Sim2 Worlds first Active 3D LED projector. - Page 6

I was hoping for higher, but these numbers are not surprising. I get around 500 lumens from my MICO50 which uses the same LED chipset for the light source. The rest of the light engine has been redesigned in the 150, though, and I was hoping for a larger gain.

As has been pointed out, we can't rely on the absolute value of these measurements as there's just too many variables among meters and projector settings. My CA813 meter reads quite low on my MICO50, so low that I no longer use it.

In any event, 550+ lumens on your size screen presents a punchy image I am sure.

Bob

re HK effect, I have never had an LED in my personal theater so I jsut can't say. That said, I've had input from others who I trust who say it does look brighter than they would have guessed so there appears to to be some real validity to the claim.

But as justmike said, it is surprisingly low since I think it's predecessor measured higher IIRC. That could be from meter error as the inexpensive meters aren't incredibly accurate. But it would have to be grossly wrong to put the calculations in the 1000 lumen range.

The thing people have to remember though is whatever this puppy starts off at is what it ought to be for it's original owner's ownership time. Other PJ's like the popular JVC in this brightness range *may* start off brighter, but will drop substantially over a relatively short bulb lifetime.

Wow was hoping for more light. Hopefully it is the meter. I measured somewhere about 540 on a Mico 50 so this is not much of a bump, however, zoom, lens and even calibration affect this so hopefully it is a little higher, but I am not sure the added price of the 150 is worth the few added calibrated lumens.

Looking forward to more numbers as people buy this PJ.

I own a Runco Q-750D LED pj and after reading the spec sheet for the Mico 50 pj and noticing that it uses the same "high efficiency" PT-120 R/G/B chipset from Luminus Devices i wondered how did Sim2 manage to essentially double the lumen output of the Mico 50 while still employing the same LED light source; If these measurements are correct, they would seem to indicate that either the company used a much smaller screen (perhaps high gain ?) to arrive at such specs OR it is another case of manufacturer's hyperbole.
I could be wrong but i don't think that Sim2 engineers would be willing or even capable of increasing the output of the PT-120 LED chipset at will simply to claim they have the first LED pj to break the 1.000 lumen barrier; I imagine that could lead to an increase of premature failure due to internal heat build-up.
At least i won't feel envious any longer of this supposed increase in lumen output of this "new generation" of LED pjs, ha !
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Marcos

Here's something interesting...when I put the projector into Overlap, SMPT-C, Native and jack the brightness from 50 to 60, I'm coming up with 1067 (36FC x 29.66 sq ft).

OK that makes sense Pete. They are measuring in the non accurate mode (overlap) and may have things pumped up similar to the way the Vango get 1000 lumens.

marketing marketing marketing.

Well to their credit, they do preface the 1100 ANSI specification with the modifier "up to". It's common for manufactures to specify brightness non-calibrated. But you'd think that with over 1000 ANSI uncalibrated, the calibrated number would come in quite a bit north of what I'm measuring. It makes me wonder if my calibration or my player or something is not right. I don't have a colorimeter, so I'm having to rely on the D65/HDTV/Gamma 2.2 settings to put me close to the mark (which in the past put me within 100 IRE of D65).

Measurements notwithstanding, the image quality is very, very, VERY satisfying. And at the end of the day, that's what matters to me.

What is "overlap"?

Pete: On your size screen the brightness works in your favor. If it were 100 you'd need to use a Joe Kane extra negative screen.

This figure is perfect for my screen, but for 2D. I wonder how much I could push into less calibrated territory to get some extra 3D brightness.

"Overlap" is a display mode available in the MICO (and maybe the other LED pj's) that drives the RGB LED's such that an increase in brightness of 20-25% is achieved at the expense of color accuracy and noise. The user manual is virtually silent on just what this mode does. Here is what it says:


I have measured the affects on the color accuracy, but I don't have it at my fingertips to show you now. (The image is certainly watchable, but not ideal.)

I always use mine set to the "Normal" mode.

Bob

I was suspicious when I realized that the part numbers for the led units had not had not changed

550 for most people is enough light for 2d but not for 3d

If you buy a meter which has a Nist certification does that insure the meter is accurate?

I've got two 3D memories...one at D65 for "normal" movies and documentaries that are shot in fairly bright settings (outdoors and brightly-lit interior shots), and one for "dark" movies and documentaries...'Hugo', for example...where I set it to D75 with some brightness boost. If I need to, I can throw it into Overlap and really jack it up, but this comes at the expense of some contrast. I find 3D so captivating that I'm really not cogniscent of slight aberrations in color temperatures.

