Hi all,

I am debating which PJ to replace my 4 years old HS10 projecting to the DIY 100" Parkland screen ? My HT room is 17'x17' with full light control, sitting postion about 15' from the screen. Project is 14' from the screen.
I know the VW100 was the previous flagship and with the Xeon bulb. Will it be significant better than the new boy HW10 ? I have not seen the PQ on all of these model in person. I am hoping you guys experts can give me some ideas and pros and cons for what I should look out for.

70% Movies (DVD and Blu-Ray), 15% HDTV and 15% PS3 Gaming.

Many thanks in advance..

I'm also not able to decide between Sony HW10, Panasonic PT-AE3000 and Epson 7500 pro. 50% movies and 50% HDTV (sports) and little bit of Games.

I understand that Epson is about $1.5K costlier than Panasonic but I am reading lot of comments from many members that Panasonic has issues with Smoothscreen which makes picture much softer as comapred to Epson.

Sony has good picture but has less lumens as compared to above two.

My viewing distance is 20 feet for screen (16:9 format) size of 150 inch diag in a light controlled basement home theater. Throw distance will be around 17 feet.

Hopefully with time and more reviews from fellow members, this forum will help me make a decison.

As of now I would cross out the Ruby (100) on your list. Mainly because you can't do 1080p/24 into a HDMI input but also because the lamps are expensive. I would look at your other two options more closely and consider going with one of them. Jason did a nice review on the new Sony have you read it? Just click on the more popular threads and it is right on the top...

I'm also not able to decide between Sony HW10, Panasonic PT-AE3000 and Epson 7500 pro. 50% movies and 50% HDTV (sports) and little bit of Games.

I understand that Epson is about $1.5K costlier than Panasonic but I am reading lot of comments from many members that Panasonic has issues with Smoothscreen which makes picture much softer as comapred to Epson.

Sony has good picture but has less lumens as compared to above two.

My viewing distance is 20 feet for screen (16:9 format) size of 150 inch diag in a light controlled basement home theater. Throw distance will be around 17 feet.

Hopefully with time and more reviews from fellow members, this forum will help me make a decison.

While the Epson Pro 7500UB may be approx. $1500 more then the AE3000, the non-pro model 6500UB is essentially the same projector (white case instead of black and minus a spare bulb and ceiliing mount) it should be priced similar to the Panasonic AE3000 and Sony HW10. I wouldn't consider the VW100 as the HW10 is a simply a better projector and replacement bulbs cost a small fraction as compared to those for the VW100 (for the cost of a couple bulbs for the VW100 you could buy a new HW10 projector). as for Screen size you suggest (150") the only way to get ideally bright image from any of these projectors with a screen that size is to use a higher gain screen. While it true the Sony projector may offer lower light output in the brightest uncalibrated mode, the lumen output from all of these projectors in in the range of 500 to 600 once they are properly calibrated to 6500K and that's with a new bulb. A 150" screen with a gain of 2.0 and with a 600 lumen projector will give you 18 FL which is at or near the recommended brightness for a home theater and even with some decrease in light output as the bulb ages you will still be at the recommended minimum of 12 FL. A screen such as a Dalite High Power (with a gain of up to 2.8) would do the job for you, but only if you can mount the projector near eye level and not up against the ceiliing.

"A screen such as a Dalite High Power (with a gain of up to 2.8) would do the job for you, but only if you can mount the projector near eye level and not up against the ceiliing."

That's for max gain; my pj is 7' from the floor and I guesstimate a gain of 1.8, plus all the HP's other unique advantages.

Hi,
My Parkland Screen is about 1.0 gain, sitting location to the screen is 14'. Will my screen be able to hand the HW10 ? What is the cost for HW10 now ? Any powerbuy for the HW10 ? Thanks.

"A screen such as a Dalite High Power (with a gain of up to 2.8) would do the job for you, but only if you can mount the projector near eye level and not up against the ceiliing."

That's for max gain; my pj is 7' from the floor and I guesstimate a gain of 1.8, plus all the HP's other unique advantages.

