DP-1200 Obsessional...  

The Barco Digital cinema DP-1200 are beginning to ship as we speak. While hundreds of videophiles are satisfied with the images provided by 1080p 3 chip dlp units including some with novel adaptive contrast enhancement techniques, there are a few rabid perfectionists who demand the ultimate possible image quality.

The Barco DP-1200 is the ticket to the ultimate videophile experience and on it's own offers significant improvements over Barco's own Dp-1500 and DP-2000 units. Let's discuss!


Professional Pledge:

I CINERAMAX hereby avow that henceforth I shall dedicate most of my awake time (18 hours a day on a 366/7 basis) to the perfection and improvement of the DP-1200 platform as it applies to PROSUMER SCREENING ROOMS and Bel-Air Digital Circuit Systems which through exerted first initiative, I have become the defacto coordinator of sorts for the South Florida Bel-Air Digital Circuit; better known as the: Miami BADC.

Phase one involves the creation of a DP-1200 Obsessional Webpage:

www.miamibadc.com

Phase two involves in association with a couple of the greatest companies in the field (perhaps coinciding with the newly relocated SHOWEAST @ SoBe ) the creation of a CLOSE PROXIMITY and 3-D critical review room for the SuperKontrast modded DP-1200. And what a better international destination location than South Beach to have this advanced laboratory available to the world's most ardent videophiles, premiere custom installers and their clients to experience two things:

1) A DP-1200 properly mounted and installed accessibly to warranted interested parties to be able to do critical image quality evaluations with the most advanced sources in 2 and 3-D. With the opportunity to look under the hoods and understand the electrical installation (part ups, upconversion of 120 to 240), the lamp housing and adjustments, the air handling system, and the convergence controls. Because the projector will be naked "al fresco" there will be ambient noise in the room for which we have on purpose made the room a Dolby Surround Headphone audio experience. There are plenty of impressive surround sound demonstrations, with the quality of today's equipment it takes serious cerebral damage to mess up the sound.

2)The Fourth Dimension: A correctly implemented D-Box system will be complementing the world's greatest image. The purpose of it is to enlight the viewer in one of three facts. He who creates an ultimate viewing room and does not incorporate D-Box is one of three things: A) Means challenged (we feel your pain) , B) Ignorant (that is 99.9 percent of you), C) A F_cking Idiot (there always are a few of those around). We will have done the due diligence to help you sort out the category to pigeonhole yourself IN !

While I have made this facility a top priority and hopefully you will follow it's development here... For now I introduce you to the Greatest Projector in the History of Home Theater :

CAPTIONS TO COME>>>

But enough teasing....

What are the advantages of the DP-1200?

The projector comes fitted with the 2kw xenon lamp with which it was tested at the factory, that is good in most cases because a) the lamp is pre targeted and centered correctly and B) it has been focused for maximum light output, uniformity and lack of flickering (an improperly focused lamp will flicker).

That is a saving on the lamp, and the lamp installation and focussing- as long as the projector does not get banged up on the way to you.

Hi Norman Barco extimates that with CLO this screen is good for 18 foot lamberts continous on a 25 foot screen. But that is at 2k, the dual aperture mod that is ray traced (the MKIII AP mod) will reduce light output by 40%. The on/off contrast is in the 4,500 range. For those that want to bitch about 20,000 contrast go elsewhere, it is totally irrelevant in the context of the image you are getting with 99.9 percent of scenes which is the Ne Plus Ultra and otherwise UNACHIEVABLE by any other display device.

Another advantage is that when there is less than 2kw being consumed all Barco projectors lower the fans and associated noise significantly- the DP1200 is the quieter of these noisy beasts.

The one thing that truly makes the DP-1200 better than it's senior brethren is the convergence adjustability, that is world class very few projectors have this level of convergence adjustability and it truly sets this projector apart in that regard WHICH IS EXPONENTIALLY more crucial when projecting 3-D, the projecotr handles the Dolby 3-D wheel just like it's big brothers.

While the Dolby system is currently only for DCI stereoscopy , I believe that it can be used for gaming and other steroscopic applications.

The Dolby 3-D method has the highest MTF of all the 3-D methods and seems to be the Videophile's best practice.

Ah and finally the power connectivity. On the bigger projectors it is recommended practice to have a ups, try getting a ups for a 4.5 kw load, it is huge and noisy annheavy.

If you look at the graphic above there is a power jumper cable, if you disconnect this you can use a UPS rated at 550w just for the electronics section and feed the lamp with a 20 amp straight feed. So you can have a 15 amp and 20 amp circuit feeding the projector [which presents interesting opportunities in the home for using 120volt transformers instead of the 220 required]. I am already designing the self contained rack system that will handle all the power management from dual 120 volt feeds.

The projector is modular and improvements to the light engine and integratioon of the TI circuits will be forward compatible, essentially the last projector you will ever need.

For hush box installs there is a 1,300 optional rear firing port that makes for a very sexy exhaust alternative. For those that plan to use a Crestron control, the unit is IP controllable and any of the macro profiles can be called upon. In Prometheus we have three depth effect adjustments through Gamma and three Lamp Power Intensity presets.

Actually I counted three compliments deleted and one Angry person's post get deleted.

Science smience (too much theory for me) it should be about ultimate image quality and that is buddy where your obsession with numbers DOES NOT ADD UP.

This is my Barco DP1200 obsessional thread, whatever I had to prove go read Helene and Prometheus (two of the finest home theater images of the present time).