I'm a little confused when you say brightness boost. Do you mean you jacked up the contrast setting? The brightness setting has little effect on the lumen output. The contrast is the control that needs to be set as high as you can adjust it without blowing out the whites. I set mine using my Radiance or the Spears & Munsil BR disk so that I'm able to display a few levels above 100%. Although I could get a few more lumens by setting it higher, I like to have a little margin above white.

The proper settings differ substantially depending on whether the input is RGB or YCbCr. For RGB input my settings are B=56, C=48. For YCbCr my settings are B=50, C=50 (incidentally the defaults). I don't use YCbCr as the projector won't normally display BTB nor WTW. It also limits slightly above 90%. This can sometimes be remedied by cycling dynamic black on and off, and then it will display BTB and WTW. I find this a pain in the butt, so I always use RGB input. But it will revert back upon the next power cycle. The MICO needs a firmware update to correct this, but since it has been discontinued I don't see this happening. I would assume this has been fixed on the M150, but I'd be very interested to know. Since I use a Radiance I can set its output to either RGB or YCbCr, so this is no huge inconvenience for me.

Sorry...I did mean contrast brightness. The software on the M.150 is very different from the MICO 50. I'm still trying to wrap my head around some of the terminology. "Parametric", for example. It does have lots of memory possibilities, though. It remembers your last settings for both 2D and 3D and automatically goes there depending on which format you feed it. There are half a dozen assignable user memories. And it also remembers by input.

Very good Pete. It seems they have made a lot of improvements. I hope they implement some of them on the other MICO projectors.

Pete, any update on your observations? My Mico 50 hast to go in for repair, and I am considering taking the opportunity to upgrade to the 150.

I am wondering if you have measured the difference in On/Off CR, one area I feel lacking on the 50? Is there a significant, visible difference in dark scenes and fades to black, or is the main difference just a brighter, sharper image, and more saturated colors?

Free,
As a fellow owner, albeit of another brand of LED pjs, a Runco Q-750D, i would appreciate if you could post the reason your Mico 50 LED pj is being sent for repair; I think it would be a good point for us owners to keep track and report short/medium/long-term reliability of these differently designed LED pjs.
On the Vango TruVue LED pj thread an owner apparently living on the 19th floor of a high-rise in Munbai, India had to send his unit for a repair that turned out to be extreme dust accumulation on mirror in the light path, after only a few months of use.
So, does that mean that only the DMD chip is glass-enclosed and dust-free but all other internal parts are not ? Was it an unusual amount of atmosphere dust or the mirror is too susceptible to dust accumulation ? What is the manufacturer's recommendation concerning cleaning filters (if any) in air intake/outflow vents of these LED pjs ?
Tx....
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Marcos

The Vango and the MICO are based on the Chi-Lin design, the Runco and most others are based on the Delta design.

I won't know until it is looked at, but I believe my issue is the power supply. Fortunately, I have found Sim2's customer service to be excellent, so I am sure they will take care of it quickly.

After the reported issue with dust in a Vango, I took the covers off my MICO 50 this weekend to look inside for any accumulated dust or hairs. (We have 2 long haired cats). I found the inside extremely clean. I blew some canned air over the water-cooling radiator and saw nothing. The blades on both internal fans were also clean. So basically, I saw nothing. It also looked to me that the entire light engine is sealed in that I saw no place for dust to enter. No issues uncovered on my MICO 50, which has been bullet-proof for over 1300 hrs now.

Thanks guys.
BTW, in the "Digital High-End Projectors $3,000 + USD MSRP" thread a couple of owners of Samsung front-projectors equipped with LED chipsets from Luminus Devices, projectors that have been around for at least five years, are reporting that their units have been working unfailingly and exhibiting the same lumen output after years of heavy usage, which is comforting.
Its good to know about the entire light engine on Chi-Lin designed LED pjs being completely sealed and that the problem encountered by the Vango owner with dust accumulation on mirror is related to massive native atmospheric dust/debris even on the 19th floor of a building; Can you imagine what that does to your lungs ? Yikes...
In my case i would be mainly concerned about carpet dust/debris, as my condo has a lot of carpeting...

How's it going with them? Hope the unit's okay..

