Epson EMP-TW1000 1080p LCD HDMI1.3 - Page 2

When I bougfht my Cinema 500 there was a pretty good
case for the price premium. Compared with the LCD competition
at the time it had better optics, better processing, power zoom
and power focus, a more robust lens shift and a much better
out of the box picture. If you look at all that the Mits 5000
has to offer the case for premium pricing does not seem to be
there for the Epson.

Hey any Epson corp. reps out there that can throw us a bone with a little information leak? Don't let Panasonic, Mitsubishi, and Sony steal all the limelight!

Seriously, I'm a few months away from buying a projector, but I'd love to have a little more information to froth over in the meantime.

right on brad... i check epson's web site everyday hoping to see something. maybe a news clip would be cool. come on epson....

Epson Tw1000 - Powerlite 1080 CEDIA video and interview with epson product manager.

http://www.cinenow.com/uk/play-video-448.html

Hoping (as everyone here) the tw1000 would arrive at the sub 3000$ price, but not holding my breath....

Here's some information from Epson's Japanese site (nothing on the U.S. site yet):

http://www.epson.jp/products/dreamio/emptw1000/

Up near the top, looks like Dec 2006 availability.

And an English translation (entertaining, if not accurate) via Google translation (click the nav items on the left side to get to other pages):

http://translate.google.com/translat...language_tools

I'm especially excited to hear that "minute image is pulled out entirely with Kousei detail", which is a key feature I'm targeting.

Any word on what this unit will be using as a processor/scaler?

That product manager needs to work on his sales skills. Spending the whole interview saying that the 1080P projector will be innovative because it uses 3 LCD chips. Uh, yeah, so does every other LCD projector - but Epson INVENTED it.

Wow. It's like saying that the newest Ferarri will employ 4 wheels each with its own rubber tire for maximum stability. Then he blathers about how really good for the money Epson projectors are known to be. Mmm, not necessarily. With the fate of the product in this guys hands, I'm worried.

What a maroon. Not only does he spend way too much time explaining 3lcd, but he then goes on to say it is unique to Epson! That's just after he explains how they provide the technology to other well known companies. And how about that unique feature called lens shift. Wow, I sure wish other manufacturers would use that. It sure sounds awesome.

I'm excited about the 1200 ANSI lumen spec. Epson has a reputation of more honest brightness ratings in the past. If so that would make this at least 2x as bright as the Mitsubishi which measured around 400 after calibration. I guess we'll see.

I saw somewhere also that it uses the same bulb as the 700, which is rated at 1600 lumens, so maybe there is some cause for optimism on the light.

Edit: Oh yeah, it was the last page on the Epson Japan site:

http://translate.google.com/translat...language_tools

EMP-TW700 spec'd at 1600 lumens here:

http://www.aboutprojectors.com/Epson...projector.html

If Epson delivers hdmi 1.3 at that resolution and brightness, I think they've really jumped ahead of the market. My application is a dedicated home theater and those are the specifics I was waiting to break $5,000 and thought I had at least 8 months to go. While I would prefer all of that in DLP, I'll quit waiting and buy the epson if everything that's being tossed around turns out to be accurate.

I don't get why some others think HDMI 1.3 isn't important in a projector? I can be severely confused yet again, but I thought as soon as one component in the path is HDMI 1.0, the entire path is HDMI 1.0. I'd sure appreciate the depth of color that 1.3 offers - is the point that an LCD projector isn't going to be able to take advantage of the extra information being carried to it?

And while it's impossible to stay in front of the technology, I try to shy away from buying behind the curve. My perspective is that with the industry commitment to HDMI 1.3, buying something w/o it is not a very long term strategy.

I'm eager to see some content coded to that color depth at 1080p soon.... Hopefully from a < $3k epson hanging from my ceiling.

HDMI 1.3 would be a nice bonus, but I certainly would not hold off buying a projector for this feature.

Do we know what Video Processing Chipset is being used?

Yes, it's the same 170w E-Torl lamp. The earlier tw600 (also specced at 1600 lumen) used a 170w lamp, too.

The tw600 lamp is said to be a different model, on epson site (maybe they changed the lamp case only? )

Hope it will have the same tw600 punch, can't wait to read some previews!!!

imws

As you know when they marketed the Cinema 500 they made a big deal
about identifying the use of the faroudja FL2310 chipset but since then I have not
seen any specific reference to their chipsets even when the 800 was released
in North America at a rather premium price. Is there any reason to believe
that they have downplayed processing in an attemp to become more price
competitive? I hope not given what the Mits has to offer.

