Benq W1200 and W1100 thread - Page 2

I am currently right in the middle of installing my 1100, picked it up yesterday. Projecting on a 90 inch white screen. Watched a movie yesterday with cables hanging all over because it is more important to watch something than fix cables in a nice way
First impressions are very positive. Did some basic changes to brightness and so on but nothing major. Very bright, nice punch and surprisingly nice colors.
I believe this is a keeper.

Edit: Played around a bit and I am confused about the settings. I have everything going through a Onkyo 3007 receiver. when I start a Blu-ray from an LG 390 player all settings for picture are available - Brightness, color, tint and so on. But when I start my Mac mini with a media software (Plex) or my Xbox 360 I am only allowed to change brightness and contrast, not color, sharpness or anything else? Everything else is greyed out, what have I missed?

i dunno for sure, but try change video signal to Video sourse instead of Computer. I forgot where it is, probably in HDMI section.

Thank's for helping out. didn't work though.

No go on Xbox 360 connected with HDMI to the Onkyo Receiver and then to Benq also via HMDI.

No settings on Mac Mini Connected via DVI/HDMI to receiver and then to projector via HDMI.

Only brightness and contrast can be changed in pic settings. Does not matter if I set signal to PC or Video in HDMI settings. Can't find anything else in settings that looks like it will do the trick.

It annoys me a little.

I haven't even attempted any calibration yet, but you should try turn Brilliant Colour On/Off, I remember reading somewhere that unlocks some settings.

I think brilliant color on/off unlocks advanced color management but not basic settings.

According to this review by projectorcentral, http://www.projectorcentral.com/benq...tor_review.htm, this is a glitch in the menu. Turning brilliant color on is the only way to adjust some settings. I agree with the review.

Also, has anyone noticed the digital noise/dithering they were talking about? I have noticed that there are tiny flickering dots in a light background such as snow. A good example is the outside winter scene in the movie "Misery" Are tiny flickering dots digital noises? It makes the scene unnatural.

This is not the problem I am having, my issue is that from a computer or xbox 360 I canno do changes to anything but brightness and contrast on the basic picture page. It always defaults to certain values, even if I have made a user 1 profile with color set to "10" and then try to load it while with the xbox it just defaults to "0" and is greyed out. It does not matter which refrence mode I am using or anything else it seems, feels like I tried everything. Why would some basic settings be locked like this?

Edit: Been playing around with no success, it must be a setting somewhere I missed.
Playstation 3 - only brightness and contrast
Xbox 360 - only brightness and contrast
Mac mini - only brightness and contrast
TV/HD box - all settings
Blu-ray player - all settings

It is only the settings on basic page that are greyed out. All other color management features, brilliant color, color 3d space and so on are ok.

Oh I just checked and I have same issue. My sourse is HTPC and Xbox and also connected via AVR. Its not a biggie though. Dont really need those I think. But its another sign that the firmware is raw.

Thank's for checking.

I usually do an easy calibration using DVE and for this I think I need to access color and tint. Isn't it strange that these basic settings are greyed out for some sources?

Firmware bug?

there are other avaliable settings for color calibration. I am too lazy to turn the PJ and computer on now but I am sure there is a possibility to change colors. AFAIR there is 3d color option and soemthing else.

The French review website now states that both the W1200 and W1100 have DC2.

"The manufacturer BenQ projectors is a staunch supporter of the DLP-based projection. We finish today's tests of its new line of spring 2011, with the model W1200. This projector positioned at a public price of 1299 EUR has several attractive characteristics. It is equipped with a Dark Chip 2 DMD chip, its internal video processing includes an interpolation mode image and finally, it receives certification ISF (Imaging Science Foundation) and has tools for adjusting the ad hoc colorimetry . So many options that were found only on far more expensive projectors."

"The W1100 is equipped with an optical system optimized for Full HD. The latter is composed of 12 lens elements to offer the best clarity and perfect sharpness in every image. With a 230W UHP lamp whose light bounces flow on micro-mirrors in the dark chip 2 chip from Texas Instrument, the W1100 offers the combination of a high native contrast associated with a light power, a pledge good dynamic image."

I honestly thought the W1100 had a DC3 when I bought it. Love the PQ, but I am pissed about the lack of/misinformation from the various review website and from Benq.

+ About DC2/3

Although Kraine from here was adamant it was a DC3 chip... or he is the same guy from the French review site?

I set up a 130" artists canvas screen in the weekend, with white primer on it.

WOW. What an amazing picture. With no light coming in, the blacks were black and the colours were simply phenomenal, popped right off the screen at you.

