Need Help! Time for Upgrade

3D or not, how big of a screen, and is online FPS gaming lag times important?

Mitsubishi hc4000 is better than the Epson 8350 for your purposes, although the 8350 has more brightness to punch through ambient light, but I think coming from DLP, LCD might bother you. Watch out for placement flexibility since the Mits has no lens shift. If you are more focused on movie viewing and black levels and not gaming, then I think a refurb Epson 8500ub or 8700ub is where it's at. I heard some were under $1500 or even far less now, but they probably have too much lag for you.

If you want 3D or just a brighter DLP, the Optoma hd33 would be another one. However, the hd33 isn't quite as good as the Mits at 2D for movies (but Optoma is semi-close), but the Optoma is brighter and it comes with 3D. Optoma hd33 is under $1,500. One thing about the Optoma is the placement is really tight, it has less Zoom than the Mits, so check the calculator in my SIG to find placement (or any calculator). Make sure it works.

If it were me and if it fit in my room, I'd probably buy the hd33 because it comes with 3D, has good 2D PQ, is brighter than the MIts hc4000, less RBE, and still comes with a 2-yr warranty.
I think the long-term reliability might be less on the Optoma than it is with the Mits, but the 2-year warranty should hopefully offset that.
Edited by coderguy - 8/17/12 at 3:48pm

Mitsubishi hc4000 serves both purposes very well, but I'd say the Optoma hd33 does too. The main difference is the Mits hc4000 might have better black levels for movies but the Optoma has more brighter modes. You could also look at the Benq w6000, but it has no 3D (only Optoma has 3d) but the Benq is audibly noisier.

The Benq w6000 will work better as it has center-point lens shift and can be mounted anywhere between the top and bottom of the screen. It actually probably has one of the best images of the three, as long as you don't mind a slightly audibly noisier projector.

The Optoma hd33 might also still work and should be a bit quieter than the BENQ w6000. The hd33 has half the offset of the Mits, but depending how high you mounted your screen the hd33 might still be a very tight fit from a ceiling mount height perspective. Also, the hd33's maximum throw position for a 106" screen is only 13 feet 10 inches, so if your projector is currently mounted at 14 ft back and you put the Optoma hd33 where the current PJ is, then the hd33 might throw too big of an image (but I cannot say that for sure since these numbers are often not perfectly accurate, usually only within a few inches). That said I think the hd33 would probably fit, but only you would know the limitations of the room (not me).

The Benq w6000 on the other hand should have no issues fitting the room, at least as far as from a mounting distance from the screen, or from the mounting height. The Benq w6000 also has quite a lot of zoom and is flexible. You may have to get a drop-pole mount for the w6000 however since it might have to be slightly lowered compared to your old mount, it will depend on how high up the top of your screen is. Although you can mount the Benq almost anywhere between the screen, optimally the Benq's lens should be mounted a foot or more just below the top edge of the screen so that you do not need to use the maximum lens shift.