Well, I finally managed to see the SIM2 M.150! SIM2's rep graciously brought the machine to a local dealer's very nice demo theater, so I was able to try it out with a half-dozen of my own Blu-ray discs on a StudioTek 130 screen in a dedicated room.

The pros

• Very attractive picture, good color rendering, sharp and bright. There was really nothing to not like about the image that we saw. Color fidelity appeared to be outstanding, with realistic flesh tones and superb saturation and subtlety in the colors, especially the reds. Really impressive.
• Enormously reduced color separation "rainbow" effect. I'm crazy sensitive to color separation artifacts, and I deliberately front-loaded the demo with a number of scenes that would absolutely produce it on a color wheel DLP machine, because there would be no point going further with the demo if I saw rainbows everywhere. I had high hopes in this area, because when I saw the Projection Design LED machine, I only saw a hint of color separation when I was actively looking for it. I'm happy to say that the M.150 was the same in this regard. I could spot the occasional tiny color fringe when I was looking specifically for it, but I don't think this would be any problem at all in normal viewing.

The cons

• With my extremely high flicker sensitivity, I did notice various different kinds of strobing, which my friend who came along did not notice at all. As I mentioned, I caught the occasional glimpse of color separation, but what was more distracting was just overall strobing of the picture, which I assume is the result of the various blanking intervals as the LEDs change colors and the DLP refreshes. I see strobing on 3-chip DLPs, so that should give you some idea how sensitive I am to flicker. If my history with 3-chip DLPs is any guide, this projector may actually have been set a bit too bright, as I've noticed that the effect I see on the 3-chip machines becomes unnoticeable when the projector is calibrated to 14ftL. I should also note that I didn't see this phenomenon on the Projection Design machine, which I believe was closer to 14ftL. I wish I had brought my light meter and a disc of test patterns.
• Fan noise. I was surprised at how much fan noise the projector puts out. I may have been seated in a bad spot, although my friend commented on it too. I moved into a position where I could simulate how far away I would be in my own theater, and it was similar in volume and tone to a C3X 1080. I had hoped for a significant reduction in sound because of the liquid cooling and large-diameter fan. SIM2's rep noted that the projector was sitting on a plastic table, so it would probably be quieter hung from a ceiling with acoustic treatments like mine. But, I sat closer to the Sony 1000 in high lamp (also on a plastic table), and it was substantially quieter.
• We weren't able to demo 3D, as the rep didn't have the necessary emitter and glasses. That was a pity, as this machine is supposed to do very good 3D and it would have been nice to see it strut its stuff.

Overall
So, a bit of a mixed bag. I was hoping for a real home run with an ultra-quiet, tack-sharp hassle-free LED projector. I think the flicker issues might disappear with calibration to reference light levels, but the fan noise is a bigger problem for me, as ultra-quiet is a big focus of my room, and there are clearly quieter machines available that throw very nice pictures indeed. As much as I value the instant-on and long life of the LED light source, that may not outweigh the need for whisper quiet.

If any AVSers in the SF Bay Area have one of these machines or get one in the near future, I'd love an opportunity to take a second look, especially if the machine is calibrated to 14ftL or thereabouts, and if it is set up for 3D.

And, of course, for those folks considering this machine, definitely see for yourselves. My particular sensitivities are probably not the same as yours!

Sorry, haven't checked in here in a while. Sim2 received the projector, fixed the power supply, and had it back to me within a week. The service, as usual, was spectacular!! (As was the service from Jason at AVS who facilitated it all).

I believe they upgraded the firmware as well, since the image looks even better than it did before the repair. It also could have been the switch to my JVC RS35 during the repair, which can't hold a candle to the Mico 50.

Thanks Free, it's good to know they've got it together.

Well, I have a Mico 50 running and an RS 25 on reserve. I used the temperature in warm, and gama 2.35. The image is pretty good to my eyes, but certainly the Mico loses for the JVC in black levels.

Walter

Looks like I'm not the only one that's blown away by the performance of this projector: http://www.avforums.com/reviews/SIM2-M.150-3D-1080p-LED-Single-Chip-DLP-Projector-Review_309/Review.html

Interestingly they measured 900 Lumens...after calibration.
Edited by Pete - 6/19/12 at 10:46am

Pete: Interesting review. I hope their lumen measurments are correct. I've sold a lot of lens systems for these and eveyone who has them loves them. Not just you

I was particularly interested that they were told that early demo units had noisier fans than production models. This was my #1 issue when I saw a demo. I really want to see a current production model now.