This is true, the service menu is not even supposed to be accessible through the remote control. You must use the buttons on the projector itself.

Originally posted by simong

The projector never made it beyond the WAF (Wife Approval Factor)...in fact it never even made it off the start line.


Yes, the dreaded WAF!

The only way for me to stay married AND drop $2kCDN on an H30 is to also drop $2kCDN on a new bedroom set ;-)

Personally, when I'm stumbling around at 6am looking for socks, I don't care if they are in a $1000 pine dresser or a $50 Wal-Mart dresser. Heck, I'd even save $50 bucks and pile the clean socks in one corner, dirty socks in another! Then again, the wife would be just as happy watching VHS movies on a 13" black and white tv as she is watching a 6' pj screen with DD/DTS sound.

Bottom line, my wife will let me buy almost anything as long as she gets something in return. Hey, money is useless in the bank! Enjoy it while you're ALIVE.

Originally posted by simong
Hi Guys

I'm sad to say that after having my H30 for just over a month I may not be a proud owner for much longer :(.

The projector never made it beyond the WAF (Wife Approval Factor)...in fact it never even made it off the start line.

After weeks of sitting in a box until I got a pull-down screen I finally got the whole system up and running last weekend.
My wife went out for a meal with friends on the Saturday night so I made use of the time and mounted the screen and ceiling attached the H30 using a nice little £7 mount from Argos (Works very well). Hid the wires in trunking and fired the system up.

The image quality on my 80" diagonal 16:9 pull down was amazing and everything looked neat and tidy - although the screen does look a little ugly haning from the ceiling (Not wall space).
To cut a long story short my wife HATES it....and I mean REALLY HATES it !! :(. She won't even watch a film on it ....full stop.

She hates the screen....she hates the PJ hanging from the ceiling......and she hates the big image - everything I love about it.

The only compromise we can come to is that I have to mount the PJ every time I want to watch a film, and even then I'll be watching alone due to her determination not to even be in the room when it's turned on.

As you can imageine this has caused some friction (to say the least) over the past week so in order to keep the piece I may have to sell the PJ and screen.

Anyway, enough of the sob story - I've not given up hope yet but the thought of a) watching films all alone, and b) having to spend 20mins mounting, lining up and focusing the PJ when I want to watch a film (Table mounting not an option due to children) depresses me and isn't the solution I'd hoped for when I purchased the PJ.

Women.....don't you just love 'em :)


My wife absolutely loves the projector, and she certainly isn't into electronics and stuff. In fact, my mom, who only got a VCR few years ago, loves the projector. I was shocked. I can't understand why your wife wouldn't like it. I played Finding Nemo on the PJ and they couldn't stop talking about how beautiful it was. And my wife loves DDR on the Xbox on the big screen, maybe you just haven't shown your wife something yet to get her into it. Although, if she won't even look at the PJ, I think your in trouble. I hate to say the problem isn't women, just certain ones.

PS Did anyone get a chance to look at thier ADC gain settings?

I don't understand your wife.

Say, "ok then lets get a big screen rptv"

Big screen televisions take up WAY more space than this projector does.
She'll lose 3-4 feet of livingroom space going this way. Then ask her to help you carry the replacement bigscreen in the house with you, I bet she LOVES the 4.8 pound projector after that. I helped move a big screen tv for a friend once and was shocked at how heavy it was.

Hide the cables, lose the screen, shoot onto a white wall or wall mounted screen, the projector itself is hardly noticeable. Oh and turn up the surround sound and enjoy a movie...

Simong,

You did something stupid, you don't know what it is, and now she is making you pay for it. Happens to me all the time.
I don't know what you could have done to have her hate your H30 though. Eeek!
She do any scrapbook stuff, or anything with pictures. Throw up some wedding pictures or if you have a video, get it transferred to DVD and throw that up there. You need to take some drastic measures here brother!

Originally posted by rocker999
I don't understand your wife.

Say, "ok then lets get a big screen rptv"



We already have one of those...and she was never really keen on that either

simong - Yep, I would say that the A/V equipment represents something else in her mind, something that she hates. Did you consult her about these very large purchaces, did you nag her about similar large ticket items, do you obsess about these things for months until you buy them leaving her to entertain herself,... these are all things that could make her resentful of the equipment and the time you spend with the equipment.

I think you need to return the PJ and buy something for her ( jewerly, vacation, .. ) something that is not A/V related.

Originally posted by snowmoon
Did you consult her about these very large purchaces, did you nag her about similar large ticket items, do you obsess about these things for months until you buy them leaving her to entertain herself,... these are all things that could make her resentful of the equipment and the time you spend with the equipment.

I think every reader at this forum read this and felt like you were talking about them personally :)

A few thing I had to do to gain 'wife acceptance':

1) Point out that we could get rid of the ugly black box that was our 32" WEGA and stand, and the black ugly AV cabinet as well. This made an impression.

2) Hid a pull-down screen behind a false beam so as to be all but invisible when retracted.

3) Got rid of dedicated CD player in favor of a DVD player that will play everything (my old one didn't), got rid of VCR for tuning cable stations (the new DVD player has integrated OTA digital tuner, so what if we can't watch cable on the PJ.) Hid the two remaining components (receiver and DVD / CD / OTA receiver) behind a chair so as to be all but invisible).

4) Let her arrange couch, chairs to her liking. This was the biggest sticking point because her arrangement is FAR from optimal for viewing. She says no way was she going to have everything facing the (invisible when retracted) screen so the living room looked like a 'home theatre' istead of a 'friendly conversation area' (yea, like we ever do that!)

5) Carefully hid all cables to the best of my ability.

6) PJ is 'table mounted' on a small chest. When not used, the PJ is put inside the chest. It then becomes an end table for the couch. Cables stay attached as I cut a slit in the back of the chest to accomodate them. Again, not optimal (I would prefer ceiling mount) but it works.

7) I bought her an expensive watch for her birthday, cost more than the PJ (a Rado she had wanted for longer than I had wanted a PJ).

This is the short list. But, now we are both happy and spend every other night watching a movie. All in all, it worked out great (well, OK) for both of us.

John F

Originally posted by snowmoon
simong - Yep, I would say that the A/V equipment represents something else in her mind, something that she hates. Did you consult her about these very large purchaces, did you nag her about similar large ticket items, do you obsess about these things for months until you buy them leaving her to entertain herself,... these are all things that could make her resentful of the equipment and the time you spend with the equipment.

I think you need to return the PJ and buy something for her ( jewerly, vacation, .. ) something that is not A/V related.

Eeek.......are you my wife ????:eek:

I think you are spot on there snowmoon - I've been "reaserching" (ahem....obsessing) PJ's for many weeks and did kind of drop the purchase on her at the last minute (Found one on Ebay with only a few hours of the sale left) so I suspect that this is the root of the problem. I also seem to have a natural talen of doing this sort of thing at the "wrong time of the month" so I'm my own worst enemy.

I'm really reluctant to sell the PJ but will if I have to.
Hmmmm.......Off to find something nice to buy my wife :) - I saw a fantastic LCD TV the other day ....DOHH!! :D

Thanks for the support guys - Anyway, enough of my sob stories let's get back the the H30 :)

Okay, time to eat some Crow.

I just got off the phone with Optoma, and they have thourougly evaluated the H30 that I sent back with the "buzzing" noise. According to them, they cannot duplicate the problem I experienced. They say that the H30 is within the specified noise levels, which I found a bit surprising, but as I said...I'd eat my words if that's the case.

So, I guess the news is that for those of us with the "buzzing problem," it really isn't a problem, and that's just the noise of this particular projector. Many people are susceptible to different noises and frequencies (I pick up high frequencies, such as the tube in a CRT TV quite well, even in different rooms than the TV), so maybe some of us are just a bit more "in tune" to the spinning color wheel or whatever it is that's making the sound we hear.

I'm at about 60 or more hours on my projector, and I still hear the noise, though it may be a bit diminshed (though whether the noise has gone away, or I'm just more used to it, I can't say). I'm not entirely happy with it, so I may look into building a "hush box" or some such thing to make it a bit better for me.

Anyway, thanks to all for their feedback on this. I'm going to start the calibration process and play around with the projector some more this weekend. (I didn't want to do much to it, if I was going to be returning it). Sorry to propogate any panic about this great projector. Tom, you were right, I was wrong. :) Just had to say it.

Cheers, all.

- Valk

Valkyrie-

It is NOT your imagination! My H30 buzzes...even louder now after 50 hrs. My Bosses H30 (older firmware) does NOT buzz. His is whisper quite, no buzz at all, only the whisper of the fan. This is with my H30 side by side to his in real time.

I just called Optoma today and they are sending me the RMA forms by fax. They didn't at all question my buzzing problem, buy maybe it's because I prefaced it with "compared to my bosses H30...". They will be doing a hot swap with a new unit and I'm writing on the forms to test bench before sending.

Personally I don't think it is a break-in issue. The buzzing is getting worse with mine, not consistent with a unit 'breaking-in".


Fleaman

Hey Simong don't give up yet, your gonna have to compromise and definitely lose the screen.

What about getting her a nice new wall unit, you know the type that's well ventilated and has doors?

You gotta sweeten her up a little, my missus stopped dead in her tracks when I put on a Photo CD of the kids, think what a video would have done.

You may also have to stoop really low and yes I do mean let her watch Corrie, Eastenders and Emmerdale (UK soaps, Ugh!).

Find something she's really interested in on DVD, for Christmas I got one for mine by Trinny and Susannah called "The essential guide to what to wear".

I got to tell you I'm still milking that one!

Regards and good luck, MikeDes

Originally posted by fleaman
I just called Optoma today and they are sending me the RMA forms by fax. They didn't at all question my buzzing problem, buy maybe it's because I prefaced it with "compared to my bosses H30...". They will be doing a hot swap with a new unit and I'm writing on the forms to test bench before sending.

Personally I don't think it is a break-in issue. The buzzing is getting worse with mine, not consistent with a unit 'breaking-in".


Fleaman

Hey Flea,

If possible, please keep on them about your returned unit and find out if they are able to reproduce the problem. I definitely heard a buzz on mine, but it seemed to go away the last couple of movies I have watched. Not sure I am out of the woods yet though so I am very interested on what they have to say about this, especially with your unit considering you did a side by side comparison with a unit that didn't buzz. I wish you could have had an Optoma tech there when you did that test and then we could hear what the answer is.
Still could just be the color wheel and break in period, I am fine with that as the answer for now, but just really curious as to what they say about your returned unit.
Thanks for keeping us posted on this.

Good luck on your next unit, hope its even quieter than your Boss's :)

Hi everyone. I just stopped by to tell my tale of woe. I've had my H30 for exactly 100 days, and have loved using it the entire time. We were watching it last night, when about 30 minutes into the show ... blink... it goes dark. I look at the unit and the lamp light is amber. I powered it down, waited 5 to 10 minutes, then turned it back on. It started whirring as normal, and I could see a faint light come on for just a few seconds when I looked directly into the lens. It then stops spinning, pauses, and tries again. The same cycle happens 3-4 times, and then the amber light comes on again.

So does this sound like a dead bulb? I called Optoma, and because I've had it more than 90 days (barely!!), they will only cover it if it's a problem with the projector itself. They are issuing me an RMA, and I can send it in for them to check out, but if it's the bulb, I'm out of luck. Nice, eh? I only had about 100 hours on the bulb too.

I suppose I can just fork out the money for a new bulb and see if that fixes it. If it does, I sure hope the new one would last more than 100 hours. I'm certainly not going to spend several hundred dollars every 100 hours to keep it all working.

How disappointing... I really love the projector other than getting screwed with the bulb.

veggie ,

--- and yet another UGH !!! :(

--- Here is to hoping it is not just a Lamp failure [ although it sure sounds like it to me :( ] .

---- Best of Luck !!!

-------- Jason

The nightmare of every new pj owner. Sorry about your luck Veggie. I think this must be the biggest stumbling block keeping pjs from hitting mass market.

(Hugs his Benq 6200 free bulb rebate).

While it's not confirmed or admitted, I suspect this (with no real knowledge):

Early old firmware H30's:
--Possible higher than normal lamp defects.
--Power on problems with premature orange light issues.

Newer firmware H30's:
--Very low or hardly any early lamp failures
--Hardly any pwr up issues.

It's possible the newer H30's have a different pwr supply and different lamp to solve the old problems. But I think it might have also caused new problems that none of the older firmware H30's had, like:
--Buzzing
--Severe OTB calibration shifts (as in, maybe new lamps with slightly different specs were installed in units that were calibrated with the older lamps).

I know I'm taking some big guesses here, but it would kinda make sense.

Also, my experience with manufactures of these kinda products is that they rarely admit to a wide systemic problem.

Fleaman

Veg, first try re-seating the bulb. Look on the bright side a new bulb for the Sony SXRD is $3,000.

That 90 bulb deal is sent down from the bulb mfg's.
good luck

Re the buzz, looks like it's considered to still be within spec levels. Hopefully all your buzzes will go away like mine did. ;)

Originally posted by fleaman
Newer firmware H30's:
--Very low or hardly any early lamp failures
--Hardly any pwr up issues.


I wish! I've only operated my projector 10 or 12 times since I got it, but at least two-thirds of those startups yielded The Annoying Orange Light. Pull the power cord, reinsert power cord, try again. Twice or perhaps three times, it didn't power up until the third attempt. This lather, rinse, repeat business is frustrating. It doesn't seem to matter what power status my source equipment is in, though initially I thought it liked them to be off.

Is this something I need to seek RMA service on? Hey, at least it doesn't buzz thus far!

Hello...I'm back with another question.

I see a few pixels on both the vertical sides of the picture not being used.
My source is an interlaced dvd player(480i). The zoom control on the h30 did not expand the image to cover these pixels. Any idea why this is happening or is it normal.

The dvd player is set to widescreen display and the h30 is set to 16:9 native. Changing modes on the h30 does nothing to expand the pic to cover these pixels.

Thanks!!!

I just got my 2nd H30. The first one did the "green slime" on progressive.

After about an hour of use with the second one the "bumble bee" started buzzzzzzzzzzzing.

GOODBYE OPTOMA!!

"I just got my 2nd H30. The first one did the "green slime" on progressive."

Everyone else got rid of that quite easily, even me.

"After about an hour of use with the second one the "bumble bee" started buzzzzzzzzzzzing."

Did you try holding in you hand while running by any chance? Mine buzzed a bit, and as soon as I picked it up it stopped. I put down a thin piece of foam packing material under it, and has never reoccured.

"GOODBYE OPTOMA!!"

Oh, that means you are sending it back? Best of luck with your next brand.

John F

I had the same issue because with all the equipment in the way it made the living room messy, unwelcoming and did not fit the decor.

Things I did to make some peace and she is pretty happy with the compromise.

- Got a portable screen that can be setup in a matter of seconds. When not in use put it away. It doesn't have to be that big. Got a 54" diagonal screen.

- In the process of cable management. Its not easy but can be done. Having a rack that does cable mgt. Also running your wires under the baseboards behind the quarter rounds. Run them into the walls.

- Got speakers that she thinks she picked. High WAF factor. Most people think my speakers are room dividers or window shades.

- Got a 2 level coffee table. The PJ is in the second level where it can not be seen on top.

- matching all equipment to her sofa, coffee table, floors and curtains.

This is a work in progress since I just moved into my new home.
http://www.spacelofts.com/h30/



Good luck ... it definitely is not always easy.

Originally posted by simong
Hi Guys

I'm sad to say that after having my H30 for just over a month I may not be a proud owner for much longer :(.

To cut a long story short my wife HATES it....and I mean REALLY HATES it !! :(. She won't even watch a film on it ....full stop.

She hates the screen....she hates the PJ hanging from the ceiling......and she hates the big image - everything I love about it.

The only compromise we can come to is that I have to mount the PJ every time I want to watch a film, and even then I'll be watching alone due to her determination not to even be in the room when it's turned on.

As you can imageine this has caused some friction (to say the least) over the past week so in order to keep the piece I may have to sell the PJ and screen.

Anyway, enough of the sob story - I've not given up hope yet but the thought of a) watching films all alone, and b) having to spend 20mins mounting, lining up and focusing the PJ when I want to watch a film (Table mounting not an option due to children) depresses me and isn't the solution I'd hoped for when I purchased the PJ.

Women.....don't you just love 'em :)

Originally posted by jfried
"I just got my 2nd H30. The first one did the "green slime" on progressive."

Everyone else got rid of that quite easily, even me.



I had the "green slime" in the last week of January before people came up with a "jerry" rig solution!

XXXXXXXXXXXXOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Hey simong
Did you end up selling the pj?

If you still plan on it I may be interested!lol

I always thought that the amazing thing about pull down screens and ceiling mounted pjs is that when not in use the setup is very close to hidden.It takes up less space than a 27 inch tv in cubic inches and takes up no floor space.Instead of having a living room full of gear- your room could look like something out of better homes and garden and the at night you transform into a movie theater.I dont see how she could not get that!

But lastly if she is just determined to piss you off-you might point out that marriage is teamwork and I'll bet most everything in your house she's picked out and if you tried you could point out many extravengant purchase that shes made that you dont get...shoes etc..

