Panasonic PT-AE3000 info and video here - Page 13

That is the point I was trying to make. I believe Cine4Home mentioned in one of the Panasonic reviews that smoothscreen does NOT cause any loss of detail and the results are just as good on the standard sharpness tests that they run.

As peteer01 pointed out, you can probably get away without adjusting the horizontal shift if you can live with an off-centre 16:9 image. How bad that looks will depend on how off-centre you are mounted.

Actually that is a good point and one that I didn't realize had already been made. Since I plan on using some sort of masking curtains on the sides for 1.85/1.78:1 and 4:3 material, I can probably get away with this. I'm not too much off center anyway - certainly less than 6".

Professional '1/4 inch' pixel grid patterns show no softening or loss of detail on all panasonic LCD models from the AX100 to the present 3000.

So everyone who can see that the picture is softer are "crazy"?

About no loss of detail ok, I agree.

A sharper image isn't necessarily a better image.

Neither is a softer image.

It all boils down to if you believe a projector giving a sharp image natively is more accurate, or a projector that blurs pixels together? Someone posted comparision screenshots between the Epson 1080UB and the Panny AE2000. There was no screen door effect on the AE3000, however there was clearly less detail to hair strands and facial detail such as wrinkles and pores.


I understand that the smoothscreen does not make it less resolution, but to put it bluntly, the "blending" of pixels with smoothscreen definitely, without a doubt, causes an obvious loss of detail when viewed with the human eye. Whether you're a robot or a human, may depend of if Panasonic's smoothscreen is right for you.


I am not saying smoothscreen is a bad thing. If the screen door effect is a problem you have that drives you nuts, this is a superb feature. However, if the screen door effect isn't a problem you have in your home theater, SmoothScreen will cause an unnecessary hit on sharpness that you may not desire.

Panasonic dropped the ball again by not making this a feature you can disable.

If you want a 120Hz projector, get an Epson 6500 if you don't want smoothscreen, or a Panasonic AE3000 if you do.




Dust blobs are another problem to consider with the Panny. Can anyone link to a mod that worked with the AE2000? I'm sure many owner's of the 3000 will want to fix their filter ASAP once these start becoming available.



I'm keeping my eye on the 6500 and 3000, but dust blobs + smoothscreen on the AE3000 seems less appealing than no dustblobs and a sharper image on the Epson 6500.

There's always the Z3000...but we'll see when/if they sell anywhere for a reasonable price. (In all honestly, I was hoping the Z3000 would be priced much more competitively here, as I do like the system the Sanyo's have for handling dust yourself.
I mentioned in another thread that even the display AE2000 at a local Yodobashi camera had a pretty surprising amount of dust. How is this dealt with? Once you feel that you have an unacceptable level of dust, can you just send it off under warranty? Do they give you a loaner while yours is under repair? I'm not just asking about the AE2000/3000, I'm also interested in the Epsons, but since this is the PT-AE3000 thread, I'm hoping someone can at least give me some insight into that.

Look those photos from www.projectorreviews.com.

If the orange logo on left is not softer on AE2000 I don´t know what the word "soft" means.

AE2000:


Z2000:


HD80:


HC6000:

Personally based on those pictures, which I have seen many times before, I would choose the HD-80 first for best overall picture quality, then based on my viewing conditions I will get the Panasonic. I will put the HC-6000 as the worst of them all. There's no doubt that the Panasonic projector is the softest, you would have to be blind not to see that, but it seems to me that you would have be blind as well not to see the grid lines inside the letters. At the same time the outline of the letters are not as smooth on the HC-6000, which basically shows uneven lines around them. I have a 138" screen and my first row of seats in the theater are too close for a super sharp projector to would make grid lines too visible, so as I said before sharper does not mean a better picture on detail alone.

In a perfect world we would have a smooth screen and the sharpest image all together in one package and even then we would make different decisions based on specific set up requirements, so enjoy your Sanyo, etc and I will get the Panasonic 3000 when it comes out.

You are right. In some situations, like yours, smooth screen is a great feature.

