New Casio projectors: LED/Laser, 720p, compact - Page 3

Sure, I have too. But don't you want a 1920 x 1080 machine with this technology that produces a truley home-theater quality image?

I could care less about resolution. I've done 480p and 720P projectors and as long as you sit far back enough you'll never see the screen door. I had a 720P projector set to the point where I just couldn't see the screen door anymore.... I was sitting 8 ft away and the screen at about 103in was too big! I've got laser corrected eyes too so it's not like I have bad eyesight. So no I don't really care about 1080P. It be nice... but what I'd really like is the Contrast to be something more like 2500:1 or 3000:1.... 6000:1 would be a dream. I don't have a pitch black room right now so really it's the brightness that matters. Right now, I was using a sharp DT-400.... then the bulb blew... installed a new bulb... and the color wheel tore apart.

Forget about "screen door" for a moment...

Are you saying you can't actually see or appreciate the added RESOLUTION stepping up from 480 to 720 to 1080?

At 1.5 screen-widths, which is the proper viewing distance for film, 1080p is light-years ahead of 480p, and is visibly more detailed in comparison to 720p.

Sitting "far enough back" isn't the correct solution for judging resolution. Movies are composed by directors to be viewed wide-angle... to generate a 30 degree field of vision. If you sit farther than 1.75 screen widths back, you're just watching "TV" and not reproducing a movie at all. That's not home-theater, that's television.

Which isn't to say that there's anything morally wrong with watching movies in "television" mode, but you won't see the detail in the HD picture, or get the effect of visual impact, that the director intended you to see. In which case, why the heck to you want a projector?

Am i the only one who is not very convinced about this "mating" of hybrid technologies (laser and LEDs) for front projector illumination ?
How reliable can we expect it to be, considering that it uses a laser light source which needs a "fluorescent element" to change its color spectrum from blue to green and then must be integrated with a completely different light source, namely LED ?
Scanning the specs, i noticed that it states a blue laser w/fluorescent element for the green primary, a LED light source for the red primary, and no mention of what the unit uses as source for the blue primary, but i imagine it is also a LED.
Personally, i would be wary of this technology "mish-mash" and i think that at this point in time manufacturers should concentrate on both technologies as pj illuminators separately, with some companies specializing on lasers and others on LEDs.

Probably.

Also, why in the world would you assume they'd use a blue led for blue, if they're using a blue laser for green?
This suggests that a blue laser would be even brighter than their green one.
Never mind the fact that you're wrong about them not saying what they use for blue light to begin with:

"The high-brightness light of 2,000 or more lumens was then attained by projecting blue laser light, green light converted from blue laser light with the element, and light emitted by a red LED through a DLP® chip onto the screen."

I see very little to complain about other than the fact that this is a business projector. It would be nice to know the lumen of the projector @D65 though.

Kamus >>> Ah, if only the article's writer had inserted the indefinite article "A" as in "attained by projecting "A" blue laser light, "A" green light converted from blue laser light with the element, and "A" light emitted by a red LED", i would have noticed the inference to the blue primary being projected by a laser source !
Still, if Casio was able to find and use the two laser sources for color primaries which are the most expensive and troublesome to manufacture with a modicum of longevity, then why use a red LED for the red primary, when, afaik, red lasers as pj illuminators have been available for awhile now ?
That is my point of contention : more parts, more ancilliary controls needed, more heat generated and consequently diminished longevity/reliability....

I'd like to know the answer to this one myself, and i'm sure we're not the only ones.
As far as i know, the only problematic laser is a true green one, and i'm pretty sure i read somewhere that some japanese guys had finally invented a true green laser not too long ago, not that that helps a lot of manufacturers since it's probably patented.

Found the link to the green laser:

http://arstechnica.com/science/news/...splay-tech.ars

Another update, straight from their press release at:

http://global-sei.com/news/press/09/09_08.html

"We have applied for over 60 patents related to this technology."

Well... at least the thing exists now.

"That is my point of contention : more parts, more ancilliary controls needed, more heat generated and consequently diminished longevity/reliability...."

How is it more parts? More different parts, but different color LED's are a different part# as well.

I don't see why you're fussing about this; I commend them for picking the best current technology for the job.

Well Noah, i guess only time will tell when it comes to the reliability and life expectancy of an electronic item that uses brand-new technologies embedded together, packed tightly inside a plastic case that, i imagine, generates a large amount of internal heat considering its lumen output, ain't it so ?
By more parts, i meant the control board for the LED and, i imagine, a separate one to control the laser "flashing" in syncronization with the DMD chip....And what about that other fluorescent light source ?
I am also very excited that Casio and other manufacturers are FINALLY introducing pjs with illuminators that provide such output out of LEDs and lasers, and if companies found a way to combine them for such purpose, all power to them !
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Marcos

"i guess only time will tell when it comes to the reliability and life expectancy of an electronic item that uses brand-new technologies embedded together, packed tightly inside a plastic case that, i imagine, generates a large amount of internal heat considering its lumen output"

That has nothing to do with your original objection, which was that it used two different light source technologies.