Lastly ,Id can the rptv for a compromise.Im not a chick and i cant stand the thought of a 200 pd box cluttering up my living room!

good luck

Hi Guys,

how do I know which firmware my H30 is having? Can anyone advise me?

BNP

Toddr

I had exactly the same thing for about the first week or so. I did not unplug it just left it for about 3 min then was able to power up normally (after the power light turns green again).
I put up with this for a while (like I said about a week, maybe 15 or so start ups) and now it never happens, went away all by itself.
Good Luck...

Ok guys, I was about ready to purchase a big screen tv when I stumbled in here. After about 3 days of reading I was totally convinced to go the PJ route rather than RPTV.

However, after another 2 or 3 days of reading I am not too keen on the PJ idea (especially the H30) for several reasons...

1. Buzzing/fan noise - I'm one of those guys who spends a couple hundred extra $$$ to get a nearly silent PC. I can't stand buzzing electronics or loud fan noise. A gentle fan is ok but this buzzing issue with many people really has me put off. The "use it for 100 hours" does not fly with me.

2. Early bulb death - Again, a 90 day warranty on something that will cost me over $500CDN to replace does not fly with me.

3. PJ's like the H30 might be cheaper than a RPTV but when you add $500 for a screen, $300 for ceiling mount, $200 for UPS to help prevent early bulb death it ends up being more expensive than a decent rptv.

4. For my seating distance (8' to 9') a large screen is out of the question for pixelation so I'd have to stick with a smaller screen size anyways. Comparable to a RPTV.

5. Only local dealer I have is over charging on the H30 and after the first 90 days he says I have to deal with Optoma for service. Not impressed with paying $2k for something I have to "mail-in" for service.

6. I can buy the H30 from several places online but with all the problems people are having with the H30 I want to be able to scream at someone face to face (if need be). Not have to mail my PJ to Optoma and have them say something like "sorry but the buzzing noise is completely within spec".


Well, maybe in another few days I'll change my mind again but right now I'm depressed and that's how I feel. A PJ is just too big of a risk for me. I now understand why they haven't replaced RPTV for most people and likely never will.

Amber light startup..... My H30 did that as well. It seems after several weeks, and 100+ hours of use it has completely gone away. I now am a solid green to go on startup! Amber free zone here.

I do have another "problem" I guess. I purchased a 30' RAM component cable to solve a signal loss while viewing progressive inputs. I am getting the signal loss and blank screen, it seems, on a few dark segments of a movie. This does not happen w/ a svideo of the same movies. The RAM cable seems to be better than the audio quality RCA's I was using. Anybody else have this? Anything I can do to lock on this component signal better?

Thanks,
Don

I have the 25' Ram component cable and do not experience a signal loss.

Originally posted by edgebsl
Hey simong
Did you end up selling the pj?

If you still plan on it I may be interested!lol

Hi :)

Haven't decided yet - Really don't want to so will se how things go over the next couple of weeks and if I have to I'll let you know ;)

Thx

Dillinger and benos55...

No kidding? That's encouraging. I'll "wait it out" next time it happens and hopefully it will reset itself without my intervention, and eventually stop the behavior altogether.

Of course, I will experiment when my wife isn't going to be sitting there wondering why it takes 4.5 minutes to begin throwing an image. :p

Thanks

Quote:
So, I guess the news is that for those of us with the "buzzing problem," it really isn't a problem, and that's just the noise of this particular projector. Many people are susceptible to different noises and frequencies (I pick up high frequencies, such as the tube in a CRT TV quite well"

That's the thing, you all probably know I had one of the first H30's from Jan 5th. It had a faint buzzing sound that when away. I did ask about this and was told it's a small casing and that the sound of the color wheel and fan are still within the 32db spec levels. They did say on the $8,000 models they use bigger cases and take more steps for super guiet operation. I think those get down to 28db levels.

The bigger worries s/b fatal failures like groups of dead pixels and power supply burn outs, also bulb failures. Mostly there's not a large outbreak of these problems.

I was thinking the bulbs could shift around in shipping so maybe the few members the saw a yellow light might try re-seating the bulb also, even thow this glitch seems to be one that doesn't occur all the time do a re-seat to make sure the bulb's making good contact.

Originally posted by guitarman
Quote:
So, I guess the news is that for those of us with the "buzzing problem," it really isn't a problem, and that's just the noise of this particular projector. Many people are susceptible to different noises and frequencies (I pick up high frequencies, such as the tube in a CRT TV quite well"


It Really isn't a problem?!?

BULL!

My wife heard the buzzing 2 rooms away from the projector!

Goodbye optomoana h30

Hello BenQ PE7800!!

Moving on up!

Finally got to play around with RGB connection from my DVD player to the H30 last night, and it was pretty interesting.

First off, when playing a rented DVD, all I got was a message "cannot play copy protected disc through RGB, try component instead". A little investigation on the 'DVD player' forum revealed that LG (I've got the LG LST-3510A) belongs to a consortium that prohibits playing DVD's over an RGB connection. How this is going to deter illegal copying is beyond me.

Next I tried a copy of the same DVD (using 'DVD Copy' and 'Region Free' software. All of this was for educational / investigation purposes only, keep in mind. It played perfectly through the RGB connection, so in the process of copying the disc it must lose the copy protection. Interesting.

To my eyes, the image looked marginally better using RGB over Component. No 'fringing' anywhere. Plus, I could swear that the H30 had been calibrated using the RGB connection because colors, black levels, and white levels were just perfect without any adjustments.

Next I started switching between 480p, 720p, and 1080i. (Using component connection, the 3510A will only output 480i or 480p when playing a DVD.) Both 720p and 1080i looked slightly better than 480p, although there is probably no good reason for this. I'll have to try Avia test patterns to make sure it wasn't my imagination.

In the process of switching rapidly between 480p, 720p and 1080i with a sharp scene on freeze frame for comparison, the H30 suddenly went black - no button on the remote or H30 did anything. The orange light was on - it never did this using component - I powered off the H30, let it cool, powered back on, and it worked again.

I really think this was somehow a result of switching input modes. I've got the old BO3t firmware on this pj, so I'll try this again after the upgrade to see if it happens again.

After comparing the image between component/480p or 480i and RGB in any mode, I'd take the RGB in a 'heartbeat' if it weren't for the 'copy protection' problem. Maybe this makes a good case for the HTPC guys out there, eh?

John F

[QUOTE]It Really isn't a problem





BULL!

My wife heard the buzzing 2 rooms away from the projector!

Goodbye optomoana h30

Hello BenQ PE7800!!

Moving on up!


well good luck on the benq7800 ;) ,but you don't have to get all bent out of shape here :rolleyes:

Just a quick note to say my projector, on the way back to optoma canada, got SNOW delayed in Winnipeg on the way to Ontario yesterday and added another day onto my wait.... Sigh.....

By the way it looks like the old firmware on it was an honest mistake somehow and they are giving a new one.
Even with all the problems I can't remember a company, Will Xing in particular, trying this hard to please me.

Now to make me really happy I hope he leaves the new bulb in it. hehe..

By the way where do we go for bulbs, seeing I am going to need one someday?

Originally posted by new teq joe
well good luck on the benq7800 ;) ,but you don't have to get all bent out of shape here :rolleyes:

Well I can understand his frustration. Even though this is considered a low end projector, for many like myself this is a once in a lifetime purchase. Or at least once every 10 years!

I'm really not sure the H30 is a quality piece of equipment that I want to drop $2kCDN on. Picture quality certainly sounds excellent but build quality has big question marks for me right now.

Some people have buzzing out of the box, some get it later, some get it randomly, for some it disappears over time, for some it doesn't start at all until 100+ hours. Jeez!!! This thing will be situated 3' directly above my head when mounted (over 2nd row of seats) so any buzzing at all is NOT tolerable for me.

And for Optoma to say the buzzing is "normal" and "within spec" speaks volumes for me. This is NOT a company I want to deal with :-(

And I REALLY REALLY REALLY wanted an H30 :-(

UnknownShadow



number one the pic that comes from the h30 is great


and i have the h56a optoma no problems at all and it is plenty bright and the detail is fantastic


if you think that it is only optoma that has issues you are mistaken because optoma has a "0" dead pixel policy and they pay for the return shipping "usually" and so on ,and i doubt that other company's can offer the service and so on :)


ps all the company's have there quirks you just have to do your home work and see what makes you comfortable ,


;)

Hey Joe;

You wanna come over and calibrate my unit. I'd rather get a person who can calibrate it with experience than buying that AVIA disk and stumble about in the menus. PM msg me if your interested.

Saturn

Originally posted by new teq joe
UnknownShadow



number one the pic that comes from the h30 is great


and i have the h56a optoma no problems at all and it is plenty bright and the detail is fantastic


if you think that it is only optoma that has issues you are mistaken because optoma has a "0" dead pixel policy and they pay for the return shipping "usually" and so on ,and i doubt that other company's can offer the service and so on :)


ps all the company's have there quirks you just have to do your home work and see what makes you comfortable ,


;)

"And for Optoma to say the buzzing is "normal" and "within spec" speaks volumes for me. This is NOT a company I want to deal with :-("

We get the hint, you don't want to buy the H30. I think the thinking is it isn't a very loud problem and no louder than the fan. Sounds like brooster got a buzzsaw though so maybe he has a good beef.

Tom, out of curiosity, do you have any guesses why Fleaman heard two very different units when he brought his never H30 over to his bosses house and compared it to the older firmware version? That was kind of strange, don't you think?

I'm thinking of running to Fry's today and buying another H30, just to compare a third one. I certainly understand the frustrations here. I watched the Last Samurai last night and even with the volume up to rattle the walls during the battle scenes, the buzzing was quite noticable to me, especially in louder scenes.

I wonder if it's possible for H30 owners in the same area to compare sounds of each other's units? Are there any Seattle-area people with a nice, quiet H30? I'd love to have someone come by and hear mine, just to see if I'm crazy.

I'll keep you all informed, if I do try the other unit.

Shadow-

FWIW- my H30 has been utterly flawless as I'm sure a very high percentage of them are. In this forum you are going to read about a lot more issues than you will hear stories like mine. That is the reason for a forum like this so that users/enthusiasts can share their experiences and more importantly look for assistance or verification when there is a problem.

I am fortunate in that I have no buzzing sounds emanating from my H30 and with all due respect to Tom- I'm not sure that this issue is being properly addressed yet. If I had any noise coming from my H30 that is louder than the fan- I would not be a happy camper. I think if enough people having the issue provide consistent and direct pressure on Optoma and the dealers that may have to take the units back that this will eventually be addressed properly.

Go get one and happy watching...

brooster got a buzzsaw


tom i agree with him on this issue ,but lets put it this way it is like buying a brand new car ,you did your home and made your choice ,but the fact is when the cars are going threw the assembly line to get made ,the cars that come of the line are not all same quality some will have quirks others may not :) , so electronics are the same way that i have gathered .



we just have to find the perfect company "but i have not found it yet ";)

I try to connect in RGB mode with PAL sat box but the image is unstable and flickering...
I found phase and frequency correction on manual (signal sub menu) but it's NOT on image menu of the H30.
The manual say "signal sub menu is supported under the analog RGB and analog YPbPr input sources", so why it's not there???

I guess PAL RGB must be fully supported anyway (RGB 50Hz appears on the screen).....

Or is there some way to do it through the service menu, I didn't found it...

Thanks,
Mauro

Originally posted by guitarman
We get the hint, you don't want to buy the H30.

Sorry guitarman, my post sounded a bit harsh after re-reading it. The opposite is quite true... I REALLY DO want to buy an H30 but I don't want some of the problems that are being described here. That's why I'm torn and a bit depressed.

Is there a PJ in this price range that is known for it's quiet operation? Some people walk into my computer room and say "wow, that computer is quiet!" but I sometimes want to take an axe to it because the cpu fan/buzz is still much louder than I would like. Just so you know where I am coming from.

Man I want an H30. What do you think the noise would be like if it's mounted 3 to 4' directly above your head?

Yeah some have noisier color wheels. Mine was one of them but "was" is the key statement. Even when it buzzed I had to put my ear up to the PJ to hear it.

They all don't buzz though, who knows what the percentage is. The trade in I just got doesen't buzz. It make a whirrr sound though. I hear a bassy fan/air sound and a higher pitched whirr sound which I figure is the color wheel. Overall both aren't very loud and I'd say the PJ is very quiet. Not at all like the NEC LT150z Brooster sold me, that thing was a Jet planes coming in for a landing. :)

You wanna come over and calibrate my unit. I'd rather get a person who can calibrate it with experience than buying that AVIA disk and stumble about in the menus. PM msg me if your interested.


Saturn_AD
have you tried to do it yet :)


what is the problem green issue , because i thought you are running the pj threw the htpc ?

Originally posted by UnknownShadow
Man I want an H30. What do you think the noise would be like if it's mounted 3 to 4' directly above your head?
I would consider the feasibility of building a hush box around it if it did turn out to be louder than ideal. If you are annoyed by the volume of a PC's fan, I'm not sure that a PJ is for you. My H30 is definitely louder than the fan on my Dell desktop but not at all what I would consider annoying. Anyone seen plans or pics of hush boxes?

Yeah some have noisier color wheels. Mine was one of them but "was" is the key statement.

In the last 5hour (15h now) buzzing has occurred only for a few minutes, and not as louder as the first times..........

Tom, what about my RGB sync problem?

I now have the Optoma H30. Initial impression is THRILLED. I love it. Wife loves it. Beautiful.

I have a question though about powering off. When I hit the power button, I get the usual display message, and when I hit it again, the power light turns orange. If I hit it once more it flashes green almost indefinitely. What is the correct procedure for powering down?

Thanks,

Ryan

When powering off, hit the power button twice. That turns off the lamp and the cool down process starts. Once cooled, the fan turns off and it goes into its normal standby mode with the green light flashing.

Ryan- I always hit mine the first time, get the display message and then hit it one more time. As you mentioned the orange light comes on and then my fan runs for about a minute and shuts down. I then have the green blinking light. My guess was that the short period of fan operation was necessary to cool the bulb.

and also after the orange lite turns green still leave the pj for at least a half hour before you turn it off ;)

Mauro, is your cable box on when you power up the H30? If so, can you turn it off (unplug it if necessary), turn on the H30 and then turn the cable box on? Does hitting the resync button help?

Thanks, guys! Haven't even TWEAKED this thing and it's stunning!

valkyrie ,

--- I am only a couple hours away from you [ in Vancouver , Wa. ] if you ever get the gumption to compare units [ my current unit is pretty quiet ] .

_________________________________



--- I think the buzzing is something that needs to be considered an issue at Optoma . Even if it does eventually go away and it is indeed the color wheel causing the noise it would not be acceptable to me to be told ' just deal with it ' or ' your problem is within spec ' . All in all I think Optoma is a great company and they do offer great service most of the time but I think the Quality control needs to be taken up a notch or two .

------------ Jason

Originally posted by UnknownShadow
Sorry guitarman, my post sounded a bit harsh after re-reading it. The opposite is quite true... I REALLY DO want to buy an H30 but I don't want some of the problems that are being described here. That's why I'm torn and a bit depressed.

Is there a PJ in this price range that is known for it's quiet operation? Some people walk into my computer room and say "wow, that computer is quiet!" but I sometimes want to take an axe to it because the cpu fan/buzz is still much louder than I would like. Just so you know where I am coming from.

Man I want an H30. What do you think the noise would be like if it's mounted 3 to 4' directly above your head?

The low priced machines are mostly presentation models with heavy fan sounds. The Sharp DT200 or Z90 were decent HT model but they do have a louder fan that oscillates louder and softer sometimes

The more expensive machines are quiter like the NEC HT1000 and HT1000. The HT1000 was the quietest PJ I've had but even some users complained about it's sound level.

For you I like the hush box idea, but you'll probably hear the fans in the hushbox, unless you know of some dead quiet fans that can be bought.

I think my intermittant signal loss via component input was due to me using a different component RCA to VGA adapter than the one supplied w/ the H30. I couldn't use the stock one due to my mounting position, so I moved my PJ this AM and installed the Optoma component adapter. I cued up a movie I watched last night and didn't get one signal loss in an hour. I think it might be corrected. Just FYI.

Don

To keep with the title of this thread I took some more shots this morning of the new H30 which I had to calibrate the progressive signal on.
See what you think.

http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30future1.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30future2.jpg

http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30parents1.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30parents2.jpg

http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30bill1.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30bill2.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30bill3.jpg

I know the H30 has some growing pains but when they're right the picture is just unbelievable. Check out them Kill Bill shots. :)

Mauro, is your cable box on when you power up the H30? If so, can you turn it off (unplug it if necessary), turn on the H30 and then turn the cable box on? Does hitting the resync button help?

Thanks,Mike.

Yes, I try hitting resync button but this doesn't help...
I ALWAYS turn on the pj before plug in any cable...

I guess it's not a failure, as the manual said only a frequency adjustment is needed...

anyone has the signal sub menu on RGB ?????????

I'll try to build a DIY RGB-component -YUV- adapter :( for my sat box but I guess direct RGB must be better.

tom looks nice what where your final setting and what did you use color facts or avia ;)

I used Avia for the blacks & whites and initial color but then use the advanced adjustments to fine tune the color. The interlaced signal was tuned perfect, progressive had a green bias. I didn't hv to move the RGB's much, I think minus 2 on the green then adding +2 each to the Red & Blue, this for the RGB-contrast and did similar number to the RGB-brightness.

yes it looks nice ;)


tom in the service how much of a diff was there in the high ire and low ire in the service menu after they finished


as in numbers from factory setting?

