BenQ W1070 Projector – Performance 3

Posted on June 7, 2013 By Art Feierman

BenQ W1070 3D Brightness

1700 calibrated lumens at mid-point on the zoom lens, is going to make this one of the brightest 1080p 3D capable home theater projectors on the market. Oh, the Epson 3020 and 5020UB can muster up an extra 400 lumens, but that’s uncalibrated. By comparison those guys are under 700 lumens calibrated!

Still, 3LCD projectors often are brighter doing 3D than similarly measured DLP projectors. Note that LCD and LCoS projectors usually have “glasses” controls (in the projector not the glasses) that can allow them to be brighter (but with it more crosstalk).

None of that really matters. What does, is that I can watch a 124″ diagonal image without ambient light (night time in most family / bonus rooms), and have it look reasonable.

We’ve come a long way in two years, when I really dissed a JVC projector for it’s really dim 3D – back then, 3D projectors were less efficient. That is, with the same lumens measured, today’s projectors appear brighter when viewed. Well that JVC couldn’t quite do 700 lumens! This projector is 2.5 times as bright as that $12K home theater projector, and it certainly is at least that much better in brightness!

Perhaps the first 1080p, affordable 3D projector was the Optoma HD33, at about $500 more. This projector does better 3D and much brighter too. And that Optoma’s less than 2 years old (and still current).

Enough – I like the 3D – let’s move on!

BenQ W1070 Sharpness

I expect single chip DLP projectors like this BenQ to inherently look sharp (at least compared to 3LCD and LCoS projectors) due to being the only technology that isn’t 3 panels that have to be converged.

After that, it’s up to the optics for the rest of how good the sharpness is.

All considered, the BenQ W1070 very nicely sharp, with no more center to edge shift in sharpness than we would expect in a low cost projector, in fact it’s better than most.

But, there is one minor issue, and that, as mentioned elsewhere. The lens controls – the focus ring is very stiff, at least on this unit. It can take a minute to focus, as it sticks and then jumps a little. Hard to get it exactly right. But, this is minor nuisance only, as with a little effort, you can get it dead on. The fact that some of the HDTV images in this review are a bit out of focus is my error. I moved the projector (closer to the screen by several inches) after initially setting up, got distracted, and simply forgot to refocus. In the back of the room, controlling the camera, I just didn’t notice, I was too busy taking pictures and selecting scenes.

I don’t believe anyone will have any issues regarding the sharpness. I also will mention that I didn’t notice any defocusing as the projector warms up.