In process of building a dedicate HT - fairly high end - 110" AT screen. Room is about 17x23. Two rows, 9 total seats.

Most of my viewing will be HD DirectTv, conventional DVD and lastly HD DVD or BluRay.

Ultimately, I would like a 1080p projector like the panny 2000, but need to start at a lower budget point. I want to start at the lowest cost possible where I will be at least satisfied. I previously had a Panny 75u and was plenty happy (I guess I have low standards - but back then no better point of comparison).

I see HD70s, HD32s (same as 70) and Mitsu 1500s for about 700-800. After I upgrade, I will likely donate the prior projector to a school, house of worship, etc. I'm not sure its worth the extra money for the panny 200 given the potential upgrade - rather save the $$

My screen will be very near the ceiling, so I will need lensshift or live with keystone correction for now.

Any suggestions, comments, etc.?

db

I don't think you'll be satisfied with a HD70 with a close to the ceiling screen. The offset is enourmous which means you'll need a huge amount of keystone correction which means you'll need to push the projector back and lose light output.

If it wasn't for that, the HD70 is great.

I will be locating the projector ideally 14' from the screen which will be only a few inches from the ceiling. I could go back as far as 18' from the screen. I would also like the projector as close to ceiling as possible.

I will be locating the projector ideally 14' from the screen which will be only a few inches from the ceiling. I could go back as far as 18' from the screen. I would also like the projector as close to ceiling as possible.

what he means is that even with the projector right up on the ceiling, the image will be around the middle of the wall onto which it is projected due to the large offset of the HD70. You can adjust a few inches either way without having to use the digital keystone correction, but if you want the projected image right next to the ceiling, you'll likely have to use massive amounts of keystone correction, which will soften your image a good bit.

You are going to need an LCD with lens shift like the Benq w500. The gap between the lens and the top of the picture, for the HD70, is 1/3 the image height. So if the image is 60 inches tall the gap will be 20 inches.

I had not considered the W500 - seems like a good compromise priced only a hundred or two above the HD70, but still well under the panny 200 (and with lens shift and very good specs on paper) - will have to await more reviews of it.

HD32 can be had for about $600. I will have to use keystone given the close to ceiling mount.

Almost a no brainer NOW at that price, but my concern is that after CES (and I won't be ready to use this until about April 2008) 1080p will drop to sub $2k and 720p as well such that the $600 is no longer a bargain.

Any thoughts?

720P is a bargain at $600. Even when 1080P drops below $2k it is not twice as good as720P but yet will be 3x more expensive even with the drop. So 720P is still a bargain. I am selling my HD70 now and I had great results. I also have a low ceiling. The offset did not bother me because I bought a mount that was adjustable so I could just tilt it to where it needed to be. I did use keystone but not much. Keystone adjustment is very easy on the HD70.

Why can't you move your screen? Fireplace? Speakers?

Sightline from second row is the only issue. With a 110 or 120" screen and 7'4" ceiling I figure the bottom edge of the screen would have to be about 10" off the ground (without keystone correction). I need the screen much higher for the second row sightline.

db

I use a HD70 and view at thirteen feet with a 96x54 screen.

I got a mount off of ebay that let me easily tilt the HD70 front up. This caused the image to align right on my screen which is one foot from the ceiling and only had to use a tiny bit of keystone.

Looks great, couldn't be happier. I totaly love the PJ and the awesome image. For nine hundred bucks I can't imagine spending more than double for a minor increase in resolution. I upgraded from an infocus X1 which was ok but, like I said, I love this thing and I've had it for a year already.

Halo 3!

Doesn't tilting the mount up distort the image though? :confused:

Doesn't tilting the mount up distort the image though? :confused:

Yes, it creates a trapezoid shaped image which can be corrected by using the digital vertical keystone correction setting. This however creates an image that has been rescaled to fewer pixels, some of which are extrapolated from the original image. In reality, most folks don't see any problems using keystone correction while watching video/film images but do notice problems when viewing a computer screen.

Excellent, thanks for the help!