Watched BBC - Life videos, not even in HD, and it was easily the best picture I've ever seen in anybodies home.

Will settle on a paint for the screen this week, and might book in a projector tuner to come by and calibrate it for me, would it be worth it? I haven't done any calibration at all, and the picture still looks perfect to me.

I'll take a pic tonight from my iphone of my set up. I wanted a 150" screen, but could only find canvas 73" high, and looking at it, it is MASSIVE. 3 metres wide. 150" would have been overkill.

Any idea if you can power the on-board speakers through HDMI? I have an nVidia GTX 560 Ti feeding the projector, but there is no HDMI audio device in my Windows XP. Do I need to install an nVidia HDMI audio driver, or upgrade my motherboards on-board sound device?

+1 on the PQ.

Just watched the Fifth Element Superbit DVD tonight. I have watched this DVD many times before, but it had never looked better. The W1100 just makes everything lifelike. The scene when the Diva sings in the theater made me feel like I was being in that theater. Space crafts just jump out of the screen. WOW!

I made some very basic calibrations using one of those calibration discs. I am very happy with the PQ. I really don't understand what reviewers are saying about this projector needing complicated calibrations to achieve the best PQ. But I suppose this is true with all projectors.

I hook up my Win7 netbook to my W1100 and get HDMI audio just fine. Don't know about XP. Sorry, I can't help you with that.

the reviewers are usually lacking cinemetic taste and they replace it with their obsession of numbers and diagrams which have nothing to do with the real experience of users. I agree that the PJ is amazing and personally i believe that there is no better projector on the market

in sense : it is totally satisfying all my needs. More expensive solution is simply not required. (but i do expect the firmware update).

Went to Fry's to pick up a copy of "The Mask of Zorro" bluray for $8. I check the AV area every time I go there. Spent about 1 hr looking at Mitsubishi rear projection tvs, a $4,000 Sony LCD display, and a $2,500 Panasonic plasma display. The only thing these displays have over my W1100 is brightness. My W1100 is sharper than most and the PQ is better than most.

I know that's a bold statement but the PQ of the W1100 is just more natural than those displays I saw.

Of course. Once you connect the PJ to HTPC you will probably have the hdmi audio driver enabled. If it doesnt happen then its some driver issue.

Yeah there is a driver issue. Trying to to into the extracted nVidia drivers folder and running the HDAudio setup returns something like "There is no compatible hardware found on your computer." Time it get rid of XP I thinks.

How big are your guys screens? I re-calculated mine at it's 136" diagonal, and it's plenty bright in the dark, too bright even on white scenes, but does suffer a bit with the lights on. This is probably because the light in my cave is a single 500w flood light.

Can I zoom it out when the lights are on for a smaller, brighter picture, or do I have to physically move the projector closer?

Does zooming in reduce PQ? I've got it on the floor at max zoom atm and I am going to roof mount it soon, and was wondering if having it zoomed out and further back would have better quality and/or dimmer?

My screen is about 92'' and used in a small bedroom setup. That's about as big as I can go because the throw distance is only 9.5ft. I have the projector as the widest zoom to fill the screen. So far I have no experience with the long zoom. The W1100 has a total of six modes with different levels of brightness. If one particular mode is too bright, I can easily fix that by choosing another mode with less brightness.

less the zoom brighter the image. but then again you will have white area surrounding the image and this white area around the picture will cancel the overall perception gain. the screen should be same size as the image and bordered by darker material.

I'm not sure why BenQ doesn't put up publicly how the new models have 4x color wheel. Nor do I know why they don't publicly put the DC2 confirmation.

The one thing I do know and can confirm with you guys is that it seems that the new W1100 has extremely amazing picture quality, and I think the main cool features that keeps it as an attractive buy is the features it bolsters. It's pretty cool that BenQ added the picture in picture function which will be great for people who enjoy gaming while watching news or movie at the same time. 1.5 zoom is also extremely beneficial on the W1100. I can't wait to purchase one of these but unfortunately may be a while before I can gather the cash for it... been traveling a bit too much lately... sigh

I'm curious though. Will anyone be interested in the W1200 for its 24p interpolation and slightly higher cs ratio? Has anyone been able to get ahold of it? The price gap between the 2 models aren't that large right?

I am also curious about the comparison between the 1100 and 1200. Seems as though everyone has gone with the 1100.

