of projectors, which is pretty much what it is, though I assume many components are shared. The two lenses though imply a total of 6 DLP panels. Basically one projector for each eye. I like it.
I take that back, I love it. I watched the clips and, finally after a day and a half, I had an answer to the question – have you seen anything really awesome? Ca-ching! Bingo!
I realize I’m going to have to “settle” for a Sony or JVC or ?, but Runco’s 3D performance – and on a much larger screen than those others.
Later on, I saw another superb demo, and that was in the SIM2 booth, in their mini-theater… Far smaller than the ballroom setup Runco had. The SIM2 setup truly is made of a pair of their C3X Lumis projectors, and the demo was dazzlingly bright, and almost as impressive as the Runco. I’ll just say that I was able to thoroughly enjoy both demonstrations, primarily taking a quick note of the blacks and dark details, then the skin tones and colors, in each clip, and then I just enjoyed the content. I wasn’t looking for artifacts, and none shouted out and interrupted the viewing enjoyment.
OK, that’s it for now. I’ll have to get to a few others tomorrow. Ahh, including an M series Digital Projection 3D projector (with tons of lumens) – that they will send me for review. -art
Posted in Products, Uncategorized | 4 Comments »
September 25th, 2010 Art Feierman
Hmm, my next stop was JVC. I had to hoof it to the Omni hotel next to (a 15 minute walk from the show floor), because they always set up in a real theater or a hotel ballroom each year).
OK, here’s the basics: And yes, all 3D projectors we talk about, of course do 2D!
Remember the JVC DLA-RS15, RS25, and RS35? Well, they are still current products but will be replaced shortly by the JVC DLA-RS40, DLA-RS50, and Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Uncategorized | 13 Comments »
September 23rd, 2010 Art Feierman
Hi everyone, remember the new Sanyo review has not been proofed yet. I want to be clear about one point. I’ve said in the review, that I cannot tell whether the improvements in color handling that I noted, were actually improvements, in the 4000 from the 3000, or firmware updates done as a 3000. I fully stand by my statements that the Z4000 I received after calibration definitely was slightly improved over the 3000 we reviewed. -a
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
September 23rd, 2010 Art Feierman
You will be noticing a whole pile of new home theater press releases, on the blog. That’s because I’ve gotten a lot of requests… Problem is, I often do not speak of a new projector except in passing until one is inbound for review. As a result, those who rely primarily on projectorreviews.com, often were a bit late finding out about such things. Posting the press releases helps solve that communication issue.
I’d like also to announce that in a day or 4, we’ll put up a second blog – focused on press releases on new projectors for business, education, and home.
We’re still debating whether to keep putting the new home theater press releases on this blog “the art..”, or just to restrict them to the new blog. Your feedback is more than welcome.
One more thing. Lori (the wife) handles inputting all the projectors into our database, will be posting the press release blogs, including most of the ones now up…
She’s not a reviewer, but she’s been listening to me babble about this gear for more than 15 years.
She will try to flag one or two points she thinks I would consider worthy of mentioning first, before you get into all the manufacturer’s hype.
For example, on the new JVC projectors press release (tonight hopefully), she points out that the substantial lumen boost is critical for the 3 new RS JVC’s because they are all 3D capable (yep blu-ray…), and with 3D, as most of you know, you lose at least 50% of the brightness.
That type of tidbit is the kind of thing I’ve asked Lori to come up with. Often she may ask me for points, but during the show, she’ll probably post 5+ releases (most are multiple products), and “she’s on her own”.
Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
September 23rd, 2010 Art Feierman
Greetings!
Folks, sorry, we had some site server issues this starting past weekend (email erratic…) so we did an emergency change to a more robust server (we’re in the clouds now). Unfortunately, the transition which started yesterday, had our site still a bit erratic by this morning.
Actually the site has been fine since about 7:30 am east coast time, but for many of us, the old address in your computer caches, may be pointing you to the old IP. Of course, me writing this won’t help those still suffering the problem, because you couldn’t get to the blog either.
Bottom line. If you are having difficulty – totally, or intermittantly, then our webmaster says all you have to do is reboot your computer. That worked for our PC’s back at the “office” and all three apple devices I have with me at CEDIA – macbook pro, iphone and ipad.
Once again, sorry bout that. But, we’re running well now, unless you have that cache problem.
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
September 18th, 2010 Art Feierman
Digital Projection dVision 35-WQXGA
ATLANTA, GA – CEDIA 2010 – Digital Projection International (DPI) an Emmy® Award-winning manufacturer of high performance projection systems, announces the dVision 35-WQXGA, the first precision DLP® projector to deliver over 4 million pixels of imagery. Recently recognized as a “Best New Product” finalist at the 2010 CEDIA Expo, as well as a CE Pro BEST Award finalist, the dVision 35-WQXGA delivers a 1080p solution for 2:35 aspect content without the need for an anamorphic lens solution. Through a capable combination of programmable lens control and software, the dVision WQXGA delivers the CE channel’s first anamorphic lens free, full resolution, constant height, aspect ratio shifting projector.
DPI’s single-chip dVision 35-WQXGA boasts the highest resolution of any DLP® -based product available today. WQXGA is the nomenclature that represents 2560 x 1600 pixels – nearly twice the resolution of a 1080p projector. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Uncategorized | 6 Comments »
September 17th, 2010 Art Feierman
Epson Home Cinema 61000 Projector
I’m excited. The season for new home theater projectors is upon us, starting with the CEDIA show, next week. Unfortunately, this year looks to be one where many manufacturers are offering just minor improvements (and lower prices) on “new” models. For that reason, something new – a new type of panel – or chip, call them what you wish, and three new projectors built around it, sounds interesting, and promising.
All the fuss is about Epson’s new projectors sporting first generation reflective LCD panels or Reflective 3LCD as Epson calls them. Their claim of 1,000,000:1 contrast certainly is going to Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in New Projector Reviews, Opinion, Products, Uncategorized | 29 Comments »
January 18th, 2010 Art Feierman
Greetings Sportsfans
And movie fans, but today is NFL playoffs, so Sportfans gets top billing.
This will be a long ramble! Get ready. Lay in snacks! Here’s the deal:
I’m watching the playoff games today, with a fair amount of light in my room, as I am reviewing the Epson Home Cinema 705HD – a low cost ($749) 720p home theater projector, that claims 2500 lumens! I’m also down for the count, sick as a dog, and Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Uncategorized | 15 Comments »
December 4th, 2009 Art Feierman
Greetings one and all,
OK, it’s been really busy. But, I’ve got a most impressive projector to tell you about, and that’s the Optoma HD8600. First I want to say that at this point, I’m completely overwhelmed between responding to emails and blog comments. I’m falling further behind, with no end in sight. You guys are burying me in well over 100 combined, every week these days. At least through Christmas, I doubt I’ll be able to respond to more than half, if that. Ok, back to the Optoma HD8600 projector. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in New Projector Reviews, Opinion, Products, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
November 25th, 2009 Art Feierman
Hi everyone,
No point in yakking about the article here, so I’ll just point you to the comparison. Sorry it took so long, a labor of love, I guess. Check it out! PT-AE4000 vs. 8500UB. Enjoy! Life frantic here, family in, lots of pages in mid-completion.
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!
-art
Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »
