Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Common Interests front projection tv....

anyone here use one? i'm considering getting an infocus x1. CC has them on sale right now for $799 so it may be worth taking the plunge... but what are the goods and the bads?

You talking just a Projector? or one of theones where its like a square box in front of the tv on the floor kinda thing?

While the screen size is hard to beat, there are better options. The cons to using LCD as a TV are: no tuner, no internal sound system (usually), and they require a dark dark room to work well. Even then a cheapie projector will probably leave you a little disapointed. I've had the pleasure of using one that was about $3-4k and its certainly not bad, but the screen can even get washed out by ambient light on those too. Bigger is not always better.

If you can control light, a front projector is great. The X1 is an excellent one on it's price range.

No sound or tuner is true, but I haven't used TV speakers or tuners in years. Many people use satellite/cable boxes and surrond systems anyway.

Main specs of importance w/ projectors that can vary greatly, model to model is: Contrast ratio, and lumens (light output).

Cheaper projectors are much dimmer than expensive ones. Also color temp is important to many. Nice ones may have expensive 5500k metal halide bulbs (same color temp as the Sun) in them to produce vibrant whites that halogen can't produce due to it's 3000k color temp. That's w/ LCD ones. DLP projectors are different altogether. I don't know what DLPs use for lightsource, whether it be a bulb or what.

I'd make sure you test the one your thinking about, in the store (at the desired screen size you will want to run it at in your home), and make sure your happy with it before leaving the store. Because a lot of times, they show you at the store on a small size like 15 or 20 inch screen, which will make quality and brightness much, much better, when the reality is that when you expand that size to the 50-100+ inch or whatever size then it gets way dimmer and quality goes out the door, directly perportional on an X to Y curve of distance/screen size to quality/brightness. More of X will = less of Y.

Or another option, is go buy one from Costco, since they have an AWESOME return policy. If the given store will let you return it just because of dissatisfaction alone, then go ahead and try one. But if they wont let you try it first then don't get it, because you gotta make sure your happy with the performance before you marry yourself to it, especially with projectors because there is so much variance in performance, model to model

Also, here's a good resource to study up a bit on pointers:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/

thanks for the advice guys.

i just noticed an X1 sitting in my bosses office..... so i'm going to kiss ass and see if i can borrow it for a couple days. then i'll just have to track down a screen to borrow or buy and return.

if none of that pans out, circuit city stocks it, and they have at least a 14 day return policy, so i may go that route as well.

i definitely will want to test it out before i make any final decisions.... especially when it comes to front projection....

If you actually plan on buying one, make sure it can do at LEAST XGA resolution (1024x768). SVGA (800x600) is marginally good, and can't really do any HDTV stuff. I opted to get a Compaq MP1200 that has a pretty good bulb life. The longer life, the better. Especially since the bulbs are over $300. (HID Baby!)