I suspect if you use the screen gain calculator developed by FLBOY (link is HERE (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=966057)) you will find the resulting gain is lower than 1.8 for a HP screen when the projector is mounted at 7 ft. For my HT geometry when I placed the projector at around 7 ft. above the floor the HP material didn't look much different in terms of gain than 1.1 to 1.3 materials. However with the projector at 5 ft. above the floor the HP really started coming to life with a brighter image than the 1.3 to 1.5 gain materials.

Thanks Ron for your advice so far. Here are some more details about my setup.

1. As the theater I'm building is in the basement and I cannot take this large Dalite screen to the basement via stairs, I'll have to plan for using screen goo to paint the wall where I'm going to project. Screen goo white paint has maximum gain of 1.8.

2. I'll have to mount the projector to the ceiling but I can drop it down to 16 inch from ceiling (total finished height of the room is 90 inch) without it obsturcting the view (seating is behind the projector at about 24 feet from the screen).

3. I am able to center the projector horizontally though.


Ron, can you suggest what projector I should consider given the above listed conditions I have to keep in the theater room. I want to keep the diag size of the screen to 150 inch (maximum what I have available)

Thanks in advance.

1. As the theater I'm building is in the basement and I cannot take this large Dalite screen to the basement via stairs, I'll have to plan for using screen goo to paint the wall where I'm going to project. Screen goo white paint has maximum gain of 1.8.

What about an electric or a pulldown screen? More likely to fit down your stairs.

hrd

the maximum length (width) I can take down via the stairs is about 10 feet. Does the pull down screen comes in two separate widths which gets joined at the time of final installation or its one piece length.

hrd

the maximum length (width) I can take down via the stairs is about 10 feet. Does the pull down screen comes in two separate widths which gets joined at the time of final installation or its one piece length.
One piece. You might be able to fit in a 133" diagonal Da-Lite pulldown, but not likely a 150".

http://www.dalite.com/products/spec_pdfs/230.pdf

Just buy the pulldown, take it out of the case, bring it down the stairs (should be a bit over ten feet wide, but you can bend it a bit), and build a frame around it. It actually costs less to buy a Da-Lite pulldown than to buy just the screen fabric alone from Da-Lite, so others have done this very thing. It will be much better than using a painted screen. You really need the high gain for 150" (or 133"), and no one has seemed to report much in the way of successful high gain paint in the DIY forum.

the maximum length (width) I can take down via the stairs is about 10 feet. Does the pull down screen comes in two separate widths which gets joined at the time of final installation or its one piece length.

Perhaps I am missing something here, but fixed frame screens come in pieces that you assemble yourself. Thus, for a 150" diagonal screen, the longest pieces will be the top and bottom screen edges - but they will only be slightly longer than 10 feet (don't you have any small, basement-style windows through which you can pass the frame pieces?). You then assemble the screen in your basement.

I would be VERY careful about a DIY screen with high power material. It is very heavy and extremely difficult to stretch (it actually has quite limited stretch-ability) perfectly flat over a DIY frame. I tried a few years ago and ultimately gave up in favor of just buying the entire screen.

I'd wait for the Epson 7500/6500. The performance of HW10 should be roughly equal to VW60 which is only slightly better in black than 1080ub. If Epson 7500/6500 delivers it should be better than HW10. That however also depends on how much premium you'll have to pay for the Espon over the HW10.

I'd wait for the Epson 7500/6500. The performance of HW10 should be roughly equal to VW60 which is only slightly better in black than 1080ub. If Epson 7500/6500 delivers it should be better than HW10. That however also depends on how much premium you'll have to pay for the Espon over the HW10.

The 6500 should street for less than the Sony, based on past markdowns.

I am close to buying a HW10 also, but I went into my local electronics store and they were selling their floor model VW100 for $3500.

The VW100 would include 2 new bulbs and a 4 year extended warranty. I don't how many hours are on the original bulb.

Would anyone go for the VW100 with these extras (or if they marked down the price lower)? Or is the HW10 that much better of a machine?

any ideas?

any ideas?
For not much more money than that, you should be able to get a brand new JVC RS10. With an RS10, you would have newer technology, much better native contrast, plenty of brightness, and a reasonably-sized projector. The VW100 is old technology...someone on this forum offered a VW100 with no more than a thousand hours of use along with a brand new bulb for only $2500 over two years ago. More recently, I've seen used VW100s listing for as low as $2000.