"And what about that other fluorescent light source?"

I believe it's just the addition of the phosphor powder.

It's analogous to adding the phosphors on the inside surface of the glass tube that make a blacklight into a regular fluorescent light; I wouldn't count that as adding a light source.

You have a valid point, but for me... if I can't see the pixels on my current 720p at 110in diag. from 14ft away.... adding more pixels isn't going to change anything... I'll still see no pixels. Now if I moved my seat up 2 or 4 feet then maybe I'd look into getting 1080p.

Detail is more important than pixels IMO. For example with a SXRD I see blurry color shifting around at near 6 feet, then it looks like a soggy tissue from 4 feet. That was a 92" stewart screen I was looking at. CRT on my 6" CRT looked like a direct view CRT at 7 feet without the pixels. My DLP at 7.5 feet I see pixels if I am looking for them, defocused or not. I have never seen 720P except in some stores which looked very blurry IMO. I have 20/13 vision btw.

Yes, adding more pixels will most definitely change something!

You don't see pixel *structure* at the distance that you're watching... and that's great. But it doesn't mean you're seeing all the detail that's possible for your eyes to capture in a 1280 x 720 resolution image.

Want proof? Have someone walk up and stand next to your screen when there's an HD image with a person of approximately the same size. Can you see more detail in the face, hair, and clothing of the real-live person standing in your room 14 feet away from you than you see in the digital image on the screen? yep. That's because your eyes can see * vastly * more detail than a 110" 1280 x 720 matrix.

Going to a 1920 x 1080 image on your 110 screen, assuming you're watching good 1080p source material, will reveal noticeably more detail.

I wonder when Casio(or anyone) will come out with a 1080p LED projector, and what it will cost? If it was reasonably priced, I'd jump on that.

Yeah and that person would also be in 3D.... why don't you just complain about this projector not being able to shoot 3D while you're at it.

Your whole analogy only proves my point even more. That person has pores on there face and from 14 feet away I can't see them..... yes there are there, but who cares... There is a certain distance where the eye can't see anymore detail. My 22in 480i tube TV looks the same as my 110in 720p from 14ft....it's just that one is bigger than the other. Now if I walk up closer... yes I'll see the detail difference. Honestly, I'm done talking about this. And really this is just wasting someone's time who's trying to find something out about this projector. Convo over.

You say you can't see more detail from your 14 foot distance and 110" screen, I explain how you can, and now you're upset? That's not exactly a conversation.

Are you familiar with his visual acuity?

If so, fine, if not you're being presumptious to "expalin" anything about it.

And you would probably be wrong. As nate358 as stated, once you are far enough from the screen, 720p and 1080p are indistinguishable for most people. See the below link for real world proof.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=767929

With true 1080p source material that's full-resolution, anyone with good vision standing 14 feet away from a 110 inch screen would be able to see the improved detail.

My discussion was already taking into account the viewing angle that was provided: 14 feet from a 110 inch screen, which is just a tad farther that I sit from my own 1080p image in my own system (I sit 12 feet back from a 106" screen). 1080p is visibly more detailed, assuming that the source material was more detailed of course (ie, 1080p of a 16mm film doesn't look any different than 720p of a 16 mm film).

And yet the majority of 35 members of an av club viewing a 130" screen from 13-14 feet found the difference between 720p and 1080p subtle at best. Did you even read the link?

It's not just visual acuity either, it's physics. Light reflected from a projection screen is incoherent. Which means the light is going to scatter and the integrity of the image will break down at greater distances. This is why the image is also darker farther from the screen...those photons are simply not making it to your eyes. Can you shine a flashlight from earth and have it hit the moon? No. Can you use a coherent light source like a laser and accomplish the same feat? Yes.

That's 1.75 screen widths, well into the range where many people can't tell the difference.

Very good link and a very valid point to leverage some discussion.

One thing I noticed in that thread:


Did anyone else notice that their HD content was only 1080 interlaced? In that case, not only are you losing vertical resolution because in 2006 you can bet that they deinterlacing for the 1080p output wasn't doing 3:2 pulldown reversal (probably just bob/weave), but the "live" shot 1080i demo material would have been vertically filtered during shooting to minimize aliasing.

