M2500 experience  

I reported in another thread that my M2500 screen had a noticeable crease, about 8" in length, plus what look like bicycle tire tread marks across the screen at various heights (my wife described these as looking like the quilt pattern found on some brands of toilet paper.)
Also, there were several vertical bands and one 8' wide line across the middle. Only the 8" crease is visible in natural light--all of the other "patterns" can be sen only when a bright white light shines on them.

I borrowed a Dreamvison dlp projector (600 ANSI lumens) and watched hours of movies.

The horizontal line showed itself only once on an all blue screen. The vertical streaks (at regular intervals which seem to follow the rolled up on the tube in shipping pattern) were only evident a few times during very bright scenes and only momentarily. The crease showed itself whenever I looked for it.

What was remarkable was that I started my viewing during the day--no sun but fairly bright in my room, which has an entire wall of picture windows, and a spiral staircase that lets in light from upstairs as well. The picture was as good as most of the rptv's I've seen, even brighter than some. I could enjoy daytime viewing without any blackout curtains.

At dusk, the picture was great, and we put the overhead lights on with just a little wash out on the screen. It was still very enjoyable to watch. Amd others could read in the room at the same time.

At total dark, the picture was, at times, too bright. A quick adjustment of the brightness and contrast (turning each down 5 clicks) resolved that problem. I had been cautioned that the bright Sony 10HT I am getting would not mate well with this high gain screen. The Sony is 25% brighter than the Dreamvision. But I suspect that any overly bright images could be adjusted through the brightness and contrast controls.

I plan to exchange this screen (with the crease) for another M2500.

I could easily live waith the vertical streaking, although I hope the replacement screen will be better. And the ability to really enjoy the projector for daytime viewing with lots of ambient light is very important to me.

When I visited my friend, we could not watch during the day on his Vutec 1.3 gain screen. Even after taping black plastic over most of the windows, the image was still very washed out. The difference between there and here must be the M2500 screen's increased gain.

Hi Mark, Glad that your M2500 doesn't have any vertical streaking.

I suspect that my fabric may have come from the end of the roll--too many markings on the material. The short time that the fabric comes rolled up in delivery is probably insignificant compared to the original master roll used by Draper.

But the streaking or vertical lighter bands, go by so quickly that it's almost a non issue.

I, too, removed and mounted the screen when it arrived. I fastened the screen to the wall studs, so that there is absolutely no chance of bowing.

Hi Brett,

My friend with the Vutec screen was the one who lent me his Dreamvision. I am fairly certain that it has a gain of 1.3 (it's electric, non tensioned and cost about $900 if that helps to identify it). He recently installed blackout blinds on his main windows, but the imaage during the day was still not as bright as the Dreamvision on the M2500 at my house.

I found no fault with the colors, although it was not my main priority in watching them. And because I accidentally enabled the PAL aspect of the projector (the Green button) while trying to figure it out, this in turn somehow defeated the s-video input so I had to do my viewing experiment with the composite video cable. I'm sure that using s-video or component cables will make the colors even more enjoyable.

It was the brightness that surprised me. My tube Toshiba is more difficult to watch during the day because the glass screen reflects everything in the room. My wall mount M2500 will enable me to watch during the day without closing out the views we enjoy from our home.

I just hope that the Sony 10HT has enough range in its brightness control to reduce the light output during the dark evening time so that the picture isn't too bright. Who would have thought that I would be concerned about a front projector being too bright to watch?

My replacement M2500 screen fabric arrived yesterday, about four weeks after the order was placed.

The screen is near perfect with none of the problems outlined in the initial post in this thread. There are two very small vertical nicks or scratches and one small area where there is some patterning on the material, but the rest of the screen is absolutely smooth.

I won't be able to test it until my Sony 10HT arrives.

But Draper also packed another frame into the box, increasing the shipping costs and possibly the time it took to send it (if they had to make the frame anew.)