But we can not say that smoth screen does not make the image looks softer than the others.

You can guess that the smooth screen is what makes the AE2000 look slightly softer in this comparison but the only way to prove it would be if there was a way to defeat Smooth Screen or if Panasonic made an identical model projector using exactly the same chips/ electronics/ and optical engine but without smooth screen.

If one compares two brands of 4dr sedan cars and the one with the sunroof has better acceleration, 0-60 miles per hour, that doesn't prove that sunroofs cause better acceleration.
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On a side note, I think this comparison has a major flaw: the total lack of screen door effect (SDE) and the smooth, less jagged diagonal lines of the letters "A" and "M" in the words "Master Audio" exhibited on the HD 80 suggests to me an intentional or at least "less critical" focusing of the HD80.

A very slight intentional mis-focusing of especially non-smooth screen projectors can indeed be a good thing, almost as good as smooth screen I might add, but in this comparison attempting to analyze SDE/sharpness/smoothness and such is a bit unfair if you ask me.

The sharper HC6000 picture with the jagged edjes is probably the best because it is the most "honest" by revealing the lack of resolution. It just means a higher resolution is needed for that particular viewing distance.

Until we get 4K resolution or higher, I'd rather adjust my viewing distance rather than blurring my pixels with smoothscreen or defocusing.

Well, let's take a look at the Panasonic AE2000, the Epson 1080UB, and the Mitsubishi HC6000. Since the both Panny's and Epson's next step up models are in direct competition for specs and pricing, the AE3000 and the 6500UB, those are the only two you should be comparing. I threw in the very sharp HC6000, just to remind you that Panasonic is not the only company to provide a decent picture without a distracting pixel structure.

Panasonic AE2000:

Epson 1080UB:

Mitsubishi HC6000:



When comparing these 3 directly, you can see that Epson's offering may be more of interest to you than you thought.

1080p with 'smooth screen' is a great combination. There are certain source materials which contain heavy grain and other poor encoding artifacts which when viewed on specific projectors like my "sharp 20000' make me want to switch on my panasonic 2000.

The previous comparison images which we have all seen a million times already show images from about a foot away from the screen or even closer which is pointless when normal viewing distances are involved.

At a 13' viewing distance from a 100" screen showing a 1080p source my panasonic 2000 looks identical to my sharp 20000 which IMO is the sharpest projector out there so I have an excellent comparison situation.

I get your point. Why is the Panasonic's picture always zoomed in?

Actually, the AE2000 has a flaw that the picture is slightly stretched vertically. They fixed that with the AE3000.

But yes, for some reason the camera is slightly zoomed in on the Panny shot. They probably did so to show off the smoothscreen?

Pictures like that don't mean squat!...The Panny Pic is Doctored...it is zoomed in and obviously slightly out of focus. It's BS. I have this projector and I am looking at a logo on mine similar to this DTS logo and it is razor sharp even from 5 feet away. Give me a break!...

Are there dust problems on the AE2000, if so, why ?
How do you know there are dust problems with the AE3000 ?
Why are there no dust problems with the Epson ?

Must be a government conspiracy.

Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Hallelujah . . . This AE3000 feature is a panacea for anyone with constant height set up like me. No need to manually zoom in and out every time you go from video to 2:35 movies - that's every day for me. Anamorphic lens set-up for movies may be nice for filthy rich, but the cost, bulkiness requiring more space, need to move lens- not to mention the need to squeeze the picuture digitally with processing, I think zooming out to fill 2.35 option is better in probably 99.9% of set ups. Black bars are a non-issue IMO as any decent set up is blacked out around the screen and they are not visible (even now with my AE900). More lumens, better contrast, motion processing 24p movies AND video, plus this feature . . . I'm definitely getting this PJ. Time to upgrade the AE900to 1080P ! Sweet.

Yes. No such thing as a truly sealed light path.

