Optoma HD131Xe Gaming Projector - Input Lag Times

The Optoma HD131Xe home entertainment projector starts out as one of the least expensive 1080p resolution (Full HD) projectors on the market.  It is a DLP projector, and well suited for serious gaming.  Click for the full HD131Xe review. This Optoma projector is very nicely sharp, and puts a very bright image up on the screen, that should make it easy to spot enemies in dark areas of the display, thanks to having a pretty good gamma. But the first test of any projector intended for use by serious gamers, whether your choice of games runs to the likes of Call Of Duty, or   the latest Need For Speed, it's input lag times that is the spec to look at. 50 ms lag times are about as high as the large majority of serious gamers  will find acceptable.  Under about 35, life is generally great, and best I can tell, anything under 20 might as well be considered almost perfect, from a player standpoint. So how does this sub-$800 Optoma do?  A quick test, using the usual digital timing program on the internet, via my MacBook Pro, shows input lag of 16 - 17 milli-seconds in multiple measurements.  That's pretty much right out of the box.  With a time that good, I didn't even bother to start turning things off, to see how much lower it could go.   Of course don't engage FI - Optoma's frame interpolation.  That will slow things down a great deal. As you can see in the image above, the projected timer is 17 ms lower than the image on the Macbook, indicating that it would be another 17 ms before the projector would be displaying what the computer just did. Understand, the Macbook has some lesser input lag of it's own, but per my old gaming bloggers, it's a reasonable device to use as the reference.  Everyone's display does. Bottom line, the HD131Xe projector should be fast enough to satisfy virtually all gamers, especially since its quite likely that faster can be found, by turning off various sensing features.   Considering it's not even $200 more than Optoma's latest, lower resolution GT (Game Time) series projector, it would be a great choice if you want to balance great gaming with the full 1080p resolution for your movies and sports.   That pretty much covers it. Click for the full review of the HD131Xe.  Thanks!  -art