I'd like to see the same demo with real, actual, native 1080p captures... like some high quality blu-ray disc material sent to the PJ in unprocessed 1920 x 1080 native. I can assure you that Ratatoullie looks noticably more detailed in 1080 than downresed to 720 on my older BenQ 8700. Perhaps if this AVS shootout had been performed with full-resolution 1920 x 1080 (progressive) material, the results would have been less ambiguous. NOTE: when they did the followup test a year later with HD DVD, they *still* used 1080i which very well could diminish the final resolution depending on the type of deinterlacing engine.


For the record, it's never been contested that 720p and 1080i are "on par" with each other. The vertical filtering in 1080i tends to make it roughly the resolution equivalent of 720p, and in fast action 720p capture may actually be better.

Want proof that you can see the resolution limits of 1280 x 720? Here's a good way to take the issue of non-optimal source material out of the equation.

Pull up the CGI menu on your 720p projector. if it maps the menu graphics 1:1 with pixels on the screen (without applying some sort of blurring/anti-aliasing) you'll be able to do this.

So assuming you've got "icon style" graphics and text now up on your screen. Look at the "round" edges of the text. Can you see the stair-stepping of the pixel edge as the text tries to render a smooth curve? If you have normal vision and you have a good projector that can really throw those pixels on the screen (obviously having a filter or defocus to smooth pixels won't work here), you're demonstrating that your eyes can see the "noise floor" if you will of the 1280 x 720 matrix at that 1.5-1.78 distance. For me personally, by 2 screen widths the pixel-edges disappear on my 720p projector. But at 1.5 screen widths with a tight focus, I can see the stair-stepping of what is supposed to be a curve even where the graphics generator is using every available pixel to try to "map" the curve.

From the same distance, looking at 1:1 pixel text on my 1080 projector reveals much smoother curves.

If you don't have a menu system that can do this, just hook up your PC and map 1:1 to the resolution of your projector, and view the windows desktop and see if you can see the edges of the pixels in 720.

Again, if you have a 720 machine that's softening the picture by blurring pixel edges to make them less bothersome, that's not proof that 720p matches your human vision... just that your PJ design is not delivering the full image resolution to the screen. Also worth noting is that not all 1080p projectors can really deliver 1920 x 1080 resolution to the screen: chromatic aberation and inferior optics are one reason that many so called "1080p" projectors don't really show you actual 1080 resolution in practice. Similarly, the pixel-pixel interaction of LCOS also means that you many not get real full 1920 x 1080 resolution with some LCOS products.

Good single-chip DLP with high quality optics and no chromatic aberation should be able to deliver real 1920 x 1080 resolution. I'm also interested in Sony's new vw 85 that appears to not sacrifice sharpness unlike many of its SXRD predecessors.

That is funny, as there sure seemed to be a lot of people that were attending his demos at Cedia. Based on your premise, Amir is no longer an expert because he was in the HDDVD camp. Just because someone guessed wrong doesn't mean they are no longer relevant.

agreed. You're correct. But such a drastic lack of vision about the evolution of HT technology and where it ought to go IMO is cause for reserve about donning an industry icon with the crown of 'expert'...

Sure, both JK and Amir are "experts" in some ways in some areas. But I'd take their convictions with a grain of salt ... worth hearing about and learning from, but hardly the gospel truth about all things image quality related.

Ah yes and this thread is now way off topic.

not that everyone's vision is exactly the same, but assuming a projected image is really preserving the full native resolution and the viewer has average-good eye sight:

I just was at my country's launch of the Casio Green Slim laser projector, and I'm not particularly impressed. For one, it has a 2-color wheel, so you get rainbow effects. For another, the green color alignment was off on both demo models by several pixels.

Well, it's not surprising that is unimpressive when it comes to that, it is after all just a cheap business projector.

Now onto what really matters about it: What did you think about it's brightness? did it have a lot of bias towards one particular color?

Since this has become a thread on resolution debate, here are my thoughts.
- I sit 10' from a 100" screen, I can easily see pixels on 720p. That's why I chose 1080p. And that's MY preference.
- Why would I want my 1080p source downscaled to 720p?
- 720p is not adequate for computer use.
- For people saying we should be at 4k, think about the quality and price of lenses you'd need.

Well, red and blue were both lovely and bright, but green was again slightly weak- no surprise as it's just recycled blue light.

It makes a lot of fan noise on maximum power, but eco mode 2 is practically silent- good enough for movies.

They showed a DVD in a room about as well lit as the average hotel lobby, and it looked fine- I could see people using this in a room lit by artificial lights, but probably not in a room that gets lots of daylight.

I tried turning off the lights in the demo room, set it on eco mode and it was pretty nice.