We don't, but it looks like the AE3000 is a revision of the AE2000, and the AE2000 does have dust issues, with no way for the end user to resolve them. (See Sanyo projectors for an example of how user intervention is possible)

The Epsons aren't immune to dust, but the 6100/7100 (TW3000) and 6500/7500 are a different body than the current models, which hopefully means an even better filtration system, and hopefully minimal dust issues. As far as I know, the new Epsons do not have a user serviceable way of dealing with dust blobs either.

I'd be very unhappy if they did not implement the extra frame software well for 24fps movies. I think this is important reason I would buy this projector. I can't see how the picture would actually be faster-it may look faster than you think it should, but perhaps that's actully the true speed? or as someone mentioned poor implementation software. I was hoping for not just interpolation, but black frame insertion (i.e. 4/4 with every other frame frame interpolated and every other frame black). I don't know perhaps this would create visible flicker. Never-the-less, I would like more details on the 24fps processing feature on the AE3000. I also think you need to be able to turn on/off any of these features so one can decide for themselves what they prefer. If they may have completely missed the mark on this technology for movies, then I'm definitely bummed out about it because I wanted to upgrade to a projector that had great state-of-the-art 24fps processing. I hope you have set something up incorrectly and it's not as you say-(i.e. off the bullseye) with regard to 24p processing

I agree and I would add that if you want to have a really big screen (mine is 12' wide) and sit less than 1.5 screen widths back (like I do at one width to get full movie theater effect) the lack of pixelation is a goog thing IMO. They should have smoothsrceen down to a science now. Many good points made here on the DTS logo re:Panasonic AE2000, the Epson 1080UB, and the Mitsubishi HC6000, but in the end your set up and personal preferences will determine which one is "best picture".

But there would be zero SDE at 1.5 screen widths without Smoothscreen, and SDE wouldn't even be visible down to about 1 screen width. So the number of people who benefit from Smoothscreen is very very small with the latest 1080p panels.

If you look at the TM (trademark) in the images you can see how far the convergence is off on each projector.

I was also hoping that 120 Hz would mean that 3:1 black frame insertion or 4:1 (if 24fps = 120 Hz) would be an option, since just one black frame would only mean losing roughly 25 or 20% of the brightness. This feature doesn't currently exist in any of the soon to be released 120 Hz projectors, correct?

Well this is the main counterpoint, but still doesn't change the benefit in my set-up. And I would add that if you construct your set-up to be able to have a big enough screen and sit in the sweet spot to get the THX recommended wide angle view (I forget the exact angles) then, you are about 1 screen width back and many people will be able to see some screen door effect even at 1080P. Now most people do probably sit 1.5 + screen widths back, but hey they are missing out on the full movie theater ambiance aren't they-it's not my problem (or Panasonic's) that most people don't have optimal set-up, but their projector with smoothscreen is considered useful for some that want to eliminate screendoor effect because we are less than 1.5 screenwidths away from our big screens and we don't like looking at movies (or parts of movies where it becomes obvious) through a screendoor even if it appears sharper to some people because of what is essentially artificial edge enhancement at the pixel level IMO.

"Looks like (frame creation software) is just 96hz (processing) from 24p sources, which isn't too bad. "

Does this mean the frame interpolation software will only work on 24fps input from Blueray or HDDVD, but not on DVD player standard output or HD sports from satillite sources?? What good is 100Hz processing if our main sources are 60Hz? Or will the AE3000 also use frame creation software at 120 Hz for 60 Hz material? That would be ok.

So you want artificial edge enhancement at pixel level, with added DNR as well? Because in your words according to the above, smoothscreen is DNR at pixel level IYO.


If you have screen door issues, than smoothscreen can be beneficial, I'm not arguing that. But to call a 1920x1080 projector that doesn't blur pixels as a form of artificial edge enhancement, is simply not the general attitude of videophiles. We all want 4k, it will be here one day,. For the time being, we either have to adjust our home theater arrangements for optimal viewing, or we can rely upon debatable features incororated in certain devices to achieve our goals. Most of us hate DNR and EE, and the same goes for both smoothscreen and 120Hz frame interpolation. Decide what works for you, but don't be surprised if purists remind you that sometimes it is best to leave good enough alone.