I just checked the specs by google-transalting the japanese page and the HDMI 1.3 is real. It supports 10 bit Deep Color all the way from input to projection - not bad at all.

I couldn't find any specs on the screendoor gap or the response time of the chips, tho.

Also, it implies that it will do 50/60 hertz display. I think for the price, 48/24 is too much to ask for

The 12000:1 CR is with Dynamic Iris enabled - no word on native CR.

Still - great price, I hope the give more details.

I think the epson will do correctly 1080p/24. That will be the standard output for HD player, so having a 1920x1080 vpr which can't accept the standard 1080p HD output signal doesn't make any sense, IMHO.

1080@48 is (99%) sure supported (almost the whole epson projector line support 48, why should they "downgrade" in their top-of-the-line projector?)


Can't wait for some in-depth preview!

If that's the case, then I'm VERY impressed.

I may buy this (or two!) as an interim PJ until I choose my "big dawg".

Anyone know the response times? Do the Panny or Mitsu versions of this C2Fine chip quote anything on the response times?

Kousei means corrected or calibrated. The phrase you're quoting there probably is trying to say something like "minute details in the calibrated image output can be clearly distinguished."

Anybody have any updates on the projector? This is probably the most exciting 1080p in the pipeline for a lot of us b/c of the lumen output.

If nobody has any new information, let's speculate for the fun of it!
-- jaydillyo

Out of curiousity, why are people excited about HDMI 1.3 as it applies to display device such as this generation of LCD / LCD / DLP projectors? What benefit do you forsee with the use of a HDMI 1.3 display device such as this Epson projector?

Right now it is selling for as low as 304,500 yen ~ $2,600.

edit:
350,000 yen does seems to be the retail with most stores taking orders at 330,000. I am beginning to distrust the 304,500 store and am not even going to attempt to read it.

Epson is pushing the color accuracy of this projector.

I don't have any info to back this up other than Epson's pricing history, but IMHO there's no way that this thing comes in at $3k. I think the CEDIA reports of $5k are much more accurate. They just released the 810 at $3k. Folks have said the 810 is available in Japan for about the street of the Panasonic AX100. So I don't think we can equate Japanese pricing to US pricing in this case. Apparently they sell them much lower in Japan. But I'd love to be wrong.

A little more research:
One of places selling it for 346,000 was selling the pearl for 567,000. In that Japanese store the epson is priced around 1,800 dollars less than the pearl. I'm optimistic.

From what I've read, I just think that Epson sells comparatively much cheaper in Japan. So all the yen conversions don't mean much. I really hope you're right, it would be awesome. But do you really think they'd price it the same as their 720p pj that just released?

The prices of their 720p are much cheaper in Japan, but not here. So it doesn't correlate. As Rogo said above, they'd be stillborn at a price of $5k, but that's never really mattered to Epson. They tend to sell more to the custom installer market than DIY AVS'rs like us.

But I'll hope with you

Epson Germany press release:
http://www.av-magazin.de/frontpage.4...62a57af.0.html
http://www.digitalkamerakreis.de/artikel2707.html

Specs as reported, 3 year warranty on projector and lamp, available in February, MSRP 4.000 Euro ("could change until release").

Other MSRPs in Germany: Pearl 5.000, Mits 4.500, Panasonic AE1000 not announced, probably 4.000, Epson TW700 (720p model, same as TW810 in US) 1.700.

So Epson seems to have the brightest, most flexible (lensshift-wise) and cheapest 1080p model, at least in Europe. Plus a good reputation for quality and customer service. Sounds like a winner!

How do current Epson auto-iris / DI implementations compare to the Pearl's auto iris (seems to be the DI benchmark for now)? Is it at least as seamless as it is on the Pearl?

Directly from Projector Reviews comes the following quote "The very good news is that the dynamic iris is subtle, in normal viewing I never noticed its affect, as I have on some projectors, where frame by frame, the addition of a bright object in the frame causes even the dark areas to brighten."

Granted this is on the "lesser 400" but if the DI is at least as good if not better on the 1000 it should be seamless.

Regards,

RTROSE

Sony will likely hit the market first with video games capable of utilizing "Deep Color." That is why the Sony PS3 has HDMI 1.3 and deep color support . HD-DVD and Blu-ray will be awhile but video gaming is going to be much sooner.

I read the UK press release, and the 3 year warranty on proj AND lamp is really attractive, but the proj is scheduled for a march release.
I'm wondering if tw1000 would be really available in japan in a few days, as epson said...any japan forumer?

mhhhh....great AVBuzz, we are in your hands!