Saturday, 12 February 2011

Optoma HD20 High Definition 1080p DLP Home Theater Projector (Grey)


True High Def 1080p Resolution, 1.2x Manual Zoom and Focus

1700 Lumens Brightness, Lamp life: 4000/3000 Hours (STD/Bright), 4X speed (RGBRGB) color-wheel

4000:1 Contrast Ratio (On/Off), 500:1 ANSI Contrast

37.6" to 301.1" Screen size,Offset: 116%,16:9 Native, 4:3 and LBX Compatible

Two HDMI, VGA-In, Component Video, Composite Video and +12V Trigger



This review is from: Optoma HD20 High Definition 1080p DLP Home Theater Projector (Grey)This was an upgrade for me from a 720p, DLP projector (Mitsubishi HD1000u). Initial impressions are very positive, based on about 10 hours of viewing & tweaking. Very quiet, and plenty bright running in low power mode. The high resolution (1920 X 1080) approaches that for a typical 2k digital cinema, so my 145" diagonal screen, viewed from about 15 feet distance, provides a very pleasing movie experience. That said, the increase in resolution from 720p is an incremental step, so it is not the be all and end all of image quality in projectors. More specifically the source material you feed it is what really brings out the quality. Many HD feed materials (from cable or satellite) don't ever approach the inherent resolution of the projector, so at this point only blu-ray source material will really give the utmost in high resolution detail (and not even all disks, depending on the original mastering, etc.). Black levels are similar to my previous DLP projector, so if you are obsessed with having pitch black star fields, you should opt for a pricier DLP or LCD projector, which may more closely approach jet black in those situations. I don't worry too much about this aspect, reminding myself that even film projectors don't provide jet black when the screen goes blank, so the HD20 actually matches the real cinema experience more closely (how's that for rationalizing why a cheaper projector is better!) . At this price level (<$1000) it is hard to imagine a bigger bang for the buck in terms of image quality. Finally, I highly recommend you check out www.avsforum.com , where there is an extensive discussion thread about this and competing projectors....

This review is from: Optoma HD20 High Definition 1080p DLP Home Theater Projector (Grey)I first wrote this review on another site, and now that I've had more time with this projector I have added and changed a few things and am reposting the review on Amazon. I think more people will look to Amazon when purchasing this projector, especially since the other site is not stocking it anymore. Hopefully this review helps those of you who are on the edge about purchasing this projector.Pros: Good looking, gloss-white finish. Low-noise fan on normal-bulb mode. 4000 hours lamp life on econo is greater then most projectors! Good enough to use in bright mode to use with lights turned on in the room. In the dark, it looks simply amazing!1080p content looks very good. Blu-rays played from a PS3 (or other blu-ray player) look awesome. I watched Kung-Fu Panda and was "wowed" by what you can notice on a much larger screen. I just watched Transformers : Revenge of the Fallen on it last night and I was amazed at the details and I noticed things I didn't even notice when I saw it in IMAX. This might have been because in IMAX you have such an insanely huge screen that you miss some things you might not have noticed before since you have to actually turn your head to look at the entire screen. Still, blu-ray content is amazing to see with this projector. I find it very hard to believe you can buy this for under $1000.Video games look awesome. It works well with PS3 and 360 consoles. You get a huge advantage over other players when you can see them off in the distance before they could actually see you on a normal HDTV. This of course all depends on the size of the screen you use. I'm using a 92" diagonal white screen by EliteScreens. Not the greatest of screens but will get me by for a year or two until I get the funds for a good, fixed screen.When using my PS3 with my tv I set the RGB color-spectrum to limited range in the display options on the PS3. On the tv, with the setting on full it would be far too dark and black out way too much shadow detail. On this projector you can turn on full-range and make use of the entire spectrum and it will give you better blacks and whites this way. If you put this projector on the bright pre-set setting (not high lamp mode) then you can blind yourself by the whites this thing is capable of in the dark. Bright setting should really only be used when you have a lot of ambient light to fight with. Otherwise the Cinema, Reference, or your own custom settings with the help of a calibration disc is probably best.There are lot's of options for adjusting brightness, contrast, sharpness, etc. Everything you find on current HDTV's seems to be a setting you can change here. I personally find cinema mode is about perfect for use in dark environments where you can shut off all the light and enjoy a movie. Sharpness is used differently on this projector then it is on many HDTV's. With my tv I took the sharpness down to zero, because all it was doing was adding pixels to make the picture appear sharper and it would actually take away from the realism of the picture. On this projector the default value is 7 and if you lower it you are actually softening the picture and going negative with the sharpness effect. I found the sweet spot to be 10. At the value of 10 I get extremely sharp, crisp looking text in all my games and the picture looks better at that setting then at the default of 7. Anything below 7 would turn too soft and look blurred... like looking through a water covered windshield.The Optoma features automatic shut-off which you can adjust. By default I believe it is turned off. I set mine for 15 minutes. This feature will automatically turn off the projector after no signal is detected for "xx" amount of minutes. Very useful if you are not the only...




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