The only thing I did in the service area was to lower the DLP-brightness. At first in the user menu I couldn't get the mirrors of the 2.35 aspect bars to be off and solid black. This is easy to see on a 4.3 screen. I had to move the DLP-brightness back to RGB-bright 27 on each, from the factory setting of 32 each.

oh ok so the contrast setting stayed the same .hmmm


the pic looks nice though get some dark shots up tom so people can the detail of the h30 because that was a great point for the h30 (detail) ;)

The fan in my H30 is actually pretty quiet - especially when compared to an X1 I tried. One thing I've noticed is that after about 3-4 mins the fan seems to step down and become even quieter - I'm assuming this is normal (If so it's a nice feature) but just thought I'd check.

Originally posted by simong
The fan in my H30 is actually pretty quiet - especially when compared to an X1 I tried. One thing I've noticed is that after about 3-4 mins the fan seems to step down and become even quieter - I'm assuming this is normal (If so it's a nice feature) but just thought I'd check.

Yes they start out at high speed in the initial warm up then go to econo.

Re detail, the kill bill shots show very good resolution over the lesser filmed Back to the Future & Meets the Parents.

Re detail, the kill bill shots show very good resolution over the lesser filmed Back to the Future & Meets the Parents.


oh i agree those shots look good but with the dark shots you can see how this baby handles (detail)


lets say matrix ?

Originally posted by guitarman
The only thing I did in the service area was to lower the DLP-brightness. At first in the user menu I couldn't get the mirrors of the 2.35 aspect bars to be off and solid black. This is easy to see on a 4.3 screen. I had to move the DLP-brightness back to RGB-bright 27 on each, from the factory setting of 32 each.

Tom could this only be fixed in the service menu? Couldn't accomplish the same thing by moving the RGB settings under advanced? I was able to get the black bars to match the off pixels just with the contrast and brightness settings.
Just wondering if I am missing something here, or was your unit just set so bright that you couldn't get the black bar to match up using these settings. Thanks.

tom,
thanks for the help on adjustments for the green hue.it worked fine.
question now is that do i have to keep thses values for watching dvd too?
as you recall, the green was coming from ota hd .
also finally got the avia . any suggestions on how to tweak this beauty, maybe a guide thru navigating the whole thing to where the pic is great for
both ota and dvd? using panny rp 91 interlaced signal and a tosh dst 3000
sat hd box. being switched by an anthem avm 20 processor.
to be honest, i havent opened the avia uet:rolleyes:
any suggestions will be highly appreciated.
jay

hikarate, you're ok if you can get black in the user. Mine was too bright and needed the service DLP-brightness adjustment.

Jay, you only need to do the one signal that's bad. Like with mine an interlaced signal needed no adjustment.

Here's some similar shots I took earlier with my other H30 after Wing calibrated it with colorfacts. You'll see I got it pretty close.

Old H30 w/colofacts adjustment
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/h30bill2.jpg

Kill Bill with the new H30 and Eyeball adjust.
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30bill1.jpg

Again old H30 w/colorfacts
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/h30bill1.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/h30parents1.jpg

And Meet the Parents with the new H30.
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30parents2.jpg

i like your shots better not as saturated as before ;) but tom this is a new machine correct so the bulb will dim in time ,


but from what i can tell from "shots" your pic is more natural and more detailed than before :)

New bulb, right the red should get better after 100hrs, I only have 25hrs so far since Monday. I must be losing my touch. :)

New bulb, right the red should get better after 100hrs, I only have 25hrs so far since Monday. I must be losing my touch.



you tom ,hmmmmmm na it is like riding a bike you never forget or loose your touch ;)


but i really do like your shots now from what i can tell they are more natural :D

Tom: do you have OTA or Sat HD? If so how does the PQ compare to the venerable ht1000? Do you notice the difference in resolution? More or less artifacts? Thanks

Peter

I have s Sony HD STB, OTA & the Motorola 5100 cablebox. The HT1000 will look better for HDTV compared to the H30 for DVD it's a wash res wise with the H30 having stronger colors.

For sports do you notice enough difference to want the HT1000 back or is it pretty subtle eg. a little softer but still quite watchable or damn that picture sucks compared to the good old NEC?

TV signals will look great on the HT1000 due to the scaler/farouja. Plain old Direct TV looks very good on the NEC. Are you thinking a buying an HT1000?

But for the dollar savings sports on the H30 also looks excellent. Between the two projectors you should know the difference. You've looked at many a Plasma TV in Standard vs HD/xga res, the same principle applies with projectors. Both can look good and it's all up to how much money you can or want to spend on a TV.

Hi guys
its me again just to let you know the misses came back from NYC with my H30, Many thanks go out to Jason @ coleprojectors.com for helping her and what can I say WOW better than I could imagine, I have got the latest one with all the updates lens mask and backlit remote, I hooked it up to my Sony DVD through S-Video (temporary for now) just great now I want a Progressive scan player, I was thinking about getting a Philips DVD Q50 as it has 110v - 240v power ideal for here in the UK just would like to know what you guys think of this player, I have seen refurbished ones on ebay for around $100 I am going to order my Belden 1694A component video cables from a company called bluejeanscable.com
Well guys am I going in the right direction or am I taking a shortcut in the DVD department,
Thanks again to all you guys for helping me in choosing this projector I will go now and spread the word of the Lord H30 DLP :D

Hey Guys,

I just hooked up my component cable.
Always trying to save a buck I am trying 3 AV cables instead of true component cables. (1video, 2audio)
I should note my DVD player is not progressive.
I read up on the possible shortcoming of doing this so no one needs to list them here for me, unless you just want to let other folks know.

The image is much clearer, I believe the ghosting is all but gone. Definitely green push right off the bat like others have reported. Changing sharpness seems to make drastic changes. Over S-video it was a gradual change 1 way or the other, but over component -7 looks about the same as 33 and 7 or 16 seems to be optimal (Don't remember exact # break down on that control but you get the idea)

EDIT: I think this may be caused by using the AV cables instead of true component. Maybe the audio cables are losing some of the signal and causing the sharpness to have different effects at different ranges. I don't know, just a guess, I know I am just asking for trouble when I don't get the right tools for the job :)

One thing I immediately noticed on the Avia test patters is rainbows. Specifically on thin white lines. Now I have used Avia for probably 3 hours or so messing with my 50' S-video cable and I never detected a single rainbow. (I should note I darted my eyes to detect them, just looking at the screen I didn't see them, but I had darted my eyes many times with the S-video cable and I never saw them)

I assume that test patterns are going to make rainbows much more evident than watching a movie, or is this a good indication of what I am to expect. I'm gonna go ahead and run out and buy some real component cables anyway just to see what the difference is. I'd rather pay the extra money and know for myself I guess. I never save any money, who am I kidding :)

Anyhow, if people are susceptable to rainbows, they may want to try an S-video connection out, I definitely never detected a single rainbow while using S-video. Didn't know if that was common knowledge or not. Who knows it might just be me and my freaky eyes.

Hey Guys,

Just looked over my test material, "Opening to Harry Potter".
Its really a night and day difference already. Could detect rainbows while I was looking around the screen on occassion, but the image is sooo much better than what I had over that long S-video run that I'll take that any day, long as I don't end up getting sick or anything, and as long as my fiancee doesn't get sick.
Anyhow, I am finally happy with the image. I really didn't do much tweaking, just a quick run through with Avia, so I think I can get it even better than this as far as contrast and color go, and I am pretty happy with it as is. The AV cables are doing a good enough job for now, unless you think they could possible be causing the rainbows to be more apparant than normal I will probably stick with my current setup.
Thanks guys.

Het Tom: I am bouncing between the HT1000, the H30 and the 4805. I dont plan to watch a lot of HD but good qualitysports would be nice. One problem is the 4805 may not be here before the ht1000s disappear. So I am trying to estimate how much I lose with the lower res without being able to see the difference for myself. One of the more common problems with this hobby. I was just hoping that you could describe the difference given that you have seen both in action, but maybe not that recently for the HT1000

Cheers
Peter

Indiejones,

Grab yourself a Panasonic XP30 from Ebay. One Awesome player. You will not regret it. I won 2 of them myself and LOVE them.

Originally posted by ToddR
I wish! I've only operated my projector 10 or 12 times since I got it, but at least two-thirds of those startups yielded The Annoying Orange Light. Pull the power cord, reinsert power cord, try again. Twice or perhaps three times, it didn't power up until the third attempt. This lather, rinse, repeat business is frustrating. It doesn't seem to matter what power status my source equipment is in, though initially I thought it liked them to be off.

Is this something I need to seek RMA service on? Hey, at least it doesn't buzz thus far!


I didn't mean to imply that all newer firmwares would have an updated pwr supply.
Well, if my guess is right (have no idea as it's only a guess), a different (or updated pwr supply) might of solved the orange light issue, but also have a certain # of buzzing problems.
Meaning: It does not seem that anyone with orange light issues has a buzzer (not faint color wheel noise, but loud..much louder than the fan noise...confirmed by myself comparing 2 H30's side by side).

And with that, anyone with a real buzzer doesn't seem to have pwr up issues. I for one never had a problem with pwr up.

But I am not a happy buzzer, so off it will probably go next week for a hot swap and hopefully the nice lush faint sound of only the fan (like my boss's!).

Fleaman

Originally posted by indiejones
Hi guys
its me again just to let you know the misses came back from NYC with my H30, Many thanks go out to Jason @ coleprojectors.com for helping her and what can I say WOW better than I could imagine, I have got the latest one with all the updates lens mask and backlit remote, I hooked it up to my Sony DVD through S-Video (temporary for now) just great now I want a Progressive scan player, I was thinking about getting a Philips DVD Q50 as it has 110v - 240v power ideal for here in the UK just would like to know what you guys think of this player, I have seen refurbished ones on ebay for around $100 I am going to order my Belden 1694A component video cables from a company called bluejeanscable.com
Well guys am I going in the right direction or am I taking a shortcut in the DVD department,
Thanks again to all you guys for helping me in choosing this projector I will go now and spread the word of the Lord H30 DLP :D

Indie - Glad you got the PJ OK :)
If you're looking for a budget progressive scan DVD player then it may be worth checking Ebuyer.co.uk and look in the Electronics section. Some sub £50 units available - cant comment on quality though.
Alternatively may be worth checking out Sainsbury if you get a chance - a few weeks back they had a Miko (Mico?) progressive DVD complete with 5.1 speakers etc for under £150.

Good luck with the H30 mate :)

A few more H30 questions...

If the H30 is ceiling mounted and tilted down at a certain angle, I assume the image will be distorted and need to be corrected right? Is this what "Keystone" correction is? I assume that all setups need to apply some sort of keystone correction unless the projector is pointing at the dead center of your screen right?

I have read a few posts that say keystone correction can cause quality problems for the projected image and overall picture degradation?

Can someone clarify this issue for me or point me to the proper FAQ. Thanks!

Shadow-

Projectors like the H30 have an offset of the projected image. If you have the projector ceiling mounted there will be a vertical drop from the middle of the lens to the top of the projected image. This measurement obviously varies with the throw distance as well (distance from lens to screen). The H30 has a larger than average offset compared to it's competitors which if you have low ceilings (less than ~7.5') and a long throw (more than ~13') you could have a problem. The projector in that case would need to be tilted up substantially to account for the offset which would then cause the image to look like a trapezoid, sort of like this /_\ if you get my drift. The top of the image would be narrower than the bottom. (or vice versa, not sure) Digital keystone then corrects this distortion to make the sides of the image parallel. While it is not ideal to use keystone- you may be forced to for your install. I think Tom actually has some keystone on his setup and doesn't seem to mind. I was fortunate in that my ceilings are low but my throw distance is very short (<10') so I did not need any keystone. Check my gallery and you will see on one of the shots there is a slight upward tilt to the projector. I have seen some pictures of others installs where the projector was angled up like 25 degrees, obviously not ideal.

Hope that helps...

Here is a post of mine with offset measurements from several weeks ago....


Originally posted by gottahavapj
Chuir-

Your setup is very similar to mine. My measurements are:

*72" 16:9 image on an ~80" diagonal 4:3 screen, the 16:9 image is 36" tall.
*Throw distance is 9'9" from the lens to the screen.
*Bottom of image is 28" from the floor.
*Height from center of lens to the floor is 80.5"
*I am using no keystone and have a very slight upward tilt to the projector.

I then get the following vertical offsets (middle of lens to top of image)

16:9- 18"
16:9 native- 16"
4:3 native (if you care) 6.5"

Hope that helps.. good luck!

Hikarate-

There ya go bud! Another brick in the wall so to speak. Are you going to be looking at a 50' VGA or component cable similar to your Svideo one? I wasn't real clear on that from your post...

Happy Friday!

Originally posted by indiejones
I am going to order my Belden 1694A component video cables from a company called bluejeanscable.com

Indie-

Everything I've heard about Bluejeanscable is outstanding. They were just a bit expensive for my budget. One thing I wanted to point out is that another poster mentioned it and I discovered it while researching- that 1694A cable is HUGE and STIFF. Just so you know... it was compared to a garden hose with frozen water in it. :) Hope that won't screw up your install or cable management ideas...

Cheers!

Originally posted by gottahavapj
Hikarate-

There ya go bud! Another brick in the wall so to speak. Are you going to be looking at a 50' VGA or component cable similar to your Svideo one? I wasn't real clear on that from your post...

Happy Friday!

Hmm, yeah maybe I forgot to mention I got a 50' VGA cable. Its paired with the switch box and 3 ft. AV Cable.

If you guys think it is worth it, I am going to get a 30' VGA cable and a 12' component cable. Think that will improve the image some? Now that I see the image getting better, I want it to look even better :) I've read that 25' is about as long as you want to go with VGA, so you think 30' will be a big improvement over 50' or not? 25' is just too short for where my AV equipment is located.

I've read that 25' is about as long as you want to go with VGA, so you think 30' will be a big improvement over 50' or not? 25' is just too short for where my AV equipment is located.



personally i would not go past 25 ,but maybe Jason can chime in

I got a $50 25' VGA M-M from Cables To Go only because RAM was backordered, had ferrites on it and that so I think it was a pretty good one. I don't notice any diff between that and just having a 6' component cable on there. If you're going to go 12' component and then a switchbox and then a 30' VGA- to me that's a lot of opportunity for loss. I'd get 'em as good as you can possibly afford I think. At least you have a good baseline with what you're experimenting with now....

Originally posted by gottahavapj
Here is a post of mine with offset measurements from several weeks ago....

Thanks gottahavaj.

My setup is very similar as well. I have a fairly low ceiling, around 7' but my pj will only be mounted about 9' back from the screen. So it sounds like the H30 would work fine under those conditions.

I also have push up ceiling tiles in my room so I can remove one of those if I have to and gain anoter few inches if necessary.

Actually, I was considering removing a ceiling tile anyways and just building some type of "shelf" in it's place that the H30 could sit on. So it would be "ceiling mounted" but not upside down. Just sitting up there on a shelf.

Anyone see any problems with that? Ceiling mounts just seem rediculously expensive for what you get.

Originally posted by NEO2000
Indiejones,

Grab yourself a Panasonic XP30 from Ebay. One Awesome player. You will not regret it. I won 2 of them myself and LOVE them.

Did you ever get your H30? If so how is it?

Originally posted by new teq joe
personally i would not go past 25 ,but maybe Jason can chime in

I just received my 50' VGA this morning. And my computer contact said that the models 25' and longer are built with coaxial rather than the standard stuff. Coaxial with the ferrite endings "supposedly" prevents ghosting and takes out some of those crap from the signal. And coax carries the signal much better. I guess since coaxial is used for standard cable and is run in hundreds of feet I guess it would work.

I want to send out a big thankyou out to Will Xing.
With every problem I had high anxiety as this was my first projector and a big investment for me.
Will Xing has provided the best customer service I have ever had with a product or company.
I got my new projector today, so far I got:
new projector
new bulb
backlit remote
lens mask
Same service as stateside and will paid shipping three times there and back to correct any problem I had...

Don't ship Ups:
On another note I caught the ups guy trying to leave my projector behind the neighbors house across the street!!
I couldn't belive it he had the wrong address on it and he was actually the guy who had picked it up when I shiped it.
I yelled at him to see if he was looking for me and he went behind the house to get my projector and bring it to me.
I almost lost it like the poor guy in the previous post.
I can't belive that a company runs like that. I think the previous delivery guy was ups also wasn't he?

Glad to hear that customer service took care of you, rocker. Let us know how your new one works out. :)

Originally posted by Saturn_AD
I just received my 50' VGA this morning. And my computer contact said that the models 25' and longer are built with coaxial rather than the standard stuff. Coaxial with the ferrite endings "supposedly" prevents ghosting and takes out some of those crap from the signal. And coax carries the signal much better. I guess since coaxial is used for standard cable and is run in hundreds of feet I guess it would work.

