Overall Color & Picture Quality

With the rather minimal adjustments made during calibration of the Cinema 1 mode, the overall picture quality is really very impressive. The Panasonic has excellent color balance plus good depth to the image. (The depth, no doubt helped by the excellent black levels, and a number of assorted image enhancing tools, like their Detail Clarity, and Cinema Reality controls).

When you need the maximum lumens, the Panasonic may not crank out as many as a number of competitors (it’s strictly average), but, I am impressed with the picture performance of their Dynamic mode.

After some minor adjustment, the color accuracy is better than some brighter projectors such as the Epson Home Cinema 1080 UB, in its Dynamic mode. Let’s just say that Panasonic’s Dynamic mode in terms of color is better than many projectors “best mode” out of the box. While enjoying Monday Night Football tonight, while writing up the review, I really was pleased with the color. On the down side, while its color is better, I have kept the PT-AE3000U to 110″ diagonal on my 128″ screen. When I use the Epson, I get slightly more brightness, even when filling the full 128″.

Bottom line: This is one fine projector when it comes to image quality. It is one of those projectors with no serious flaws, and everything well balanced. If I was Epson, Sanyo or Mitsubishi, I’d really be concerned about the PT-AE3000U, especially considering it’s really low $2499 street price.