When you see what post production houses are using and how they are using it, it has no relation to what CRT and Most 3 chip 1080p dlp's look like. That is no lie I am a mere observer. Since 1979 when I formed Fermont Home Theater (possibly the first use of the term Home Theater as applied to using video projection for home)[we don't claim to have invented anything but naming a company that- I remember my father asking me despectively "who wants to wacth movies at home?"] Since then I have been doing expert viewing of high end video displays and always have re-invested more than the logical portion of it in such observational research. Lately I was commissioned to design those high end rooms and after 6 conventions and several trips to the west coast settled on the logical solution.

I totally dislike compulsive obsessive CRT Black fanatics because they generally fail to see the benefits of a true film-like medium. If I had to pick the benefits of this image I would say maximum MTF and correct colorimetry (something you apparently refuse to experience with your crt and pumping dlp).

I DO NOT LIKE EXAGGERATED 20K CONTRAST because it deviates from the actual with which DCI movies are transferred at. By the same token my brain rejects LOW MTF PROJECTORS like CRT's and the flavor of the month 3 chipper with pumping mechanism (which took the cake by being the highest ansi cr. -which should have given it a high MTF quotient and then filtering all high frequecies with some sort of absurd notch filter that renders closeups looking like an overblown JPEG).

I believe in increasing the native contrast ratio of these DCI projectors,in fact I broke the record twice first for the .98 chip platform and am pushing for a rec 709 version of the projector for studio mastering (which apparently will happen with a PJ named DP-1500P )but the reality of this is that you get into the diminishing returns territory due to the 15 degree mirror tilt limitation.Then there are all the other advantages when compared to even the best 1080p 3 dlp's.

OK to recap, a dci image will have the most MTF, the sharpest presentation, the cleanest looking (high s/n), the best frame rate capability (144hz), the best optics and illumination system, the most sophisticated image control and calibration capability, that yields the world's most accurate color. Why? Because TI decided to pour 70 million dollars into it and having the best possible image quality in very close proximity applications was the GOAL , and you know what? They did it right. There is also some basic manufacturing 101 common sense. All DCI projector parts are cherry picked each one be it an iontegrtor rod, a dlp, a lamp reflector they all represnt the top 3% of the manufacturer's runs. I think that alone accounts for what we see at the final product stage (or what we do not see -pixelation, ringing lens flaring etc.etc.).

I am saying that you cannot get this kind of image for any amount of money in the consumer world (see Meridian).

If you still insist on bitching after my candid professional opinion then do like I did, go visit three post production rooms and see what they are using, then come back and report.

No problem, the importance of frame rate is not relevant on the surface, but with 3-D coming down the Blu Ray pike for 2010 having 144 refresh rate affords triple flash, the smoothest panning potential for 3-D.

In addition I expect to see powerful video processing for 24 fps based motion compensated frame interpolation to be available DUE TO AN INCREASE IN THE NUMBER OF 120-144hz displays.

I will ask my buddies when they are doing a new post house setup if I can get you in and PM you. IN THE MEANTIME HERE IS A LIST OF BARCO FACILITIES: Post Logic, Hollywood DI, IVC, Company 3, DreamWorks, the post production operations of Warner Bros., Efilm, Deluxe Labs, DR Group, Hydraulx, Matchframe/Wildfire, Cinema Pixel, Stealing Time, PostWorks, Autodesk’s Canada facility, Imagi, HTV, IO Film, Chapman, NT Audio, Digital Jungle, Encore Video, Kerner Optical and Pace.

My crt comment applied only to PJ's. In the past I have used CRT's (PJ's and monitors), Sony created the BVM series in response to the Asaca Shibasoku' s very successful 20" (2010? had one of those for awhile). Barco 9 inch crt's(the very first hd units that came to the usa) I set up with Torus screens, also pioneered Torus screens and to this date believe there is no match for them when positioned correctly the optical coupling effect is highly comfortable and organic, more so than any other form, ANOTHER ADVANTAGE TO THE BARCO which is ideal for Torus screens due to it's flexible masking system, and focusing depth of field. That would not be possible with a Titan or a Sim5000.

It is important to note that even though I was involved with one G-90 with a 2.8 Torus system upgrade in 2000 I went on a 4 year projection systems sabbatical shortly after the arrival of 3 chip dlp in 1999 (my PlasmaTvGuru.com years with the Fujitsu only store - a very short lived attempt ).

Having experimented with an early sony VPH-1800 svga 3 chip dlp in 1999 I fell in love with the higher MTF, the color and brightness, whilst simultaneously seeing insufficient pixel count. Rather than doing what everyone else did (g-90' installations) I decided i would wait until such time as TI would perfect the technology; not until SHOWEAST 2004 was I able to find a suitable projector in the NEC iss-8? line.

At that time all we could hope to get out of a DCI unit was 1800 on/off. That is when Odyssey first commissioned Barco to mod a DP-100 for contrast enhancement. He has been my mentor in the process of maximizing these .98 chip Barco's for HT use and is the best equipped enthusiast when it comes to instrumentation for calibration. He truly is the one member in this forum that has earned my unqualified respect, but enough about Odyssey, this is about the DP1200.

Next question?

As part of the comprehensive review of all the aspects of the DP-1200, I have recently received documentation on the Dolby Server part of the equation, I am digesting and will post a short summary on how the system is setup as it applies to the DP-1200 and ancillary HT equipment present in it's installation.

I will also discuss control options from a touchscreen remote.

No - Screw your idiotic posts. Let's all place Donald on Ignore.

Thank you Norman for your support it is greatly appreciated. I wont be seeing one until next month so please let us know. of course with a 2kw lamp there is a certain gamma that works best, but that I will cover another day.