Well my 50' S-video cable had ghosting and the AVIA tests for line noise looked terrible. Lots of horizontal bars clear to see. I could also see these bars in the Harry Potter opening for a split second between the WB logo and the start of the movie. With the 50' VGA cable the line noise test pattern looks clear and no bars on HP opening. There is some background noise, but it is much less prominent than it was over S-video. Looks much smaler.

With the 50' VGA the ghosting isn't present (Use the "Plus" screen to check this as the ghosting was very evident on this screen with the S-video cable)

So overall, huge improvement, the only thing left would be the background noise that I can detect on a black screen. I will probably go ahead and buy the shorter cables runs just because the curiousity kills me.

Actually, I was considering removing a ceiling tile anyways and just building some type of "shelf" in it's place that the H30 could sit on. So it would be "ceiling mounted" but not upside down. Just sitting up there on a shelf.

I have my screen mounted directly above 3 front tower speakers. So even though I have high ceilings, I still need the H30 mounted as close to the ceiling as possible to make sure that the projected image is above the speakers. I went with a shelf instead of a mount that hangs from the ceiling. The projector WILL have to be set upside down on top of the shelf. I do have the projector angled slightly as well, which can be corrected by putting the keystone at 7. Instead of using the keystone, I opted to mask my DIY screen with velvet, with the widest part of the image overlapping the mask by an inch or so on each side. You would never know the image isn't perfectly rectangular unless I told you.

Originally posted by UnknownShadow
Actually, I was considering removing a ceiling tile anyways and just building some type of "shelf" in it's place that the H30 could sit on. So it would be "ceiling mounted" but not upside down. Just sitting up there on a shelf.

Anyone see any problems with that? Ceiling mounts just seem rediculously expensive for what you get.
That basically will NOT work. Anyone else chime in here if I'm off base.

Realize that this offset places the image that far above the projector lens if it's sitting on it's feet or below the image if it's ceiling mounted- upside down. If you had the projector sitting on a shelf at ceiling level the image would project on the ceiling and never make it close to your screen. The only way that would work is if you had the projector pointed down like at least a 25 degree angle and you would then probably need massive keystone adjustment. Mike has experience with mounting a projector rather high and having it tilt down a bit, perhaps he could chime in here as well.

The mount you see in my gallery pics is actually a closed circuit TV mount that works very well with the H30. Jason found it and at least three of us have tried it now. Total with shipping on that unit was like $28...

I was going to wait till I properly calibrated the image on my new H30 (100+ Hours) to comment on the PJ. WoW!!!! Well very WoW actually. I finally got the DVD Player to work in my alterted XboX and I played a couple movies (Finding Nemo, Two Towers, Blade II, Fight CLub) last night to check out the DVD PQ. So far the PJ was only calibrated with my eyes (AVIA will be here today). I was awestruck upon playing Finding Nemo. The vibrant colors, smooth textures and fine detail projected on a 80" wide DIY Screen from 11' feet back looks awesome. The fine details in Finding Nemo (the fish skin, I didn't know fish had freckles) and Two Towers (Golems skin with pulsing veins in his head) were spectacular. Very little to no dithering in the dark scenes also.

My favorite part is when friends come over. SO far one has changed his mind on a Sony HD RPTV he WAS going to buy. Now he's looking into PJs and I sent him here to help him get upto speed on the subject. My favorite reactions so far are:

"I don't want something like this, I NEEED something like this..."
AND
"I feel so inadequate now"

Once I get my AVIA disk to calibrate the colors properly I'll post some screenshots. Thanks to Tom and everybody else on this thread. Very informative. I feel like I almost became a PJ expert after reading this thread alone.

For those that are wondering, my H30 hasn't displayed any of the buzzing or green bars (yet). It went past the 100+ hour mark last night while demoing the assorted DVDs. The screen is a DIY wood frame, stretched/stapled cloth painted with 3 base coats of Ultra White Matte Olympic paint from Lowes. Pondering if I should paint it the Behr SilverScreen or keep it where it is for a while and then paint it the SS once the upgraditis kicks in again.

Cheers,

|< | /\/\ ( ) Cal

Originally posted by jeff442
The projector WILL have to be set upside down on top of the shelf.
Thanks for chiming in Jeff... Someone else (I forget who) mentioned having the H30 sitting upside down on a shelf. I don't get how that works although it must if people are doing it :) How do you compensate for the rounded "hump" above the lens? Doesn't that make the projector sit at a bit of an angle on the horizontal axis? How do you get to the buttons for service menu and know what status the lit power button is in?

Thanks for helping out.. :)

Greate stuff kimocal. Glad to hear of another user with a flawless unit like mine (knock, knock, knock :)) I will pass 100 hours probably next week and will sit down with DVE for a looonnnggg session after that. I am going to check out the 3 local second hand media stores here in hopes that someone had Avia and gave up on it. I don't want to pay upwards of $50 when I already have DVE. Would be nice to have a second, easier, quicker tool though.

Some comments I have had recently:

Some buds over to watch the Timberwolves Wednesday night:
"That is a f***ing awesome picture buddy" :)
"If you have the room setup for it, why in the hell would anyone want one of those huge boxes?" Bingo!

My sister after I told her my total investment with pj, DIY screen, cables, mounts, shipping, everything was $1,645:
"That's incredible, I was wondering when I first saw it where in the heck you came up with like $8-10K for this."

Priceless :D

Well I ordered a 25' vga and 12' component.
I will find some way of making it work with this shorter run.
I think I am going to have to cut a hole in my DVD case and push the switch box through the back. Should look kinda cool actually, don't know how the little lady will feel about that though :)

Originally posted by gottahavapj
Some comments I have had recently:

Some buds over to watch the Timberwolves Wednesday night:
"That is a f***ing awesome picture buddy" :)
"If you have the room setup for it, why in the hell would anyone want one of those huge boxes?" Bingo!

Exactly, I had friends over for that game too. Will have some over for tonight's game. For some reason my place is now the only place to watch the games, or play XboX, or watch DVDs.... My Kings will be coming back to Sac one more time to finish off the T' wolves after tonight's big V :D All love here, I actually use the T' Wolves in NBA Live 2004 to whoop up on people all the time. Now I know most of the players' names on those 2 teams, lol.

I need to get an HD OTA Tuner for the NBA Finals. Dish's PQ is terrible (once super sized on the wall) on TNT and ESPN. Hopefully they'll have some more MDR-200 in time.

Cheers,

|< | /\/\ ( ) Cal

Originally posted by gottahavapj
Indie-

Everything I've heard about Bluejeanscable is outstanding. They were just a bit expensive for my budget. One thing I wanted to point out is that another poster mentioned it and I discovered it while researching- that 1694A cable is HUGE and STIFF. Just so you know... it was compared to a garden hose with frozen water in it. :) Hope that won't screw up your install or cable management ideas...

Cheers!

gottahavapj

Great component video cables, of course, begin with nothing but the best coax. We offer Belden 7710A, a three-conductor version of Belden's famous 1694A video coax, the best of the new breed of high-bandwidth precision video cables. 1694A is Belden's best--a polyethylene-dielectic cable, extremely low in capacitance, sweep-tested to 3 GHz, and shielded with a dense tinned copper braid and with Belden's "Duofoil" two-layered foil for maximum isolation from outside noise and interference. Engineered for critical digital video applications, its exceptional bandwidth and low-loss characteristics make it perfect for use in carrying component video signals, even over long distances. 7710A is simply three 1694A coaxes, colored red, green and blue, and wrapped together in a black outer jacket, making a bundle about 3/4 inch thick; it's surprisingly "flexible" given its size, but if you need more flexibility, you might be happier either with 1694A or with 1505F, below. We offer both 7710A component video cables and three-cable sets (black coax, colored boots) of 1694A; whichever you choose, you'll get the best component video cable performance available anywhere.

I just hope it is flexible enough for me!
Indie

I just received my 50' VGA this morning. And my computer contact said that the models 25' and longer are built with coaxial rather than the standard stuff. Coaxial with the ferrite endings "supposedly" prevents ghosting and takes out some of those crap from the signal. And coax carries the signal much better. I guess since coaxial is used for standard cable and is run in hundreds of feet I guess it would work.



well i agree with that but have seen some really bad setups this way and the pic "well not to good "

:)

Originally posted by gottahavapj
That basically will NOT work. Anyone else chime in here if I'm off base.


Thanks for the info, didn't realize the projector HAD to be upside down when ceiling mounted. I just thought the "upside down" thing was only because of how the mount bolted into the pj.

In that case I'll look at making a DIY mount or some other type like you suggested. I am definitely not paying $200CDN for a freakin' mount.

Great component video cables, of course, begin with nothing but the best coax. We offer Belden 7710A, a three-conductor version of Belden's famous 1694A video coax, the best of the new breed of high-bandwidth precision video cables. 1694A is Belden's best--a polyethylene-dielectic cable, extremely low in capacitance, sweep-tested to 3 GHz, and shielded with a dense tinned copper braid and with Belden's "Duofoil" two-layered foil for maximum isolation from outside noise and interference. Engineered for critical digital video applications, its exceptional bandwidth and low-loss characteristics make it perfect for use in carrying component video signals, even over long distances. 7710A is simply three 1694A coaxes, colored red, green and blue, and wrapped together in a black outer jacket, making a bundle about 3/4 inch thick; it's surprisingly "flexible" given its size, but if you need more flexibility, you might be happier either with 1694A or with 1505F, below. We offer both 7710A component video cables and three-cable sets (black coax, colored boots) of 1694A; whichever you choose, you'll get the best component video cable performance available anywhere.


yes they are pretty flexible and they are more flexible then the canare coax . rg6

Thanks for the info, didn't realize the projector HAD to be upside down when ceiling mounted. I just thought the "upside down" thing was only because of how the mount bolted into the pj.


check out this alot of people use it with the h30 with good results

http://shop.store.yahoo.com/securitysupplyhouse/wallmounts1.html

Indie-

OK- It probably was the 7710A that I was thinking of and read someone's experience with. Sorry- I should have searched and verifed before I spoke. With the 1694 I would guess you will have an easier time with corners, etc. since it's 3 separate cables rather than one "hose" :)

Originally posted by new teq joe
check out this alot of people use it with the h30 with good results

http://shop.store.yahoo.com/securitysupplyhouse/wallmounts1.html
Yep- that's the Panavise I referred to that Jason, hikarate and I all use. If you're interested in that one let us know as hikarate and I have already made most of the mistakes possible with that mount and we could steer you in the right direction :D

Yep- that's the Panavise I referred to that Jason, hikarate and I all use. If you're interested in that one let us know as hikarate and I have already made most of the mistakes possible with that mount and we could steer you in the right direction


LOL yes i remember you guys where flying all over the place ;)

Well the new projector is up and running. It has the new firmware and no buzz at about 2 hrs heheh..
I am so relived this worked out and am sure this one will work great...
I love the lens mask and the backlit remote rules...

Well the new projector is up and running. It has the new firmware and no buzz at about 2 hrs heheh..



there you all good ;) now you just have to tweak it and wait for a 100 hrs so the red push goes away and then calibrate it .


congrats ;)

rocker999, glad you're all set now. How about the color calibration? I had to balance out a little green on component/progressive.

rocker999, glad you're all set now. How about the color calibration? I had to balance out a little green on component/progressive.


still present on the new h30's

Originally posted by gottahavapj
Yep- that's the Panavise I referred to that Jason, hikarate and I all use. If you're interested in that one let us know as hikarate and I have already made most of the mistakes possible with that mount and we could steer you in the right direction :D

Yes! That is more like it. Any info you guys have on installing this would be greatly appreciated. Which model did you use? Was it the 826 series? 6" or 9"? Does it screw right into the H30?

I'll have to see if they ship to Canada as well.

Hey guys, man I love this place. I have been reading and reading and reading! Gosh! I think I am going to love the H30 but it scares me reading about the bulb failures, buzzing, power on problems.

I can buy the H30 at a local electronics store for about $120 more than what it goes for online. The store has a 15 day return policy. Do you guys think it is worth the extra money? They told me after 15 days, I would have to send the H30 in to Optoma if something went wrong. But anytime before, I could bring it back no questions asked. What do you think?

Not sure if Buy.com would be an option for you in Canada but that is where I got my second one. Both hikarate and I bought the 827's and tore off the thumbscrews to make them 826's :) 6" or 9", whichever works for your install. I would try to get two of those four screws into a ceiling joist or stud of some type. The 1/4" threaded post on the other end screws right into the tripod mounting hole on the H30 perfectly. You can take a peak at my install in my gallery, also look at Jason's example here for a little more "standard" and clean mount. http://home.comcast.net/~jlcburg3/wsb/html/view.cgi-photos.html-MerchantID-19852-Publish-t-makestatic-true-skip-5.html

Good luck!

Hey Chuck,

Welcome to the forum. If nothing else get the unit from there and try it out for a couple weeks. You can also be looking around for better deals in the meantime. If you don't want to buy online then get one from MikeSRC. He sells them and posts to this thread, your still buying online but everyone on this thread would vouche for Mike. Also he can check them out for you before he sends it if you want. If you read through this thread and saw all the information and help he has provided, well thats the best resume any one could ask for IMO.

Originally posted by Chuck_Noland
Hey guys, man I love this place. I have been reading and reading and reading! Gosh! I think I am going to love the H30 but it scares me reading about the bulb failures, buzzing, power on problems.

I can buy the H30 at a local electronics store for about $120 more than what it goes for online. The store has a 15 day return policy. Do you guys think it is worth the extra money? They told me after 15 days, I would have to send the H30 in to Optoma if something went wrong. But anytime before, I could bring it back no questions asked. What do you think?
Welcome Chuck-

I guess that would somewhat be your call as to how important it is to you to support local businesses. I bought mine from MikeSRC who posts (helps) frequently on this forum. I guess I didn't even ask him what his return policy was because I knew I would love the box and do. His pricing was great also which I don't think forum rules allow me to divulge. PM him if you're interested.

See and as well as hikarate and I having the same projector, mount, switchbox and all- we also share the same 1/2 a brain as we make pretty much the same posts like two minutes apart :D If I wasn't 14 years older than him- I'd wonder if we were twins separated at birth. :)

UnkownSoldier,

Also Jason pointed out it is really important to take the mount apart and clean it to get any loose paint off. Its a pretty basic ball joint mount easy to take apart and put together. Screws directly into the H30. It has a standard tripod mount so its pretty much universal. I have my mount screwed all the way in. The first time I screwed it in it didn't go all the way before it got tight, there is a counter wheel you can spin down to tighten it if it doesn't go all the way, so either way the mount is screwed in solid. After hanging a few days and bringing it down it screwed completely in the second time.
Jason also strongly recommends a safety cable, I don't have one cause I couldn't figure out how to do it, but if you can swing it set a safety cable up as well. That is always recommended when you are using a mount that is not made by the manufacturer.
If you can get by with the 6" version, I would go with that. Gotta and I went with the 9" for the added flexibility but it comes at a price of a bit of sag when you are locking down the bolts. The 6" is short enough so that when you lock it in it holds tight immediately according to the folks that have it.

So the 6" allen version is the one you want, unless you absolutely need the extra 3 inches. Hope that helps, PM me or Gotta if you have any other questions.

Originally posted by gottahavapj
See and as well as hikarate and I having the same projector, mount, switchbox and all- we also share the same 1/2 a brain as we make pretty much the same posts like two minutes apart :D If I wasn't 14 years older than him- I'd wonder if we were twins separated at birth. :)

Hehe yeah we will have to get together some time and watch Twins, I get to be Arnold though...

Thanks for the info guys!

Hey hikarate, are you currently fighting all the "bulb failing, bee buzzing, movie syncing, and amber light shining" that everybody else is?

Originally posted by hikarate
Hehe yeah we will have to get together some time and watch Twins, I get to be Arnold though...
No dice buddy... I'm 6'3" and would never pass for Devito. Of course no one will mistake my body for Arnolds either :)

Originally posted by Chuck_Noland
Thanks for the info guys!

Hey hikarate, are you currently fighting all the "bulb failing, bee buzzing, movie syncing, and amber light shining" that everybody else is? FWIW- I suffer from none of these....

Originally posted by gottahavapj
Both hikarate and I bought the 827's and tore off the thumbscrews to make them 826's

What was the reason for that? Should I just buy the 826 then?

Chuck,
I have the buzz problem. Its not bad, at one point it was getting louder at the middle of movies after about an hour into the movie, but last couple movies I watched it did not do this. The buzz I have is about as loud as the fan, but it isn't distracting at all. When it would get louder in the middle of the movie, that was distracting, enough to notice it, and really that is all it takes. I haven't been watching movies lately because I have been messing with component vs. s-video cables. Probably will be watching a few this weekend so can give more information.
Don't let the buzzing stop you from buying this pj IMO. It definitely isn't effecting every unit, and on Tom's it eventually went away. Mine has simmered down it seems to a point that it is no louder than the fan and thats acceptable to me.
If it turns out there is a big buzzing problem with some of the units, I believe Optoma will step up to the plate and deal with it. So far they have replaced a couple peoples who have reported it. Just need to give this one some more time to see how it turns out and how many people report it.
As far as bulbs they have 90 warranties, that pretty much not going to change no matter what projector you go with. Any DLP or LCD RPTVs also have bulbs, so I would assume you would run into the same problem there. The bulb issue is scary. I just hope to put lots and lots of hours on my pj prior to hitting the 90 days on the assumption that if it can last 300 hours, its probably a good bulb and I am out of the woods. Thats all just guesswork on my part though.

Unknown,
Avoid the thumbscrews. Nothing but a hassle. They are glued on and you can't get them tight enough to do the job. Get the Allen wrench version, no doubt about it. 6" unless you specifically need the 9". Do that and it should be smooth sailing, and you will be very happy with the flexibility of this mount.

Originally posted by Chuck_Noland
Thanks for the info guys!

Hey hikarate, are you currently fighting all the "bulb failing, bee buzzing, movie syncing, and amber light shining" that everybody else is?

lol, there are a ton of H30's without any of the above. It just seems like allot when the half dozen or so that found something they didn't like posted about it 100 times and generated 500 times in responses. I'd say don't worry so much the projector has a two year warranty. :)

gee, tom, i thought the forum was for posting about things - both good and bad. many of us "who posted 100 times" didn't just post about the issues we were having, but also rave about the projector. sorry, but i take offense to the implication that we're just whining about something we don't like when some people here with issues with the projectors may have a legitimate concern.

Just stating the facts. Things look very bad because of the multitude of negative posts. It's really not that bad and the PJ does have a good warranty. Just look at the post I replied to. Many are getting the wrong impression. Nothing to be offended about.

Hey Tom: thanks for your comments contrasting the HT1000 with the H30 re: HD sports. I guess what you are saying is that the HT1000 would be a bit better but probably not enough to justify the $1300 or so price difference and that dvds are about a wash with slightly different strenghts and weaknesses. Is that about right?

Cheers
Peter

so - i still love the projector. love it love it love it.

unfortunately I have to report that after 6 hours of usage the picture just went completely off and the orange light went on as well as the lamp light. i started swearing and got worried and then went over to the projector, pulled the plug, plugged it back in and it did some snow-computer-glitch type stuff and then started up normally and I finished watching the movie. the buzzing is still there. and by the way, i still love the projector. I just don't want it to die.

suggestions?

geoff

*i guess i should add the total hours of usage on the lamp was 48 and it was after 6 hours of CONTINOUS use that the projector turned off*

Now dats what um talkin bout!!!! LOL!!!

Seriously though. I can take just about anything but what shatten22 just described. I have to admit, I came over to the H30 thread because the X1 with its sync problems and rainbows scared me away. It is so disappointing to see the H30 having to take it on the chin with this problem. I really really hope the engineers get this figured out.

Tom, thanks for all your effort. I do think the H30 is a wonderful projector. I think all of us appreciate the time you've spent trying to get the optoma people to get this H30 under control. Right now, the wife and I are paying off bills but she's promised I would reap the rewards soon enough. I hope by the time she gives me the nod that these bugs are worked out.

And just think about the poor 4805 guys who have been licking their chops for the last six months. They are getting ready to ride the same roller coaster all the H30 guys have been on for several months. New products!! Gotta love em!

Well I got my H30 almost all setup. Beautifull picture. No issues so far. Here are some screenshots but my camera really is crappy. I will need to borrow a proper camera and pause the scene during the picture talking. I hope to get it color calibrated in a couple of weeks.

http://www.spacelofts.com/h30/

Took me a long while to find a proper syncing resolution to make the projector think it is receiving the signal at 800x600 but only fill in 800x450

Regards;
Saturn

Originally posted by guitarman
Just stating the facts. Things look very bad because of the multitude of negative posts. It's really not that bad and the PJ does have a good warranty. Just look at the post I replied to. Many are getting the wrong impression. Nothing to be offended about.

FWIW, I think that the H30 pic quality is worth the risk of getting a problem unit...as long as Optoma continues to offer excellent customer service regarding warranty units (even though I have a buzzer now).

Actually, I think many of these back and forth posts come from a differing opinion as to what a problem is...and if it is worth living with or returning the unit for a fix.
As for the buzzing: Tom, I think that your buzzing problem was probably minor in db level and also in the fact that it went away. It would be a fallacy to assume that everyone else's buzzer has the same level and tone as yours might of had. At this point my buzzing (52 hr mark) has reached an all time high in loudness. It now starts up fairly low in buzzing level and after about and hour it is louder than it has ever been. In the beginning it was the opposite of this. Your H30 minor buzz might of well been a color wheel bearing, but I doubt very much that it is the color wheel bearing causing my buzz. Nothing points to the color wheel as the cause and just about everything points to the pwr supply. I'm not the only one that thinks this.

Tom, I believe if you heard my unit in person, you would not at all think it was a minor buzz, even if it's part of a minor overall problem.
It's very possible that less that 1% of the units out there have problems...only Optoma would know those percentages and unless they are different from any other company, I doubt they will disclose it. Bottom line is I was all ready to buy a X1 when they came out and praised all over these very forums...until the reports of bad RBE started being posted. Remember that there were many flame wars in the beginning over whether the X1 really had RBE or not, or not 'badly'. In any event, I decided to hold off and was rewarded with an H30. Good thing about my buzz: Optoma will take it back. Bad thing about RBE and X1: Infocus will not take it back.

But again, I still think it is very well worth it to take a chance on this unit. In fact, I'm sending it in next week (waiting for the RMA) for a hot swap.

Fleaman

Originally posted by Saturn_AD
Well I got my H30 almost all setup. Beautifull picture. No issues so far. Here are some screenshots but my camera really is crappy. I will need to borrow a proper camera and pause the scene during the picture talking. I hope to get it color calibrated in a couple of weeks.

http://www.spacelofts.com/h30/

Took me a long while to find a proper syncing resolution to make the projector think it is receiving the signal at 800x600 but only fill in 800x450

Regards;
Saturn

Saturn your pix look good and your setup is killer!

We now have 64 days on our Optoma, about 300 hours on the bulb, no buzzing, no green bar, no orange light, no start up issues, absolutely flawless picture everytime. The only real problem we have experienced is the cost is getting outrageous to keep the snack bar stocked in our home theater due to all the visitors that are just amazed with this projector. Not a single person coud believe that this little box that produces such an amazing image retails for less than $1400.00. We are extremely satisfied with this projector.

HT Novice in TN-good to hear!


anyone esle using a philips Q50 with the H30? if so, what firmware does it have and if it the latest 4.15-54 do you still have hiccups? i picked one up for a decent price but have older firmware(new coming form philips). It's a classy unit so i hope it works out with the H30.
Also what's the norm for mounting? Center lens? or center tripod screw?

thanks
rudee

Rudee
I am after the Philips Q50 has got great spec and is 110v - 240v ideal for me here in the UK, I am trying to win one today on ebay, I too like to know about the new firmware and if I can get multiregion from it.

The mount you should go for is the Panavise 826 its cheap an will do the job look here for details: http://shop.store.yahoo.com/securitysupplyhouse/wallmounts1.html

indie

Well, I got tired of waiting for the 4805, and went ahead and purchased the H30. I am an LCD owner (ae100) and wanted to try out DLP.

Well, after 1 night of evaluation, I have mostly good news. The improved contrast, lower black level and lower SDE was very impressive. Much better picture than the ae100, and the colors seem at least as good (LCDs are supposed to be better than DLP in this area...)

The noise level is lower than the ae100, however occasionally I have heard the dreaded color-wheel "buzz". But the level is really not that loud. And it isn't always there. If I pick up the unit, sometimes it will go away. When the color-wheel noise stops, the remaining noise is very low... No problem even sitting close to the unit..

Next good news is that I could NOT see any RBE during normal viewing... If I shake my head violently, or dart my eyes back and forth, then, and only then, I can see it a little, but I generally don't do this when I'm watching a movie! My daughter claims to notice it more, so I think the whole family will have to do a little more extended eval. For me, though, it is no problem at all. A big relief, after reading the horror stories about people who get headaches, throw-up, etc....

Now for the bad news: My biggest problems, I _think_ are due to some sync issues. I am getting terrible tearing artifacts. When they occur (it's not a constant problem, but occurs often enough), they usually appear near the bottom and quickly climb upwards, and then off the image. It's very annoying and definitely distracts you from what you are watching... If this can't be fixed, it's a deal-breaker... Also, I don't seem to be getting the "pixel-perfect" syncing that I was getting on the ae100. There are definitely artifacts that make the picture seem less crisp. I tried all the various formats (16:9/native, etc..), but nothing seemed to help. I also played with the phase/frequency sync settings, but they didn't help much either...

I am conecting my panasonic cp72 dvd player through a component-to-RGB transcoder in to the H30's VGA connector. This is what I was using for the ae100, and I didn't want to route new cables. The h30 indicates "640x480" detected... Perhaps this is the problem? If it's only sampling the signal 640 pixels/line, then rescaling to 800, this might cause these types of problems..

Do you suppose these sync-related issues would go away with direct component connection from dvd-player to h30? But, then again, I would think that HTPC users are using the VGA connector, and it seems to be working for them... (some recent screenshots here seem to show very nice pixel-perfect display from a radeon video card set to 800x450 res...) Is there some trick to force the unit to use 800x450 and/or 800/480 syncing on the VGA connector?

One last comment: I wonder why Optoma doesn't let you shift the 800x450 (or 800x480) image up and down within the 800x600 panel. This would seem to me to be a simple thing to do, and would effectivly provide a "virtual" vertical lens shift... I think it would really be handy for a lot of installations. Maybe in a future firmware update? (HTPC users can probably do this now, since they can just drive the H30 at 800x600 native, and use processing on the PC to put the image wherever they want...)

- Frank

Saturn .. heh ... good to see your setup... Havent heard from you and assumed you must have received the screen.. Saturn ... if you are getting it calibrated let me know if you can get some lumen ratings on different parts of the screen... I know your screen is kind of small but let me know.. The unit I looked at was on a bigger screen and the brightness uniformity on the unit looked wacked... by a fairly significant margin..

Are the buzzing noises from the older units or from the newer units... Had some problems with cheap bearings and seems to be common..

This is a very long thread... any summary on what the major problems have been so far.. or if not considered major what the problems in general have been..????

Thanks in for saving me some reading...

Robert

Originally posted by Chuck_Noland
Now dats what um talkin bout!!!! LOL!!!

Seriously though. I can take just about anything but what shatten22 just described. I have to admit, I came over to the H30 thread because the X1 with its sync problems and rainbows scared me away. It is so disappointing to see the H30 having to take it on the chin with this problem. I really really hope the engineers get this figured out.

Tom, thanks for all your effort. I do think the H30 is a wonderful projector. I think all of us appreciate the time you've spent trying to get the optoma people to get this H30 under control. Right now, the wife and I are paying off bills but she's promised I would reap the rewards soon enough. I hope by the time she gives me the nod that these bugs are worked out.

And just think about the poor 4805 guys who have been licking their chops for the last six months. They are getting ready to ride the same roller coaster all the H30 guys have been on for several months. New products!! Gotta love em!

:) right that is a worrysome problem, sounds like overheating. 6hrs isn't too long either. Might had been hot in the house at that time (oven on etc). If not I'd play close attention and maybe re-seat the bulb. If it happens again better jump on a return.

Val/new teq joe, I know what you're saying. No reason you should get stuck with one that makes loud buzz sound when there are plenty that do not. I admit the both of you should keep on the tech area for a better unit. I'll bet they'll accomodate. Optoma USA would find it simple enough to return them to Taiwan so they can examine and put in a new color wheel.

The unit I looked at was on a bigger screen and the brightness uniformity on the unit looked wacked... by a fairly significant margin



hmmmm my h30 before had really good uniformity that i can remember ;)


but it was calibrated though :)


.

About the Q50, I've been using one the last few weeks. It has the latest firmware and played many DVD's perfectly. I did have mabye 3 split second freeze ups but a couple may have been the DVD becuase I back tracked and it did it again.

I like the quality of the machine for $95 :). It does have a very very sharp image. Almost too sharp, I lowered the sharpness in the Crystal Clear DCDI menu.

If you want to see what the image looks like a just posted a few pictures a couple of pages back.

Originally posted by guitarman
To keep with the title of this thread I took some more shots this morning of the new H30 which I had to calibrate the progressive signal on.
See what you think.

http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30future1.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30future2.jpg

http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30parents1.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30parents2.jpg

http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30bill1.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30bill2.jpg
http://www.cigarbest.com/sales/2h30bill3.jpg

I know the H30 has some growing pains but when they're right the picture is just unbelievable. Check out them Kill Bill shots. :)


Here's the group of pictures with the Phillips Q50.

tom what lumen rating did you get after calibration with the h30 ?


with mine if i remember correctly it was not a big drop?

Originally posted by Saturn_AD
Well I got my H30 almost all setup. Beautifull picture. No issues so far. Here are some screenshots but my camera really is crappy. I will need to borrow a proper camera and pause the scene during the picture talking. I hope to get it color calibrated in a couple of weeks.

http://www.spacelofts.com/h30/

Took me a long while to find a proper syncing resolution to make the projector think it is receiving the signal at 800x600 but only fill in 800x450

Regards;
Saturn

I like the look of the Dalite Insta Theater. I recommended that to some one here, was it you?

It goes well with those Ribbon Speakers. :)

I see a potential problem. With the low Dalite Insta Theater if you ever show video of dogs when you dog's around, well!

I have this problem any video of giant dogs and my Westie takes a run at the screen barking. :)

Hey Rob;

Did get the Da-lite screen that I ordered from you. It works really well for my setup since it is in front of a window that is not straight. Since my employee purchase plan works with the companies suppliers I went with Dell and a H30. So far so good. No problems yet. I doubt I will get the calibration done till after 100 hours on the bulb. My test picture was only adjusted for brightness and contrast. The colour settings are stock.
If I will get some readings when I get it calibrated. I do like this Wide Power fabric. You can vertually be anywhere in the room and the lumens seemingly doesnt drop by much at least for this 73" diagonal. It does seem fairly bright dead center....which can be a good thing. Colours are bright...on the saturated side but hell it looks great. My camera does not even give it justice. It looks much better.

I presume I have the new unit since I have the modified lens cap and remote. NO buzzing so far.
Buzzing based on the stuff I read are from the new units. The old units don't have the buzzing or if they do they quickly disappeared. But some believe the buzzing isnt the color wheel. Some believe it is due to power supply issues.

Rob I will follow this post with a summary but right now I got guests. :)
I might not be the best person to ask. There are rather lenghty seasoned H30 owners that are better qualified. I can only try to scratch the surface of what they know about this product.



Potus:

Took me a while to get the projector to sync...I must have put literally about 25+ settings. This is what worked for me.

PowerStrip timing parameters:
800x450=800,48,128,80,450,85,4,89,39937,272

from here it didn't totally sync until I drop the frequency to 60HZ(I think thats the 4th parameter above but I'm not sure)....everytime i switched to 80 Hz the machine would detect 125hz...really weird and the picture looked okey but sparklies showed up.

One nice thing about the above setting is that your picture is dead center of the lens. You also don't lose any information since the software DVD player rescales the image to fit the 800x450. It don't notice light spill like I did with a progressive DVD player for some reason.
I only adjusted brightness and contrast. Colors are stock until after 100 hours and I will hopefully get someone to professionally calibrate my unit. I don't have the tools.



Originally posted by mandarax
Saturn .. heh ... good to see your setup... Havent heard from you and assumed you must have received the screen.. Saturn ... if you are getting it calibrated let me know if you can get some lumen ratings on different parts of the screen... I know your screen is kind of small but let me know.. The unit I looked at was on a bigger screen and the brightness uniformity on the unit looked wacked... by a fairly significant margin..

Are the buzzing noises from the older units or from the newer units... Had some problems with cheap bearings and seems to be common..

This is a very long thread... any summary on what the major problems have been so far.. or if not considered major what the problems in general have been..????

Thanks in for saving me some reading...

Robert

"Are the buzzing noises from the older units or from the newer units... Had some problems with cheap bearings and seems to be common..

This is a very long thread... any summary on what the major problems have been so far.. or if not considered major what the problems in general have been..????"

Robert,
Buzz yes, when I asked Wing (Optoma Engineering Mgr) about the buzz he said it was on some because it's a low priced model and the colorwheel isn't of the same quality of their higher end models the H56,H76 & H77.

Problems, maybe two dozen members.
1. A few bulb failures
2. Orange light stays at start up. Re-power up fixes but it re-occurs.
3. Buzzing sound
4. Poor calibration on Progressive signal vs interlaced.
5. Green bar lock up on interlaced when switching between HDTV/progressive & 480i.

I think that's the sum of it for major problems.

Originally posted by new teq joe
tom what lumen rating did you get after calibration with the h30 ?


with mine if i remember correctly it was not a big drop?

We didn't do a Lumen test but did do CR which was around 1899.1 after colorfacts calibration.

Quote:
I am conecting my panasonic cp72 dvd player through a component-to-RGB transcoder in to the H30's VGA connector. This is what I was using for the ae100, and I didn't want to route new cables. The h30 indicates "640x480" detected... Perhaps this is the problem? If it's only sampling the signal 640 pixels/line, then rescaling to 800, this might cause these types of problems..""

The H30 does it's own transcoding. Try a straight component to VGA cable or component cables to the supplied adaptor.

We didn't do a Lumen test but did do CR which was around 1899.1 after colorfacts calibration.



wow that is not bad at all :)

I receive today my new DVI cable.
I've seen huge increase in image quality against s-video but...

Did you know what's wrong in my setup:

-GeForce Ti4200
-nvidia driver 56.72
-DVI out on DVI-VGA cable on H30
-800x600 on secondary display output

H30 display "RGB 800x600 60Hz" with windows desktop ...
Once open either PowerDVD,WinDVD,ZoomPlayer H30 display 640x480 60Hz, no way to turn out 800x600 again until I'm back to desktop.

What' wrong???

You guys with the HTPCs might want to ask these questions in the HTPC forum. Pimp doesn't seem to be checking this thread this weekend for one reason or another and he is our resident HTPC expert. The way this thread usually goes if you don't get an answer right away, the questions get lost in the shuffle.

Originally posted by Saturn_AD
This is what worked for me.

PowerStrip timing parameters:
800x450=800,48,128,80,450,85,4,89,39937,272

from here it didn't totally sync until I drop the frequency to 60HZ(I think thats the 4th parameter above but I'm not sure)....everytime i switched to 80 Hz the machine would detect 125hz...really weird and the picture looked okey but sparklies showed up.
Thanks for the info. I think it was your pictures of "pixel-perfect" from HTPC that I saw... But I don't have HTPC... I'd like to get it to work the best it can with run-of-the mill progressive DVD signal...
Thanks for the info though... Out of curiosity, when it "syncs" to 800x450, what does the H30 report? I only ever get 640x480 reported....

guitarman:
Yeah, I realize it can accept component directly (so can my ae100), but my transcoder is next to the DVD player (across the room) and my cable (run under my floor through the basement) is a VGA cable... so it was just simpler to swap the H30 in for the ae100 using the existing VGA cable.. Do you happen to know the pinout for the component into the H30's VGA connector? maybe I can make an adapter on the DVD end to by-pass my transcoder and send the component signals down the VGA cable...
When you do a standard component hookup, what does the H30 report as signal mode?

- Frank

Originally posted by new teq joe
wow that is not bad at all :)

Joe, I know it sounds scarey when places like projector central post 450lumens. But I went over the Andrea Manuti's website where he has test results for many projectors. It's not free over there I won a contest and got a free year.

Check this out.

Output lumens stock.
H56 375.22
Yamaha DPX1000 316.68
Sim2 HT300+ 287.32
NEC HT1000 364.89
Marantz 12s2 261.43
IF 7200 905.95

Buy the way the IF7200 calibated got a CR of 1267.1
H56 got 1621.1
NEC HT1000 2300.1

Output Lumens calibration
H56 295.39
Yamaha DPX1000 177.96
Sim2 HT300+ 239.19
NEC HT1000 201.41
Marantz 12s2 261.59
IF 7200 767.07

Interesting? You can the Optoma shows up being brighter than many. Except the IF7200 but the IF at a cost in CR. Actually he says for his taste the Optoma is too bright. :) But it does end up with a very good 3D type image.

Originally posted by rudee
anyone esle using a philips Q50 with the H30? if so, what firmware does it have and if it the latest 4.15-54 do you still have hiccups?

I just got one and have no idea how to access the firmware info.

Apparently, new firmware fixes a nasty example of the chroma bug, according to a review at

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_8_3/dvd-benchmark-progressive-shootout-2-8-2001.html

This player's MPEG decoder does have the chroma upsampling bug, and in fact it's perhaps the worst we've ever seen. It's clearly visible on any interlaced TV, or running it through an outboard deinterlacer. However, the Sage chip resamples the chroma channel, which almost completely hides the chroma bug. So if you plan to use this player only in progressive mode, the chroma bug is essentially a non-issue. In certain cases, you can see a minor vestige of the bug, but you really have to know what to look for, and even then it's hard to see.

Update: We received a firmware update for the Q50 that resolves the severe chroma upsampling error in film mode. The Q50s that will go on sale in the USA should have this fix already. If you have purchased the Q50 in another country, contact your local service center, and they shouldÊ be able to take care of you.


~ Kiran <entropy@io.com>

H56 375.22


tom that is what i thought because the 56 is bright ,but like i said earlier the h56a tom with the stronger lamp must be pushing out more lumen's :)


so the way i look at it the h30 should be around the number above or a little more :) and that is pretty good for the price range for the h30 .


hopefully when saturn pj hits 100 or so hours i will get a proper Gage on stuff ?

Just last night he did start barking at the big dinosaur in Jurassic Park 3. You know male dogs and domination.



Originally posted by guitarman
I like the look of the Dalite Insta Theater. I recommended that to some one here, was it you?

It goes well with those Ribbon Speakers. :)

I see a potential problem. With the low Dalite Insta Theater if you ever show video of dogs when you dog's around, well!

I have this problem any video of giant dogs and my Westie takes a run at the screen barking. :)

It's interesting that most projector come in very low comparred to the company spec level. But in real time brightness levels are good for HT.

I get 800x600 @ 60 hzs

Originally posted by potus
Thanks for the info. I think it was your pictures of "pixel-perfect" from HTPC that I saw... But I don't have HTPC... I'd like to get it to work the best it can with run-of-the mill progressive DVD signal...
Thanks for the info though... Out of curiosity, when it "syncs" to 800x450, what does the H30 report? I only ever get 640x480 reported....

oh and the reason i say this is because i tried the h30 with a high power screen (table) mounted and i can seriously say that with the gain of the screen and the optoma h30 calibrated it was to much i got something more than 42.24 ftl the pic was way to strong

Thanks sir. I hope to color calibrate at one point of time. And I definitely need to get a better camera that can shoot dark scenes. My antiquated Canon S330 2 megapixel was never good in the dark. I used to have a 5 meg Olympus 5050Z (and it wasnt small) but had to sell it because I landed on it couple of times mountain biking and also during snowboard season. I need a small but durable camera.

Originally posted by hikarate
Saturn your pix look good and your setup is killer!

Joe;

Thats what I was actually finding last night during the bright scenes. I was squinting a little and I said sh*te my X1 was never this bright.

Originally posted by new teq joe
oh and the reason i say this is because i tried the h30 with a high power screen (table) mounted and i can seriously say that with the gain of the screen and the optoma h30 calibrated it was to much i got something more than 42.24 ftl the pic was way to strong

It's interesting that most projector come in very low comparred to the company spec level. But in real time brightness levels are good for HT.



oh yeh it is way better today than a couple of years ago ( not a drastic better but better )

Thats what I was actually finding last night during the bright scenes. I was squinting a little and I said sh*te my X1 was never this bright.


yes i know what you mean pump the brightness down :)

Originally posted by Saturn_AD
I do like this Wide Power fabric. You can vertually be anywhere in the room and the lumens seemingly doesnt drop by much at least for this 73" diagonal. It does seem fairly bright dead center....which can be a good thing. Colours are bright...on the saturated side but hell it looks great.

I'm glad someone has actually used this Wide Power stuff that Da-Lite seems to use in only their portable screens. I'm getting tired of carrying around my folded-up piece of Jo-Ann Budget Blackout fabric, because it's getting creases and wrinkles in it.

~ Kiran <entropy@io.com>

i like the Dalite Insta Theater a lot but they do not make it the size i was looking for .


which was to bad

Just got the Optoma H30 this Friday. I still haven't calibrated it, yet, but it looks fantastic out of the box.

Still, as with any projector, it seems, there's always a few small snags...

First off, I got the newer firmware with the 800x600 enabled, the lens cap and the backlit remote. I have no buzzing issues and don't even notice the projector while it's on. All-in-all, I'm very pleased with the machine.

Probably the only significant problem is with using the X-Box with the component adaptor. I've tried to search for a solution on the forums, but I haven't found it, yet. It comes up when I'm playing a 720p game and eject it. The X-Box dashboard is 480i and when it tries to sync to that signal, I get a solid green bar at the top and can no longer sync to any signal but a RGB VGA signal from the PC. I did the same thing by forcing the X-Box to 480p instead of allowing a 720p signal and it didn't seem to have a problem. Of course, this was all extrapolated from a highly scientific study sample of three (twice at 720 and once at 480), so it's hard to say exactly what's happening.

Thanks for chiming in Jeff... Someone else (I forget who) mentioned having the H30 sitting upside down on a shelf. I don't get how that works although it must if people are doing it How do you compensate for the rounded "hump" above the lens? Doesn't that make the projector sit at a bit of an angle on the horizontal axis? How do you get to the buttons for service menu and know what status the lit power button is in?

To get around this hump, I simply slide a piece of paper folded up a few times under the side of the projector opposite the lens. This creates a bit of trapezoiding for me, but even without the lens hump, I would've had to angle the front of the projector up. The offset is too great to allow me to have the H30 aiming straight forward and still project the image where I want. As for the service menu buttons, I've only had to access those once, so sliding the projector to the side of the shelf (exposing the buttons) has worked fine for me. I'll try to get some pictures posted soon.

Originally posted by Maboroshi Daikon
Just got the Optoma H30 this Friday. I still haven't calibrated it, yet, but it looks fantastic out of the box.

Still, as with any projector, it seems, there's always a few small snags...

First off, I got the newer firmware with the 800x600 enabled, the lens cap and the backlit remote. I have no buzzing issues and don't even notice the projector while it's on. All-in-all, I'm very pleased with the machine.

Probably the only significant problem is with using the X-Box with the component adaptor. I've tried to search for a solution on the forums, but I haven't found it, yet. It comes up when I'm playing a 720p game and eject it. The X-Box dashboard is 480i and when it tries to sync to that signal, I get a solid green bar at the top and can no longer sync to any signal but a RGB VGA signal from the PC. I did the same thing by forcing the X-Box to 480p instead of allowing a 720p signal and it didn't seem to have a problem. Of course, this was all extrapolated from a highly scientific study sample of three (twice at 720 and once at 480), so it's hard to say exactly what's happening.


Green bar lock up of 480i from an HDTV signal is a problem with a few machines. They're looking at my first one which has this problem. With mine it wouldn't lock up all the time. One way to avoid it if you can is keep in a progressive signal. You won't lock up going from HDTV to progressive DVD. The only full cure is to call the tech area and arrange for another machine. As of right now they don't know the fix.

Originally posted by Maboroshi Daikon

It comes up when I'm playing a 720p game and eject it. The X-Box dashboard is 480i and when it tries to sync to that signal, I get a solid green bar at the top and can no longer sync to any signal but a RGB VGA signal from the PC. I did the same thing by forcing the X-Box to 480p instead of allowing a 720p signal and it didn't seem to have a problem. Of course, this was all extrapolated from a highly scientific study sample of three (twice at 720 and once at 480), so it's hard to say exactly what's happening.

Welcome to the forum.

I know some have got the X-box high res games working with this pj so that problem is fixable. The green bar is also being looked into and I believe Tom described how to work around that in the meantime. If these are your only complaints then consider yourself very happy because they are both fixable.

I have this problem any video of giant dogs and my Westie takes a run at the screen barking. :) [/B][/QUOTE]

Hey Tom,

After I got my H30 knew you had good taste when it comes to projectors...... Now I know you also know how to pick the right breed of dog. Our Westies watch TV and also get excited when they see animals.

Fred

Originally posted by jeff442
To get around this hump, I simply slide a piece of paper folded up a few times under the side of the projector opposite the lens. This creates a bit of trapezoiding for me, but even without the lens hump, I would've had to angle the front of the projector up. The offset is too great to allow me to have the H30 aiming straight forward and still project the image where I want. As for the service menu buttons, I've only had to access those once, so sliding the projector to the side of the shelf (exposing the buttons) has worked fine for me. I'll try to get some pictures posted soon.

I have mine mounted on a box with the lens overhanging the edge, or you could stick on some 1" rubber feet aka bump-ons.

Originally posted by entropy
I just got one and have no idea how to access the firmware info.

Apparently, new firmware fixes a nasty example of the chroma bug, according to a review at

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volume_8_3/dvd-benchmark-progressive-shootout-2-8-2001.html

~ Kiran <entropy@io.com>

According to a post I saw on the DVD forum, go to the main menu, arrow all the way down, *after* the last menu item, still DOWN, then you will see the firmware number.

The Secrets review was a long time ago, so I doubt there are any Q50s around (even the refurbs) that still have CUE. It's easy to check though if you have Toy Story or Monsters, Inc.

I receive today my new DVI cable.
I've seen huge increase in image quality against s-video but...

Did you know what's wrong in my setup:

-GeForce Ti4200
-nvidia driver 56.72
-DVI out on DVI-VGA cable on H30
-800x600 on secondary display output

H30 display "RGB 800x600 60Hz" with windows desktop ...
Once open either PowerDVD,WinDVD,ZoomPlayer H30 display 640x480 60Hz, no way to turn out 800x600 again until I'm back to desktop.

What' wrong???

I check this resolutions on the H30:

Desktop 1360x768 60Hz > H30 1024x768 60 Hz
Desktop 1600x900 60Hz > H30 1152x864 60 Hz

I check the resolutions being displayed on the H30 and it is ALWAYS according to desktop NOT to the H30 OSD!

So, I guess also 640x480 OSD with 800x600 is a fake due to zoomplayer switch to 720x576PAL ???

I know I have to post this on HTPC thread (already done...) but experts are here :)

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by entropy
I just got one and have no idea how to access the firmware info.

Apparently, new firmware fixes a nasty example of the chroma bug, according to a review at

http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/volu...t-2-8-2001.html

~ Kiran <entropy@io.com>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



According to a post I saw on the DVD forum, go to the main menu, arrow all the way down, *after* the last menu item, still DOWN, then you will see the firmware number.

The Secrets review was a long time ago, so I doubt there are any Q50s around (even the refurbs) that still have CUE. It's easy to check though if you have Toy Story or Monsters, Inc.


__________________
Enjoy!

Mike
Surf Audio Video
Surf Remote Control

thanks mike i was just getting to give kiran directions on the firmware-btw i have a disc coming from philips with the newest fireware and tried to d/l it off the web and flash it myself from a burnt disk- wouldn't take it so i'll wait- Mike what exactlt is CUE (chroma) and how do you see/decribe it? I don't think i've ever had a player with it but maybe ignorance is bliss- I got a good deal on the Q50 so i hope it works as great mate for the H30.


As far as the buzz in my H30- It is purely dimmer induced from dimmers in another room- My pj is on a hospital grade isolated & dedicated circuit with it's own ground completely seperate from the rest of the house and a dimmer from the dinning room causes the buzz- go figure, i'm sure someone with some electrical knowlwedge can chime in and say why but it seems as though the H30 are very sensitive to electical inteferences. other pj's that have been in the same outlet have nver suffered from this problem. Fix is easy-don't turn on the dinning room light when watching a movie:p

rudee

rudee

Originally posted by rudee
Mike what exactlt is CUE (chroma) and how do you see/decribe it? I don't think i've ever had a player with it but maybe ignorance is bliss- I got a good deal on the Q50 so i hope it works as great mate for the H30.


Yes, you may be better off not knowing. ;)

However, if you're feeling adventurous, this explains it better than I ever could: Chroma Upsampling Error (http://128.121.62.219/volume_8_2/dvd-benchmark-special-report-chroma-bug-4-2001.html)

There are a number of players out there that have this bug to varying degrees. I've only seen a few that were so bad that it actually bothered me though.

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
rocker999, glad you're all set now. How about the color calibration? I had to balance out a little green on component/progressive.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am not seeing any green push but I don't have anything component yet just htpc 800x600 60hz. It does have a little red due to new bulb.
Everything is working flawless and I really like these new units and am very pleased.

Gonna try an x box today with red dead revolver hhehehe..

Gonna try an x box today with red dead revolver hhehehe..



we are all kids at heart :) ,have fun ;)

I'll have to give it another whirl when the SP4805 comes out and do a side to side... One good thing is that you didn't have to wait.. thanks for the update guitarman...

Robert ..

Well after by-passing my transcoder, and feeding the component signal direct from DVD-player into H30, the sync-related problems I was seeing previously have gone away!.. The H30 now reports 720x480 signal instead of 640x480 on the RGB connector. It must be assuming common PC video timings on the RGB, and DVD-timings on component.. A reasonable thing, I suppose...

So now the picture is quite good. Very sharp and NO tearing.. I did see a couple isolated rainbows, but nothing to get excited about... No color-wheel buzz last night either...

One thing, though, there seemed to be a redish glow in black areas, which was NOT present with the RGB connection. I calibrated all the simple stuff in DVE, but there was still a reddish cast on grayscale. I set Red brightness to -18 to get it to go away. But now the contrast seems a little off... and the other colors don't seem quite right.

What's the best procedure for getting rid of the red cast? (I also tried backing the red to -9, then offset blue and green +9, but that didn't seem to help much...) It's unclear to me how you are supposed to use the brightness/contrast setting in the advanced menu..

- Frank

Just uploaded a bunch of pictures to the gallery. I am fairly happy with how the screenshots came out. They do a good job of illustrating the color accuracy and saturation that this amazing little machine produces. Let me know what you think.

