Home Theater Projectors

[Ultima]

Greetings Gurus and fellow Geeks!

I have come once again to ScriptUO seeking to find the answer to life's mysteries. I know if I am to find an answer it must be here at ScriptUO where the brightest minds gather to contemplate the mysteries of the universe.

So the big question....

Has anyone dabbled with Home Theater Projectors hooking up to a HTPC?

Do Home Theater Projectors blow the doors off a HDTV or what?

What's the verdict?

Pros & Cons?

How do you hook it up? HDMI?

So many questions...

 

[Ultima]

No one!?

And here I thought we actually had full fledged Geeks hanging out here.

I'm a broke Geek or else I'd be considered to give one of these guys a whirl.

People are hooking up their PS3s and XBOXs (Which I don't have either) to Projectors as well.

I'll have to post feedback to my own thread once I finish up school and find employment and have some spending money.

Maybe I can find a cheap one on Craigslist.

[TrailMyx]

I thought about a projection system for a while.  At work, we have lots of really good projectors we use, and I was never really able to get past the idea of watching a dark movie with one.  At Fry's here in SD, I looked into this a bit and found that I didn't really like the quality of projection systems due to the inability to watch darkly filmed movies.

I found the greatest bang for my buck was to go plasma.  I could get a big cheap screen, 1080p, 3d capable and VERY capable of watching dark movies.  Also, you immediately notice the difference over LCD when you are refreshing at 600hz. 

For me, I coupled my new Denon 3d receiver with my cheap-ish 60" plasma and my PS3 for 3d bluray.  I can't say enough good things about it other than I've run out of HDMI inputs (and my Denon has 7 inputs)..

I have a large box full of cables I pulled out of the ratsnest that was behind my old read-projection TV, Yamaha receiver.  Literally 30 lbs of cables!  God smiled when he created HDMI... 

Anyhow, I fear you'll soon have that projector taking up space in your closet and collecting dust-bunnies.

[Ultima]

Plasma is the way to go then? I'll have to read up on all the subtle differences...

HDMI is wonderful. My LCD has HDMI which I'm using as a monitor.

Right now I have two large Projection TVs that I wanted to use as a secondary monitor but they are old and no HDMI. One does have a DVI but it's not the same...

I tried to sell them both on craigslist.com for $150....no one wanted them.

I want a nice big 60" with HDMI like you TM! Watch all my movies with ease on my HTPC.

[TrailMyx]

You'll find people that have it against plasma because they view it as "old" technology.  I dunno, every time I did a side-to-side comparison, there was just no comparison. 

Originally I was going to buy and really expensive Panasonic plasma, but then I found the LG series of 3d-1080p screens for 1/2 the money.  I haven't looked back. 

Ultimately, you should go kick the tires of a nice plasma, budget plasma and the various LCD offerings.  When I was doing my shopping, that was ultimately what it came down to - best punch for the price.  That was a year ago now, so times may be different.

If you lived closer, you could have my Sony 65" projection screen.  It's a flower pot now, but still works great. 

[UOMaddog]

Here's my two cents:

Projectors are great IF you have the room for it, and I don't mean "space"! If you're doing a man-cave in a basement where you can keep it dark when you want to watch great movies, then by all means, get a great projector and paint a nice big wall white! If you don't have a good room for it, you'd have to fork over a LOT more money to get one with a very high light output in order to get a good picture in a well-lit room. If you fall into this category, my best advice is....WAIT! Plasma TV's are currently the "best" you can get in terms of color reproduction, sharpness, etc. but they have a relatively short shelf-life because they can be affected by both "burn-out" and "burn-in." Plasma TV's get much hotter than their LCD counterparts due to technological differences. In case you missed any coverage of the 2011 CES, there are a few new technologies that will be out later this year that take all the benefits of LED TV's and combine it with the quality of the plasmas. The new tech has two names (Sony calls it crystal-tv or something like that) and Samsung and everyone else calls it OLED. The beauty of OLED is that each pixel emits light individually, so you no longer have any backlighting which gives you the wonderful contrasts that plasma tv's have combined with the energy saving and picture clarity of the LED's as well as a much longer life. Newer plasmas have developed some technologies to fight their longevity issues, but it doesn't take away from the underlying problem. For example, some plasmas shift the picture over by 5+ pixels periodically to reduce the chance of burn-in caused by using a particular color too often (such as when you're constantly browsing the on-screen TV guide and it's ALL BLUE).


