Epson Home Cinema 3020 Projector - Physical Tour 2

Posted on July 16, 2013 by Art Feierman

Home Cinema 3020 Menus

Other than the addition of the various 3D controls, the menus of the Home Cinema 3020 and the "e" are very typical for Epson. Below I've dropped in screen shots of most of the main and sub-menus. I won't attempt to mention more than a few things. If you want details about all the hundreds of menu choices, I recommend downloading the user manual.

First, the main Image menu. And below, the Display mode pull down, which can be reached from the menu above, or directly from a button on the Epson Home Cinema 3020 remote control.

Epson's menus haven't changed much but for the addition of lots of new features, over most of the last decade. I would say Epson's layout is about as good as it gets. That's not to say there aren't four or five other brands with equally good, but different menu layouts. No complaints!

Home Cinema 3020 Menu Slideshow

Cinema

Image menu

The Advanced setting on the Image menu. Calibration is done in the RGB area. Individual colors are calibrated (we rarely do that) in the RGBCMY submenu.

Gamma control sub-menu

Sub-menus: here's the Gamma control sub-menu, with 5 preset gamma's and the ability to customize the gamma, if desired. They work well and offer wonderful flexibility. I find their choice of adjusting gamma by image, or by the "chart" below, to be extremely handy.

RGB calibration

The RGB calibration area

CMS

The CMS area for calibrating individual colors, is below that

Signal menu

3D sub menu

Settings menu

Since this menu was shot from a 3020e, note the WirelessHD feature. Note the User button on the remote - can be programmed, in this case, it is set to reverse mode for 3D glasses.
Also on this menu are the split screen controls where you can adjust which source goes where, size of each window.

HDMI-Link

You can control other devices from the Epson remote, via HDMI-Link

WirelessHD

And for those of you planning on the Home Cinema 3020e with its wireless HDMI (WirelessHD) abilities

User memories

Epson is loaded with User memories, a total of 10. I do tend to use a number of them. By the time I returned to Epson the older 5010, I had 8 memories in use.

User memories

It's nice, for example, to be able to have four calibrated "best" modes, with the only differences, being combinations of having CFI on or off, and brightness on full or eco. I might even have another couple with slightly lower saturation for that content that is just "over the top". And a customized "brightest" mode or two.

As you can see, you have the option to name each memory for convenience.

Info menu

Epson Home Cinema 3020 Remote Control

No changes to the Epson remote this year. The Home Cinema 3020 remote control is big, and black, and backlit, and has all the same buttons, in all the same places as the older 3010's remote control.

Overall, a very good remote control, with very good range, I have to worry far less about where I'm pointing this remote, than most others, and I attribute that to range and spread of the IR beam.

The top row as the big power On button on the left, a smaller Off button in the middle, and the backlight button far right.

Next comes two rows of buttons with your Source choices. On the "e" version of the projector one of them is for the WirelessHD HDMI setup. With support for HDMI-Link, the remote provides all the usual DVD type controls since it should run any HDMI-link player. In fact on the row of large buttons immediately below, are the HDMI-Link button, and Volume Up and Down.

Below those, white buttons from 2D/3D modes, Color Mode, and Memory

That takes us to the navigation controls - four arrow keys in a round formation with a center Enter button. Below all that are three buttons in a curve,

Below those buttons are Default, Menu, and Esc (takes you back a level on the menus).

Finally, near the bottom, 7 more buttons offering direct links to features/menu items: AutoIris, Color (RGBCYMK), Aspect Ratio, Split Screen, test Pattern, User (programmable from menus), and AV Mute.

I have two complaints: The backlight itself, could be a touch brighter, but it really is ok. (Better than one of those remotes with overly bright, blinding blue LED lights!)

The other complaint (and that's about it), it's that the backlight button is way at the top right, and the backlight doesn't come on, when you press any button. With a remote this long, the backlight button is far from the center of balance, so you really can't hit the button while holding it balanced in one hand.

Click Image to Enlarge

Epson Home Cinema 3020 Lens Throw

As previously noted, the Home Cinema 3020 and 3020e have a manual 1.5:1 zoom lens. That makes the placement range pretty good, although not as good as the 2D only Home Cinema 8350 which has a 2.1:1 zoom (the same lens as on the 5020/6020 series).

For a 100 inch diagonal 16:9 screen, the front of the HC3020 can be as close as 9.7 feet, or as far back as 15.7 feet. (2.96 - 4.78 meters).

The 9.7 feet is very typical. Most projectors except for some business/education the fixed lens ultra or very short throw projectors, have a closest distance for that size screen, of between 9 and 12 feet. This projector just can't sit as far back from the screen as some others designed to also be able to be rear shelf mounted (like the 8350). Projectors without lens shift aren't suitable for rear shelf mounting normally, although it can be done using keystone correction, if the other measurements work.

Lens Shift

The Epson Home Cinema 3020 lacks adjustable lens shift. You'll want to get the vertical placement right, so that you don't have to use keystone correction to keep the image rectangular. Keystone correction adds a small amount of distortion/softness to the image.

"How bad is using keystone correction," you ask? I have an easy way to describe that for existing projector owners: Any softness caused by using keystone correction, is going to take away less from picture quality, than the inherent high compression being used on satellite and cable transmissions. So, while we cringe at the thought of using keystone correction, it's not going to do something drastic, like make a 1080p image seem as soft as a 720p one in terms of sharpness. A movie scene from a Blu-ray disc, with keystone correction in use, is still going to be visibly better picture quality than the same scene coming off my DirecTV, with no keystone correction engaged, and all else being equal.

On Blu-ray disc, you should be able to see a slight difference between keystone on, and off. It will be harder to see on lower quality sources.

Anamorphic Lens - Wide Screen

The Home Cinema 3020 and 3020e do not support an anamorphic lens. The only projector in the Epson line up that does, is the Pro Cinema 6020, a projector that's about twice the price.