PS - My movie choices were somewhat eclectic.

http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho6.jpg


Seabiscuit
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit2.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit3.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit4.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit5.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit6.jpg

Austin Powers 2
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503austinpowers1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503austinpowers2.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503austinpowers3.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503austinpowers4.jpg

Zoolander
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander2.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander3.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander4.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander5.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander6.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander7.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander8.jpg

Star Wars Ep2 - Attack of the Clones
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503attackoftheclones1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503attackoftheclones2.jpg

American Psycho
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho2.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho3.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho4.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho5.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho6.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho7.jpg

jeff442 looks pretty good ;)


fat basturd quote ( i didn't have any corn :)

Originally posted by guitarman
:) right that is a worrysome problem, sounds like overheating. 6hrs isn't too long either. Might had been hot in the house at that time (oven on etc). If not I'd play close attention and maybe re-seat the bulb. If it happens again better jump on a return.

That's what I suspected. HEAT. The house was pretty hot and while I was upset, after thinking about it, I wasn't surprised. I now have a fan blowing on the H30 just in case. I don't think I am going to screw around with the bulb as I don't want to cause any damage.

we'll see.

-geoff





-still love it.
:P

Rudee, I use to design Hi-end dimmer controls for a major lighting company here in the U.S. I'm very aware of the electrical noise poorly designed dimmers create on the AC in the home.

I don't own an H30 but from what I have read on the forum it appears that the noise is coming from some wire-wound inductors in the power supply of the H30. Your little experiment pretty much shows at least that electrical noise on the AC lines can create a noisy H30. If indeed the buzzing H30 is due to poorly manufactured inductors in the unit, it would seem that the problem can easily be detected by the engineers at Optoma. The problem, from my experience with working with wire wound inductors, is not so much as finding out who the noisy one is, it's trying to get the manufacturers of the inductors to improve their production of the coils. Since most of the makers of these inductors are usually very unskilled workers in Haiti, China, etc. and there's always a communication problem between U.S. engineers and foreign engineers.

For us in the lighting industry, there was always a long long painful journey before we could get properly manufactured inductors without the added buzzing. Unfortunately, when it comes to magnetics, changing vendors or just changing the guy running the winding machine and you end up right back where you started. More buzzing. I'm sure that Optoma will eventually get it all worked out. We did but it took a few months.

uhm did i miss anything in last 100 posts? Or did the opinion about build quality change?

H30 convergence problem?

How can i fix this, everything works great with the new firmware, pal problems on interlaced sources are fixed, but the picture is blurred a bit and i found out on seeing text that letters have shades left and right.

Any tips for me?

Thanks
Rudi

Originally posted by semi_expert
I have this problem any video of giant dogs and my Westie takes a run at the screen barking. :)

Hey Tom,

After I got my H30 knew you had good taste when it comes to projectors...... Now I know you also know how to pick the right breed of dog. Our Westies watch TV and also get excited when they see animals.

Fred [/B][/QUOTE]

lol, yeah anything with fur on it and the westies go nuts. :)
Cool dog and they all carry the same traits, like the angle head move when they're trying to figure out what you're saying. Know what I mean?

Originally posted by mandarax
I'll have to give it another whirl when the SP4805 comes out and do a side to side... One good thing is that you didn't have to wait.. thanks for the update guitarman...

Robert ..

The comparison s/b very interesting. For the 4805 the fact of the 16.9 panel and the DVI will be popular. But with a level playing field (progressive DVD) will the picture be as pleasing as the H30, this is the
big ?.

Originally posted by potus
Well after by-passing my transcoder, and feeding the component signal direct from DVD-player into H30, the sync-related problems I was seeing previously have gone away!.. The H30 now reports 720x480 signal instead of 640x480 on the RGB connector. It must be assuming common PC video timings on the RGB, and DVD-timings on component.. A reasonable thing, I suppose...

So now the picture is quite good. Very sharp and NO tearing.. I did see a couple isolated rainbows, but nothing to get excited about... No color-wheel buzz last night either...

One thing, though, there seemed to be a redish glow in black areas, which was NOT present with the RGB connection. I calibrated all the simple stuff in DVE, but there was still a reddish cast on grayscale. I set Red brightness to -18 to get it to go away. But now the contrast seems a little off... and the other colors don't seem quite right.

What's the best procedure for getting rid of the red cast? (I also tried backing the red to -9, then offset blue and green +9, but that didn't seem to help much...) It's unclear to me how you are supposed to use the brightness/contrast setting in the advanced menu.

- Frank

Good, thought that was it.

RGB-contrast for the brighter gray IRE levels
RGB-brightness for the darker gray IRE levels

Use the 50% offset method. Like if you had to lower red by -9, change that to -4 and than increase the blue & green by +4each.

Bring up a grayscale step pattern with Avia and look for color within the various shades of gray. Use the RGB/contrast to delete color out of the whiter shades of gray and RGB/brightness to delete color out of the darker shades of gray.

This method worked for me. I had green cast in the high end of the grayscale and red cast in the very dark area of gray.
I didn't have to move numbers too much, just a couple of clicks. After you're done throw on a B&W movie and see what you've got. If a B&W movie looks good your color movies will look good.

My H30 arrived a couple of weeks ago and I can now add my name to the list of people who say "wow" to front projection. (My first experience with modern front projection was a Sharp XG-2000, a 479x455 pixel LCD HT projector, from around 1992. I saw it about four years ago and was pretty much sold on FP on the spot. That projector is still on the same bulb it had when my friend bought it at a hamfest in the mid-90s.)

So far the projector is working just fine. I've been projecting onto the white wall in the basement, and onto a piece of Jo-Ann's "budget blackout" cloth. (I also tried a piece of white vinyl-coated fabric sold for marine use, which worked well aside from being translucent.) A truly stunning image, even on these random white walls and projecting a 640x320 QuickTime HDTV capture from my PowerBook. (I did get a Philips Q50 (with firmware 4-15-45, thanks Mike!) but I haven't been watching many DVDs, so I can't say much about that.) I'm amazed that these low-res HDTV captures look so good blown up to 5' diagonal--at least as good as DVDs on my friend's Sony RPTV.

Most of the good things about this projector have already been said, but I'm particularly impressed by the fill factor and the brightness--at least some kinds of ambient light (like the brightening skies at the end of an evening of watching) don't cause much of a problem. I haven't been able to get the projected image above 72" diagonal yet--the H30 has a much longer throw than I'd like.

I do see rainbows, but only when there's a static image (especially the frame around Apple's DVD Player window) and I turn my head quickly to look at something else. So far I haven't seen ANY significant rainbows due to moving objects on the screen, which surprises me since it's so easy for me to see them with certain kinds of static images.

As for buzzing, I can certainly hear a tiny buzz when I put my ear to the back of the machine. I assume that's the colorwheel. I have also heard (once) a buzz loud enough to be noticeable from about two feet away, which went away when I removed and reattached the VGA cable. (The projector is usually within a few feet of my laptop, so if there were a lot of buzzin I'd probably know.)

My friend Jeff Keller points out that at 2000 hours lamp life and $1300 for the unit, that's about $1.30 a movie. (That would probably go up to $3 a movie when you add in the cost of a screen and sound system, of course.)

All in all I am VERY impressed. If anyone in southern New England wants to see this thing, they can probably talk me into bringin it over if they buy a piece of blackout cloth and a pizza. :D

~ Kiran <entropy@io.com>

Tom do you use the 50% offset method for both the RGB contrast and brightness? I have a little of the red and green, as well, in the grey/black areas.

Originally posted by guitarman
About the Q50, I've been using one the last few weeks. It has the latest firmware and played many DVD's perfectly. I did have mabye 3 split second freeze ups but a couple may have been the DVD becuase I back tracked and it did it again.

I like the quality of the machine for $95 :). It does have a very very sharp image. Almost too sharp, I lowered the sharpness in the Crystal Clear DCDI menu.

If you want to see what the image looks like a just posted a few pictures a couple of pages back.

Hi Tom
my Q50 arrives this week I bought it off ebay the owner says it has the latest software, could you tell me what settings you had for your H30 & Q50 will be using s-video for the time being until I can get my Beldon component leads, also Tom what was the layer change like on the Q50 and is there a remote hack for changing regions.

thanx
indie

Guys,

Can I get a few responses on how far back H30 owners are sitting from their screens and how wide their screens are. Also mention if you can notice any screendoor or pixelization at your seating distance. Thanks!

I know it differs from person to person but I'm hoping I can get a nice picture (no SDE or pixels) using a 6.5' wide screen (78x44) with front row sitting 10' from screen and back row 15' from screen.

With those seating distances, should I go with a smaller screen? This one would be about 90" diag.

Unknown -- We are sitting 13 feet back from an 87 x 48 inch screen, no screen door, no pixelization.

my h30 before i had a 92x52 screen at 14ft no screen door at 12ft still ok

unknownshadow,
Projectorcentral review recommends 2xscreen width. my seating is between 1.85 and 2.3 and I don't see any screendoor. I believe some have reported not being able to detect it as low as 1.5 but I would just keep over that mark to be safe.

Originally posted by UnknownShadow
I know it differs from person to person but I'm hoping I can get a nice picture (no SDE or pixels) using a 6.5' wide screen (78x44) with front row sitting 10' from screen and back row 15' from screen.

The front row will likely see some screen door, mostly in scenes with a lot of white in them. I didn't find it objectionable when I was using that same size-to-distance ratio on a temporary setup.

BTW, my comparison review (H30, BenQ 6100 and Epson Home 10) is finally done. I believe it's against forum rules for me to post a link to it, but some of you know the "spot" to find it if you're interested. ;)

well done mike ;)


and did you get a lumen rating after calibration :)

Setting up a htpc and would like some input on the best way to go.
Looks like people are hooking up their htpcs by transcoder, DVI to VGA or VGA.

From a previous post from dagame pimp , it seems that using dvi to vga there isn't any noticible difference in picture from just vga.

Saturn_AD: what are you using to connect your your htpc.

Mauro_it: are you using a dvi to vga cable because you weren't satified with the way vga looked?

The only advantage i see to using dvi to vga would come if you upscaled to 720p. (i am guessing you can't upscale on vga connector , right?)

Also, if I use vga should I use powerstrip? If I use just vga and no powerstrip, won't I get black lines above and below the picture? DaGamePimp can you clarify the quote below? Does it mean that if I use
aspect ratio control and put the h30 in 4:3 native, i won't get black bars above and below the picture?

Saturn_AD, thanks for getting those powerstrip settings, i am going to have to try that out.

Thanks everyone

(yes i know this is not htpc thread, but hoping some htpc people reading this thread)



Originally posted by DaGamePimp
memize ,

--- Are you trying to get a better aspect from your desktop [ is this why you are trying the 800x450 resolution ] ?

--- There will be no benefit for doing this with the HTPC unless you just want your desktop to look better [ vs. the squeezed look of compressed 800x600 ] . Trying to pixel map the 800x450 will not gain anything for image quality while watching movies , I did it and can see no difference [ my eyes are very well trained too as I notice any flaws right away ;) ] .

--- My suggestion with an HTPC is to let it ride at 800x600 and set your dvd player software for Anamorphic ( disable aspect control in ZoomPlayer ) and then let the H30 do the Squeeze down to 800x450 [ as long as you wish to have the image projected lower ( vs. right in the middle of an 800x600 resolution setting with aspect ratio control using 4:3 Native on the H30 ) ] . Consider the lower 16:9 image should look the best according to what Wing stated a while back in this thread [ which it sounds like this is what you want to do ;) ] .

--- Also consider that any HTPC gaming will probably not work at 800x450 [ other than those games that allow for custom resolutions ] . Most games will kick the resolution back up to 800x600 . I don't know if you do any PC gaming but thought I would add this in anyway for those that do ;) .


--------------- Jason

Originally posted by new teq joe
and did you get a lumen rating after calibration :)

LOL. No, I don't believe I did. :D

I'm just finishing a new room for the H30 that has total light control, so that won't be an issue for me anymore.

LOL. No, I don't believe I did


mike it is not for me because after i calibrate an h30 down here i will find out for myself ;)


but to be honest i think that the h30 has a little more pop then alot in it's price range ;)


i will check it out soon :)


but mike the h56a now that is a bright pj ;) have you checked one out yet at your place :) it is not bad at all

Originally posted by jeff442
Just uploaded a bunch of pictures to the gallery. I am fairly happy with how the screenshots came out. They do a good job of illustrating the color accuracy and saturation that this amazing little machine produces. Let me know what you think.

PS - My movie choices were somewhat eclectic.

http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho6.jpg


Seabiscuit
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit2.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit3.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit4.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit5.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503seabiscuit6.jpg

Austin Powers 2
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503austinpowers1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503austinpowers2.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503austinpowers3.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503austinpowers4.jpg

Zoolander
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander2.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander3.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander4.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander5.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander6.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander7.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503zoolander8.jpg

Star Wars Ep2 - Attack of the Clones
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503attackoftheclones1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503attackoftheclones2.jpg

American Psycho
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho1.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho2.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho3.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho4.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho5.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho6.jpg
http://gallery.avsforum.com/data/508/21503americanpsycho7.jpg

Great job on the screen shots. Your H30's colors look right on. The Austin Powers shots show's the good color saturtion. Should hv left FatB out of the mix though. :)

Progressive DVD? If so which one?

Hey Mike: Checked out your review; very interesting. I am not still not sure how the 6100 handles 4x3 output on a 16x9 screen. Does it produce a 640x480 box with bars all around or does it just produce a full 4x3 image that extends beyond the 16x9 screen, top and bottom. If the latter, does the zoom allow you enough latitude to reduce the picture size enough so that it can be projected within the boundaries of the 16x9 screen, top and bottom? Also have you compared PQ between the 6200 and the H30 for dvd movies and HD? If so are there noticeable differences between the two and what are they? Would you choose the 6200 over the H30 base on any noticeable differences resulting from the former's higher resolution?

Thanks
Peter

Originally posted by guitarman
Should hv left FatB out of the mix though. :)


LOL. Yeah, especially the bed scene. :D

The screen shots do look great though. Good job.

Originally posted by MickB
Tom do you use the 50% offset method for both the RGB contrast and brightness? I have a little of the red and green, as well, in the grey/black areas.

Yes I first got rid of the green by using a DVD where I know how the colors should look. Then when I looked at a grayscale pattern with Avia I could see a little red in the blacks so I used the same principle but with the RGB-brightness. At first I had the red-brightness down to 0 but after a little breakin I didn't hv to much of a red problem anymore. Last numbers go like this ---

Red-contrast +2
Green C -2
Blue C +2

Red-brightness +2
Green B -1
Blue B +2


Your's will be different. Just wanted to show how little of an adjustment was needed.
good luck

Originally posted by smyth22
Hey Mike: Checked out your review; very interesting. I am not still not sure how the 6100 handles 4x3 output on a 16x9 screen. Does it produce a 640x480 box with bars all around or does it just produce a full 4x3 image that extends beyond the 16x9 screen, top and bottom.

It does either depending on the projector setting.


If the latter, does the zoom allow you enough latitude to reduce the picture size enough so that it can be projected within the boundaries of the 16x9 screen, top and bottom?

Yes, at least it did with the screen size and throw distance I was using.

Would you choose the 6200 over the H30 base on any noticeable differences resulting from the former's higher resolution?

Thanks
Peter

I haven't seen the 6200, but I would expect it to look much like the 6100 with DVDs. The higher resolution would add some sharpness to the image, but I doubt that it would be enough to push it over the top of the H30. It might have a more noticeable improvement with HD material though.

Thanks Mike; not sure what distances you were using for the 6100 but I have a 92" wide screen and could project anywhere from about 12' to 13' from the screen. Any idea if that would allow me to reduce the larger 4x3 picture into the boundaries of the 16x9 screen?

I take if from your comments that you like the dvd picture from the h30 quite a bit more than the Benq 6100. What are the main differences that you see?

Thanks Peter

Re presentation projectors vs the H30. People and I can't blame them are trying to have their cake and eat it to in buying presentaion XGA over a SVGA HT model. Not a good idea IMO and especially for DVD. I compared the H30 to an HD2+ and couldn't see a huge difference in PQ, still loved the H30's image, color saturation, res, etc.

demon4
Mauro_it: are you using a dvi to vga cable because you weren't satified with the way vga looked?

I'm using dvi to vga only to have not to switch my primary vga from monitor to h30... I'm using my old nvidia Ti4200.
BTW, DVI to VGA is the same of VGA at all !! both analog RGBHV.

Originally posted by smyth22
Thanks Mike; not sure what distances you were using for the 6100 but I have a 92" wide screen and could project anywhere from about 12' to 13' from the screen. Any idea if that would allow me to reduce the larger 4x3 picture into the boundaries of the 16x9 screen?

I had an 80" wide screen from about 14', so I don't know if you can make it work. Can't say for sure since I don't have the 6100 anymore. Use the calculator on Projector Central (which gives the zoom ranges) to figure out if you could match the picture heights.

Hmmm, looking at that calculator it doesn't look like it would work. :confused:
Apparently, the 6200 has a different throw ratio than the 6100.


I take if from your comments that you like the dvd picture from the h30 quite a bit more than the Benq 6100. What are the main differences that you see?

Thanks Peter

Pretty much everything Tom's been talking about since he started this thread. Deep blacks, color saturation and the overall "pop" to the picture. hard to describe, but easy to see. There's also the reduced rainbow effect of the faster color wheel.