IF YOU DONT WANT TO READ THAT ^^^^, JUST READ THIS \/\/\/\/\/\/

Dark Room? - Buy a good projector!
Well-lit Room? - Fork over a ton for a projector, or WAIT and buy an OLED tv later this year!

[Ultima]

Good stuff! I knew good ole' UOMaddogg might poke his head in and tell me about the latest and greatest technologies about to hit the market.

I'm going to have to pass on the 65" Projection TV TM. I already have two 50" that I can't wait to get rid of and trade in for a flat screen of some kind. Sadly it's not in the budget anytime soon.

I'm going to read up on the oled TV!

[TrailMyx]

Unfortunately, it's going to be quite a while before you'll be able to get an "affordable" OLED screen of a reasonable size.  I only know this because the company I work for makes the special equipment that actually produces the glass panels used to manufacture them.  Still some technological hurdles to get screens that size mass-produced for a reasonable price.  The typical amorphous silicon process usually found in standard LCD manufacture doesn't really work very well for OLED, and LTPS crystallization is only now coming around to be used in the bigger generations of panels.  

You'll soon start seeing 46" OLED screens, but be prepared for sticker shock. 

That said, it's an exciting time for OLED and it brings the best of plasma performance to the LCD world.  In the mean time, you'll be soon seeing iPad sized screens coming very soon that are OLED.  That's the first step for the larger screens.

[UOMaddog]

Oh I forgot one thing...


HDMI!

If it's high-def, you gotta use HDMI! (Technically component cables can handle the weaker 720P HD)

The quick rundown of cable types (if I can remember it correctly):

i = Interlacing (half of the pixes refresh each time, taking turns)
p = Progressive (every pixel refreshes every time) MUCH BETTER!

Video Cables (some include audio):
Coax - Can technically support just about any signal, usually only used to get cable/satellite to your box
Composite - Max of 480i (the good old "Red, White, & Yellow" that comes with every dvd, vcr, cassette tape, and toilet it seems)
S-Video - Max of 480p (requires Red/White audio cable still, seen on some older laptops and dvd players)
Component - Max of 720p/1080i (the good old Red, Green, & Blue...plus of course Red/White for audio, or perhaps digital coax or digital optical if you want to get fancy)
HDMI - At least 1440p (not that we've even seen it yet, so you can say it's quite future proof! it also includes up to 7.1 channel audio within the same cable and some even support ethernet connectivity!)

Audio Cables
Composite - (The Red/White from above) supports stereo audio
Digital Coax - (looks just like composite, but heavier duty and usually orange) supports 5.1 channel audio
Digital Optical - (black jacks with little flap covers in them) supports 7.1 channel audio
HDMI - (looks like a USB connector but slightly wider and with a bevel on the ends) supports 7.1 channel audio

[Newsman]

psshhh you need to get a thunderbolt capable projector

[Ultima]

psshhh you need to get a thunderbolt capable projector

Tell us more about the greatness of Thunderbolt interface.

You have a device with this port that you use?

[Masscre]

I do not believe many devices support apples underdeveloped thunderbolt interface ?! Personally I would not waste the money on something that is propietary and possibly would never become any kind of standard.

[Ultima]

I'm not sold on the projectors for the home but there are some mini-projectors that are portable if the need ever arose. If I got a job (I wish I had a job) where I was travelling a good deal of the time maybe a mini-projector would come in handy while watching my HTPC library on the wall in the Hotel Room.

Looks like Thunderbolt was created by Intel but brought to market by Apple. Appears to be pretty fast but I'd need to hear more and learn more about it before purchasing a device with a Thunderbolt port on it.

I'm not crazy about proprietary vendors either but for some items you can't get around it. I still have my Dell PC it does the job but I can't wait for the day when I can upgrade my PC from scratch and get away from Dell!

[Ultima]