It's a brand new projector. Has maybe 6 hours on it. Manufacturered in April 2012.
Found what the problem was.... see the image below. Yep - dust on the DMD. Working much better now.
The projector is actually focused to the (116") screen which is roughly 15 feet away and shows the same spot, albeit slightly more diffused, but much larger and very noticeable. It was easier to take the photo of the close-up.
We can...
Before I attempt to contact Viewsonic I wanted to make sure that it is or isn't normal to have a lightened round area on the screen when "blank" (black screen).
I took a photo holding a piece of paper about 16" away from the projector...
