Epson Home Cinema 1080UB projector, Pros, Cons, and Typical Capabilities

Epson Home Cinema 1080UB Projector: Pros

• Above average brightness in best mode
• Extremely bright in brightest modes
• Truly Excellent overall picture quality (after adjustment)
• “Eye-popping” color – plenty of “wow factor”, especially with dark rich colors
• Especially good handling of skin tones (after adjustment)
• Incredible black level performance compared to anything in its price range
• Excellent shadow detail
• Good documentation – some decent explanations of features, controls
• Very good menus
• Wide range zoom (2.1:1) and lens shift with extreme range, give it the most placement flexiility of any 1080p projector
• Excellent warranty

Epson Home Cinema 1080UB Projector: Cons

• A bit noisy in high power lamp mode
• No support for an anamorphic lens
• Projector must be unmounted (if ceiling mounted) to change lamp
• Would like to see a 3rd HDMI input (but that’s pretty rare)
• Pixel visibility just barely decernable at closer than average seating distances (I mention this only because while I don’t see it as an issue, it has more visible pixel structure than all both a couple of the other 3LCD projectors. The LCoS and DLP’s have completely invisible structures at normal seating distances.

Epson Home Cinema 1080UB Projector: Typical Capabilities

• Lamp life
• Size and weight
• User manual
• Control panel
• Assortment of inputs

Epson Home Cinema 1080UB Summary: The Bottom Line

Do I really need to keep writing, at this point?

This is now my personal favorite lower cost 1080p projector. The Epson Home Cinema 1080UB is really short on “flaws”, and really strong on picture quality, brightness, and warranty, to mention a few.

Other than its lack of support for an anamorphic lens (which can be dealt with by buying an outboard processor, I believe), I see little downside.

To make it an even better value, I guess it could cost less, (everything could), but from a standpoint of what you get for the money, I feel it offers the best value proposition of any of the sub-$10,000 1080p projectors, for those seeking more than entry level performance.

I said at the beginning, that this is one of those rare “rave reviews” of mine, and I think I delivered on that promise.

If I were to compare it’s performance in terms of cars, I might say that this is a BMW M class, for the price of a Toyota Camry.

If you are spending less than $3000 at the time of this writing (1/08), the Epson Home Cinema 1080UB is definitely, in my book, the king of the hill, and the one to beat. It’s going to give noticeably more expensive projectors a serious run for the attention of those who have the bucks, and are willing to spend more, because, this Epson is serious competiton for most costing significantly more.