The Epson Home Cinema 880 is the manufacturer’s least expensive Home Theater model. With a suggested retail price of just $599, the HC880 offers a lot of performance for the price, which has earned it's place on best projectors under $1,000. The projector boasts 1920 x 1080 Native Resolution, 3,300 ANSI Lumens, and true 3-chip, 3LCD technology. The HC880 can deliver a good looking picture on a large screen or a blank wall.

While there are less expensive home entertainment projectors on the market, spending a few $100 more on a reputable brand model like Epson will provide a much better viewing experience. The Epson Home Cinema 880 can produce up to 3,300 lumens of brightness and good color accuracy, making the unit a good option for an entry-level home theater. I can also see many Home Cinema 880s winding up in corporate meeting rooms.

You can easily connect a cable box, Blu-ray player, gaming console, or streaming device to the HC880 via its HDMI input. The Epson Home Cinema 880 projector can also support Mira casting with mobile devices such as laptops, smartphones, or tablets. The Miracast feature allows the viewer to project or mirror a device wirelessly without any additional software.

While many projectors at this price point only offer vertical keystone correction, the HC880 is equipped with two-dimensional keystone correction with a range of ±30° in each dimension. The 2D Keystone feature dramatically reduces the trapezoid effect, which occurs when a projector is installed off-center. The keystone correction is done automatically, or can you adjust manually via the Display sub-menu. Also, you can use Corner Fit to adjust each corner independently to achieve your desired image geometry.

Wired LAN allows you to manage the HC880 from a computer using a web browser when the computer and the projector are connected to the same local area network. The HC880 is compatible with several projector control systems, including Crestron, AMX, and PJ-Link, for network control via LAN. The HC880 also supports control via RS-232

Epson offers several home cinema models that retail for under a thousand dollars utilizes 3LCD technology, and can deliver an impressive amount of brightness. The models above the HC880 provide higher contrast, include a higher quality sound system, and they are equipped with Android TV.

The Home Cinema 880 is a very basic projector, it utilizes a lamp-based light source, and it doesn’t have many smart features. However, at $599, it is very affordable and produces good picture quality for its price. With an ANSI Lumens rating of 3,300 and a lamp life of 6,000 hours (12,000 hours in ECO mode), you can experience years of quality home theater content. This lamp-based projector produced brighter and more accurate colors than many DLP laser projectors that cost 3X more. The HC880 does not have many bells and whistles, but if you desire an excellent image from an affordable projector, the HC800 should be at the top of your list.

The Epson PowerLite U50 is a 3LCD, WUXGA (1920 x 1200) resolution projector with built-in Wi-Fi connectivity. This Epson is well suited for bright classrooms and conference rooms, thanks to its high lumen output and 3LCD technology. Unlike its DLP competition, the U50 has as many color lumens as it does white ones, making colors pop even in the face of ambient light. Whether you are looking for a projector for business or education environments, this Epson is certainly one to consider.

As mentioned, the PowerLite U50 has WUXGA resolution (1920 x 1200), which is the business and education world’s 1080p. The aspect ratio, or width/height ratio of the projected image, is 16:10 instead of 16:9 (the aspect ratio of 1080p), so make sure you get a 16:10 screen if you’re buying a new screen.

WUXGA is more than enough resolution for K-12 and business applications. Many projectors in this market have the lower WXGA resolution, which is plenty for presentations and text. The higher resolution is a major plus in the case of this Epson, and makes it a fine choice for high school video production, photography, yearbook, or graphic design classes. This projector will be especially fitting for higher education, where the need for WUXGA may be higher (medical films, scientific renderings, simulation, architecture, film and design applications).

The Epson PowerLite U50 claims 3,700 color and white lumens, which is bright enough to handle the ambient light found in most classrooms and conference rooms, even in those really bright conference rooms where the walls are mostly windows. Later in the review, there is a deeper discussion about ambient light and some photos for reference.

The PowerLite can be purchased for the low price of $1,149.99, and if you're in education, you can expect a hefty discount that brings the price of the projector down to just $899. That is through their Brighter Futures Education Program. For school districts purchasing in bulk, that is a steal of a deal for a WUXGA projector.

Thank you to Epson for sponsoring the 2021-2022 Education Report and Guide!

The NEC NP-MC372X is an education class 3LCD projector that offers XGA (1,024 x 768) resolution and is rated to deliver 3,700 lumens rated light output. In ECO mode the its lamp is rated for up to 15,000 hours in ECO mode. It offers many features for its current list price of $509. This is an education/business class projector that falls toward the lower end, in terms of size, weight, and price, of education class projectors rated at or near 4,000 lumens.

The MC372X is a good solution for schools and businesses looking for a bright, compact projector with networking capabilities and the ability to simultaneously display content from multiple sources, including mobile devices.

We wish to thank Epson for sponsoring this year’s Education Report and Guide. 

The NEC MC372X is a small footprint, XGA (1,024 x 768) 3LCD projector with a 1.2x zoom lens and rated brightness of 3,700 ANSI lumens. And, while the MC372X is only an XGA projector, it can accept 4K@30P content via its HDMI inputs. It also has USB 2.0A input and a LAN port for network control and asset management. The NEC MC372X’s replaceable lamp is rated for up to 15,000 hours in ECO mode.

The MC372X utilizes a 3LCD instead of the single DLP chip found in many projectors in its class, this should result in richer bright colors. Normally 3LCD projectors can deliver higher native contrast than DLP models as well. The MC372X has a rated dynamic contrast of 16,000:1.

For those looking for an affordable classroom projector, NEC offers two different series which are the MC series and the ME series. There are two models in the MC series, the MC372X and the MC382W which we reviewed last year.

The MC372X’s 3,700 lumens and XGA (1024 x 768) resolution are slightly lower than the MC382W (SRP $559.00) which offers a slight increase in brightness at 3,800 lumens and resolution WXGA (1,280 x 800) for $50 dollars more. For users who intend on showing a lot of HD video, the MC382W would be a better solution.

For customers looking for additional placement flexibility may opt to move up to the ME series. While the ME series projectors have similar features, they have larger zoom range (1.7:1) versus the MC series (1.2:1) which also results in a wider throw ratio. There are three models available in ME series including the ME382U (SRP $919) which is the most notable model in that series at 3,800 lumen WUXGA (1,920 x 1,200).

Overall, the MC372X is a good solution for someone looking at entry level unit suitable for showing presentations photos or documents in a classroom or meeting room.