It's the money, mate. The W1100 sells at that magic $1K price point. People who buy entry level projectors are mostly first time projector buyers and an occasional cheapskate like me who don't want to pay over $1K for a projector. I can tell you that the laws of diminishing returns is amplified greatly in the world of projectors. I have been to Magnolia and Fry's and watch much more expensive projectors in professional theater/demo rooms and always leave with a smile knowing that I am not really missing much with my W1100.

So true!

The performance on the W1100 and W1200 really sounds superb! I found W1200 on ProjectorPeoples if someone is interested. We should push PP to do a simple review comparison on W1100 and W1200. Perhaps through a video demonstration and simple tests to see if there is a a big different in performance. That would be helpful I think that would be the main concern of most people - if there is a large performance gap.

Any thoughts on comparison to the Mitsubishi HC4000?

I am sure hc4000 is a good PJ, close to w1100 in PQ, but i agree with the text from coderguy in hc400 thread:

"After watching a Plasma on and off all week, I actually find the Plasma's bright scene POP to be more of an advantage to projectors than the Plasma's dark scene POP. Yes, the Plasma goes way way darker in dark scenes of course, but it also has better color than projectors in bright scenes and a Plasma has a VERY sharp picture probably even sharper than a DLP. The funny thing is, once I go back home and lose the ability to watch the 50" Plasma, I'll miss the Plasmas bright scenes more than its dark scenes, haha. It definitely has some very VIVID color better than any projector, unfortunately. I still find dark scenes less important than bright scenes, no matter what display I'm watching."

Benq w1100 should have more vibrant colors and thus better choice for me. Also with gamma 2.6 or even 2.8 and some playing with contrast and brightness I achieved very deep blacks.
POP = perception of picture.

We can assume the Benq produces a very nice image, based on reviewers and user reports, probably every bit equal to the Mits hc4000, perhaps even slightly above in some respects, perhaps slightly below in others.

My best guess without seeing the two projectors side-by-side, remember a best guess, is that the Benq w1100 will beat the Mits hc4000 for overall sharpness including sharpness uniformity across the entire screen, this could be a TINY TINY advantage over the Mits for some video games, but for TV or movies it shouldn't matter. Again, just a guess until more reviewers confirm it.

As far as color, it is impossible to say without seeing the two side-by-side, both the Mits and Benq's are so close in native contrast that the colors after calibration should be very very close, should be practically identical. Bit rate schemes and all that is more marketing stuff than reality, color accuracy is more important as well as primary color and gray scale calibration accuracy.

My best guess is these projectors are VERY VERY similar in overall PQ, probably most people could not tell the difference in most situations. The Mits hc4000 may have slightly better black levels, but that is not confirmed yet, and we know the Benq w1200 is supposed to have even better black levels than the Benq w1100.

The Benq does kill the Mits at one thing, and that is brightness, both best mode and overall. With the Benq, a very nice GIANT image is easily obtainable on a VERY large screen. The Mits hits limitations at over 130" to 140", the Benq can be pushed even farther.

I wish I could compare these projectors, and maybe I will, but was hoping someone else that has done many comparisons would save me the trouble. You really need both projectors side-by-side to do a proper comparions. Even as much as I have viewed projectors and compared, I would be hesistant to trust my memory alone, especially in a comparison that I expect to come out almost too close to call.

I agree about review sites not being the ultimate source of information, they have led me astray one too many times. The best sites I have found are Cine4home and projectorreviews.com, with some caveats. Art @ PJ Reviews is a very very good reviewer, one of the absolute best, but he tends to overrate black levels, which distorts any findings. That said, he sometimes does go into bright scene pop and often goes into skin tones too, but I don't trust the calibrations they do over there enough to be valid. You can trust one thing he does do, and that is black level comparisons. I'm not saying his black level comparions are perfect, no-ones are, but what I am saying is for the most part I have come to the same black level conclusions he has, which re-affirms my trust in this aspect of his testing.

I will wait to see what he says about black levels.

One thing is for certain, you are VERY unlikely to EVER beat the image of the Benq w1100 for under $1000
(I think almost guaranteed it will be the best at this price).

I watched "Sin City" a month ago and w1100 performed very close to perfection in terms of blackness and perception of black and grey. But not perfect. After that I painted my screen with tikkurilla H499 so now my screen is grey and today I am gonna watch "The Universe" series.

Heh, the universe series is the ultimate black level test, as long as the correct episode is playing which shows some pure black renders. I've said this before, don't mean to be repetetive, but this show is so good at testing black levels because some of the backgrounds are computer renders done at true absolute black (0,0,0 RGB / IRE 0), whereas a camera in a real video feed picks up light and does not do absolute black usually even in a starfield.