Has anyone experienced a situation where the projector "tries" to start up and fail. Twice this weekend, I hit the power button, it started to spool up, then went quiet, then tried again, went quiet, then finally on the third try the projector lit up and everything worked fine from that point onward. It's never done that before. Has anyone else seen this happen?

I've only had that happen when the source connected was "live". If I turn on the source (ie: DVD player) after I turn on the H30, there's no problem. If the source is already on, the H30 has trouble syncing the color wheel with the input.

Okay, maybe that was it. I can't recall if I turned on the projector first (I usually try and do that). Is the best practice to wait until the "Optoma" logo appears, or wait until the "searching for signal" appears?

Great job on the screen shots. Your H30's colors look right on. The Austin Powers shots show's the good color saturtion. Should hv left FatB out of the mix though.

Thanks Tom. Maybe I will edit the Fat Bastrd link out of my post! The DVD player is a Panasonic RP56. I'm considering trying the Zenith model that puts out 720p... I had to mess with the shutter speed and focus on the camera a bit before I got the results I was looking for. I'm very happy with how the shots came out (especially the lack of grain), but I think there is still room for improvement. The black level is a bit exagerated, and some of the contrast detail in dark clothing, backgrounds etc. is lost. Perhaps I should fool with the exposure a bit?

I tried to do some shots of shots of movies besides 5th Element, Monsters Inc., LOTR. Any other Zoolander fans out there? That movie is pretty hit or miss.

I am hooking up VGA out on the HTPC ot VGA in on the H30. Having the DVI to VGA doesn't matter. It is an anolog signal that is sent not digital signal. Only projector with a DVI input will have true digital to digital between the HTPC and projector(unless I am wrong in my assumption.

You will need Powerstrip to get a 16:9 windows desktop for an HTPC unless you have special video card drivers that will give you a 16:9 desktop.

with those powerstrip settings make sure to change the frequency down to 60hz and then save it...I believe those setting are set to 80 and the PJ doesn't handle 800x450 with 80hz too well..but once I dropped it to 60hz it was okey.



Originally posted by demon4
Setting up a htpc and would like some input on the best way to go.
Looks like people are hooking up their htpcs by transcoder, DVI to VGA or VGA.

From a previous post from dagame pimp , it seems that using dvi to vga there isn't any noticible difference in picture from just vga.

Saturn_AD: what are you using to connect your your htpc.

Mauro_it: are you using a dvi to vga cable because you weren't satified with the way vga looked?

The only advantage i see to using dvi to vga would come if you upscaled to 720p. (i am guessing you can't upscale on vga connector , right?)

Also, if I use vga should I use powerstrip? If I use just vga and no powerstrip, won't I get black lines above and below the picture? DaGamePimp can you clarify the quote below? Does it mean that if I use
aspect ratio control and put the h30 in 4:3 native, i won't get black bars above and below the picture?

Saturn_AD, thanks for getting those powerstrip settings, i am going to have to try that out.

Thanks everyone

(yes i know this is not htpc thread, but hoping some htpc people reading this thread)

The H30 with no noticeable difference between an HD2+ ... wow.. now that is laying it on pretty thick... I would put some coin on that one.. some fairly large coin... We speaking of the same projector the H30?..


There is a very noticealbe difference btw between the 6100 and the 6200.
Try it and see.. but commenting on it without seeing seems a bit much..

"I compared the H30 to an HD2+ and couldn't see a huge difference in PQ, still loved the H30's image, color saturation, res, etc."

Not for my eye and pocket book. Funny thing we were comparing T2 playing out of a JVC3000, but we could switch over to the Matrix Revolutions on a Denon 5900. Here's another reason for you to want to put your money down :) the HD2 had the extra green seven color color wheel. Shocker!

What I'm getting at is the H30 sure puts out a terrific picture for a low dollar outlay.

Originally posted by mandarax
There is a very noticealbe difference btw between the 6100 and the 6200.
Try it and see.. but commenting on it without seeing seems a bit much..

You're right. I probably shouldn't have assumed that they would be the same other than the different DMD. The specs seem to indicate that it's the only difference, but I guess there may be others. Since you've seen them both, I'll defer to your judgment on that. :)

Hey Valk,

I had the exact same start up fail scenario. When I first switched over to component I had left the S-video line plugged in, so the H30 was getting the S-video signal before I turned it on and it seemed to freak it out. All other times I turn the H30 on first and never have any problems. Just backing up what Mike said, live feeds seem to confuse it during start up.

For screeen size and sitting distance:
106" wide at 16.5' away main seating area- no screen door -i can only ever see it on a white background.

MikeRSC-
you're right i don't want to know about CUE! i started reading and stopped.

Chuck_Noland
Thanks for the eletrical dimmer info!
Least i know what it is now and other than the dimmer induced buzz i have had NO other problems mentioned here and have many starts with cable/dvd units already powered up- man i really think that's a crock. The only thing that makes me scratch my head is losing signal when changing hd channels? anyone? no green bars, orange light .nada. now where's my lucky rabbit's foot?:D

Tom or anyone else running a Q50 with the H30- i need some firmware info- I posteed on the dvd forum but here goes:
I ordered latest & greatest from philips and it comes as 4.15 v-o.
Philips syndicate has 4.15.54-0 as latest but i cannot get the disc to burn correctly so the player will not take upgrade- Anyone get a 4.15.54-0 disc directly from philips? i called philips cs and the guy could only tell me i had the latest- someone please confirm.

thanks,
rudee

Since mine is a recent refurb I guess it has the latest firmware. It say
4.15 C-0 5.1.14 amoung a bunch of other numbers. The player works great.

Tom-
jesh-it's not even on the list there is a 4.15c with a ?? on macrovision hacked. for what it's worth it's the last f/w listed for the q50 and seems to run top to bottom. I dunno. I thought read that 4.15-54-0 was the last- it's on the top of the list. We'll see what the dvd crowd digs up.
thanks
rudee

Originally posted by Chuck_Noland
Rudee, I use to design Hi-end dimmer controls for a major lighting company here in the U.S. I'm very aware of the electrical noise poorly designed dimmers create on the AC in the home.

I don't own an H30 but from what I have read on the forum it appears that the noise is coming from some wire-wound inductors in the power supply of the H30. Your little experiment pretty much shows at least that electrical noise on the AC lines can create a noisy H30. If indeed the buzzing H30 is due to poorly manufactured inductors in the unit, it would seem that the problem can easily be detected by the engineers at Optoma. The problem, from my experience with working with wire wound inductors, is not so much as finding out who the noisy one is, it's trying to get the manufacturers of the inductors to improve their production of the coils. Since most of the makers of these inductors are usually very unskilled workers in Haiti, China, etc. and there's always a communication problem between U.S. engineers and foreign engineers.

For us in the lighting industry, there was always a long long painful journey before we could get properly manufactured inductors without the added buzzing. Unfortunately, when it comes to magnetics, changing vendors or just changing the guy running the winding machine and you end up right back where you started. More buzzing. I'm sure that Optoma will eventually get it all worked out. We did but it took a few months.

When I compared my Buzzing H30 with my boss's whisper quite H30, there didn't seem to be any difference in the buzz of my unit at his house...and his house is full of dimmers...but only a few were on at the time.

I have no dimmers at my place, but still not sure if I might have line noise from someone else.

Either way, I would expect mine to be as quite as my boss's, so ya, Optoma needs to figure out the Quality control issues to eliminate the buzzing problems...

Fleaman

First of all, I would like to say Hi to everybody in this forum, as I just become a member of AVS. Also I would like to thank Tom for your great review of Optoma H30, which make me pick the right choice for a budget projector. All I gotta to say to this awesome PJ is this is the one for me.
My first unit had a buzzing sound, then I changed for 2nd one which got green bar problem when changing between Progressive mode and interlace. My 3rd one is working perfect, rich color and great contrast, but I am starting to see Rainbow Effect if I put subtitle on ( 480i). Anyway, I am so happy with it and I reckon this is one of the best Projector in its class.
BTW, I really need your help, TOM. Now I am using your setting( Old Firmware) which is work great for me, so I do really need your new setting(after calibrated ) to try on my system both Interlace and Progreassive. And I gotta say the this is the reason I register to AVS. So please help me out Tom. I do need your setting in the service menu like Picture, ADC DLP Brightness and DLP Contrast as well as general setting like Brightness, Contrast, color and RGB contrast and brightness.

Thanks in advance

Parst P.

My numbers:

Picture
--------
Gain Red 8
Gain Green 7
Gain Blue 4
Bias Red 13
Bias Green 15
Bias Blue 12

ADC
--------
ADC Red Gain 131
ADC Green Gain 124
ADC BLue Gain 119
ADC Red Offset 68
ADC Green Offset 92
ADC BLue Offset 55

DLP Brightness
-------------------
Brightness Red 28
Brightness Green 29
Brightness Blue 31

DLP Contrast
-----------------
Contrast Red 57
Contrast Green 55
Contrast Blue 56


That's it. Now you guys with the green problem s/b able to fix it in this service area on your own. Let us know how it goes? Oh and make sure you write down your original service numbers before you start. And pls stay out of the warning service menu's I gave, RESET & COLOR WHEEL

Hehe, enjoy and become a Mad Tweaker yourself.
__________________
Tom/guitarman

We could all write down very different service numbers. Each machine when calibrated at the factory will produce different numbers because the electronics per machine are each different.

Your best bet is to just use the available user advanced adjustments per signal. They only feature the service area mainly adds is it will do all the signals at the same time. But this isn't ideal because each signal needs a different calibration. Use the 50 percent grayscale procedure and you'll get the hang of it.

Thanks Tom also for great review, just purchased Optoma last week.

I live in Europe and I am very happy with the RGB signal Optoma provides via scart adapter. Excellent picture quality! I have one minor issue however:

It seems that red color (with small surfaces) seems to have black horizontal lines. If surface is large no black lines are visible. I have only seen this in red color so far. Any ideas what it is? :confused:

Need some clarification... the following is a clip from an H30 review mentioned earlier. I won't post links but I hope I'm allowed to make a brief quote from the review...

"Since it uses a 4:3 chip (800 X 600), the H30 offers two options for 16:9 viewing. Setting the H30 to “16:9” gives you a scaled image at 800 X 450. Using the “Native 16:9” setting gives you 800 X 480. This setting achieves the correct 480 vertical resolution, but cuts 27 pixels off each side of the picture to preserve the 16:9 aspect ratio."

If I understand this correctly, you should NOT use the "Native 16:9" setting when viewing a widescreen DVD because you actually get the sides of the picture chopped off a little? Rather, you should use just the "16:9" button?

Can someone give me (or point me to) a quick lesson on widescreen DVD resolution and how the H30 handles widescreen DVD's? I'm looking to use a 16:9 screen and will accept black bars on the sides for my 4:3 viewing. But I am NOT willing to put up with having any picture chopped off when watching a widescreen DVD.

Any info appreciated. Thanks.

"Normal" 16:9 mode downscales the image slightly and due to the downscaling effectively lowers the resolution.
Native gives true unscaled resolution, increases the height slightly but does chop off a little on both sides of the screen (Only cuts of a little)

To be honest I can't see any loss of quality whatsoever when using "normal" mode so tend to use this myself

Originally posted by Vierimaa
Thanks Tom also for great review, just purchased Optoma last week.

I live in Europe and I am very happy with the RGB signal Optoma provides via scart adapter. Excellent picture quality! I have one minor issue however:

It seems that red color (with small surfaces) seems to have black horizontal lines. If surface is large no black lines are visible. I have only seen this in red color so far. Any ideas what it is? :confused:

Use a progressive scan player. The deinterlacer on the machine is very good but does intoduce vertical lines in the color red. Not all the time but just in certain angled video shots. Like the red shirt the Frenchman wears in Matrix Revolutions. No biggie use a progressive scan player if it bothers you.

simong: I agree. I was expecting a loss of quality due to downsampling 480 lines into 450, but the scalar on the H30 must be a pretty good one. I can't see any difference... I use "Normal" also... Amazing how good a measly 800x450 res picture can look.

One interesting thing. When I was feeding the projector using RGB through a transcoder, it worked a little different. Through RGB, it didn't crop the sides in 16:9native. Instead, it just squeezed the picture horizontally to fit it all in.

- Frank

fleaman, its only some speculation on my part due to Rudee's post of his dimmers. Your boss may have some high-end dimmers that use the proper filtering to supress line noise (maybe they are my design... heh heh). I even had this one woman complaining that her dimmers were messing up her TV programs at certain times of the day. We had field engineers flying out, phone conferences, electrical contractor and power engineers, etc. etc. for several weeks. What a mess!!!! Turns out it was her neighbors X10 controls were coming over the power lines, through the neighborhood transformer, and screwing up equipment in her house!

The point being, however, is that the problem is not the line noise but poorly manufactured magnetics in your unit and not your boss' unit. The noisy electrical lines just exagerate the problem that already exists. Again, just speculation.

But in any case, Optoma has to get on top of this! The 4805 cometh and means to take no prisoners!!!

That brings up a question I had. Is anyone using the H30 with X10 controlled lighting in the same room?

Chuck,
based on your experience with dimmers could you make some brand and type recommendations?

I am building a house with basement HT and plan dimmers all thruout the house. Are the usual Home Depot quality dimmers mixed with a few X10 types likely to cause problems?

Plan to put 3 or 4 dedicated 120v lines to theater...in a very rural location so unlikely to have any interference except that that I generate.

Many of us want to optimize our PQ and this is an area that your advise would help.

Mike,

We use the X10 controls to control the overhead light, the rope lights that serve as aisle lights, the bar light, and the sconces in the front of the room that serves as our home theater, absolutely no interference or buzzing has been detected.

so I was going to go to home depot to find a screw for the 3 mounting holes on the H30... the manual describes them as M3 type screws... but I can't find anything at home depot called that... does this screw go by another name?

Originally posted by fallenturtle
so I was going to go to home depot to find a screw for the 3 mounting holes on the H30... the manual describes them as M3 type screws... but I can't find anything at home depot called that... does this screw go by another name?
I believe they are 3MM bolts that can go in about a 1/2 inch without danger of entering the cabinet. I would use nuts, washers or some type of spacer to ensure they don't go in to far.

I did find 3MM- ~1" long screws at the local hardware store that had the large array of bins and drawers containing bulk fasteners. I have not tried them yet however to see if they fit.

Originally posted by gottahavapj
I believe they are 3MM bolts that can go in about a 1/2 inch without danger of entering the cabinet. I would use nuts, washers or some type of spacer to ensure they don't go in to far.

The manual says the safest length of screw is 6mm... I wish I lived in a country that used the metric system...

M3 is the same as 3 mm. I used some M3-10 mm screws on mine, but I made a custom mounting plate that rests on the rubber feet, so a longer (than 6 mm) screw was required. I couldn't find anything smaller than 4 mm at Home Depot, but Lowes carries them. Try a True Value or Ace Hardware store.

HT Novice - Thanks for the info on X10. I never had a problem with it and other projectors, so I'm going to try it out with my H30.

Mike, Your service on the H30 was great. I'm closing in on finishing (?) my HT with WAF hanging in the balance. H30/Zenith DVB318 (component to H30)/JVC SVHS (s-video to H30)/Kenwood 1050 (Panasonic or Yamaha replacement soon) all have their own remotes - HELP!
Please suggest which remote will make it easy for her to:
1) watch TV or a VHS tape (H30/JVC SVHS (S-video)/Kenwood
2) watch a DVD (H30/Zenith DVB318 (component)/Kenwood

TIA

Hobby Shops or places that deal with the radio controlled cars/airplanes are great places to find small mm screws.

As far as my dimmers the ones causing the noise are cheapo's from HD. I also just installed some of the David Steele IR dimmers in the movie room and they also cause some buzz but not like the cheapo's in the other room.

rudee

Mooney, I can say for a fact that rudee is correct. The dimmers at HD are CHEAP and I mean that in the bad way. I used to go to Home Depot and buy various models just to take them apart and see how they were designed.

All the dimmers that I designed are considered "high-end" and cannot be bought at a local hardware store. To get good quality lighting equipment you need to go to a real "Lighting Store" where thats basically all they do. Here's a link to the company I used to work for. Take a look at some of their products.

http://www.lolcontrols.com/

I must add I have not worked there for years so even though I am familiar with most of the product lines I don't know if their quality has gone up or down since then.

If you really want some nice equipment, before I left the company I was working on some ideas with a company called AMX. www.amx.com I loved these guys. Very laid back company with bright engineers. And some really fantastic products. But you need to be willing to spend the money though.

The others out there are Lutron and Levington. Both of them make products that can be found in HD, but they also have some "high end" dimmers that you have to find at a Lighting store. I would go with Lutron myself.

The important thing to remember is that all these products generate electrical noise. Never load the dimmer above 50% to be safe. So, if you buy a 600W dimmer, I would not add more than 300W on it myself. But this is just a guideline for us HT guys. As you add more current, the inductors begin to loose their ability to knock out the "ringing" on the AC lines. And stay away from Low-Voltage lighting for dimming. This type of lighting is beautiful but is very very hard to dim and requires some great quality dimmers. I could do it, but it was very very hard!!! And some manufacturer could always throw a curve ball with their LV downlight that would create havoc for my dimmers!!