JVC DLA-RS1 questions answered! - Page 5

tstites-

You didn't notice a diference in sharpness between the pearl and the RS1?

Boy, what great reading! Tom, can you say what the lumen and CR are in each of the iris settings? BTW, very much like the idea of an adjusitble (but non-dynamic) iris!

He was talking about Sharps iris.

A few quick questions:

1. How many hours on the Sharp and JVC lamps?

2. Was the Sharp on its Economy lamp mode or regular lamp mode?

3. What was the difference in the JVC's fan noise going from low mode to high?

Thanx

Ran

I meant 110"D. My 1 key sticks sometimes. Sorry guys.

Jason. Measure the lumens as Rick did. After few hundred bulb hours and viewing a typical movie scene. You will be lucky to get 300 lumens.

All the 1080P PJs at the Expo and at Kei's party look like quality units.

The Pearl's greyscale was way off and imparted a green/grey caste to flesh tones. I'm sure that the gain/bias controls were not set to stock positions. I have never seen an HT quality PJ out of the box with the color so far off. No one should judge the Pearl's color performance by what they saw there. As far as detail and sharpness: I thought that it was superb. This is a very good PJ.

The BenQ also looked very sharp and detailed. The stock color accuracy was vastly better than what we saw on the Pearl. It thought it was slightly sharper, but the Pearl was plenty sharp. The BenQ had excellent PQ. Those interested in DLP should definitely look at this one. Processing by Gennum, I believe. It accepted a 1080P signal at 24 hz for the demo. The type of video that was shown on the Pearl and BenQ didn't allow me to analyze as much of their video performance as the video that was shown on the Sharp and JVC. That is the only reason that I have more details about them in their descriptions. I don't know how the BenQ and Pearl would compare to the Sharp and JVC in a side by side. I was impressed with all of them.

The Sharp 20000. I thought it also had a great image. I was surprised that it produced a bright enough image on the 110" 1.3 gain Stewart screen. It was set to High Contrast iris and High bulb power. The Sharp looked like it had been calibrated pretty close to D65, but tilting slightly towards green/blue. IMO it was slightly sharper than the RS1, but the difference was negligible and would not be a deciding factor for me. Objects in motion on the Sharp remained slightly sharper than they did on the RS1, but I would never have realised this if they had not been side by side. This also would not be a deciding factor for me. The black background on the Credits screen at the end of U571 looked a little darker on the Sharp than on the RS1. I did not see nor account for the ambient light that Mark described. That may have influenced what I saw. In very dark scenes the Sharp had good shadow detail, but the same details were brighter on the RS1. This made them more visible and made the black background appear slightly darker than it did on the Sharp. There was very little grey haze in the Sharps blacks and even less in the RS1's. When the Sharp was set to Low Contrast iris, it was clearly brighter than the RS1. When it was set to High Contrast iris, it was clearly dimmer. I would estimate the Sharp was making 7-8 fL, which is bright enough to be watchable, but will soon be too dim after some bulb wear. Both PJ's had about 50 hours on new bulbs. I thought the Sharp had a very impressive image. It should be paired with a smaller screen or a higher gain screen than the 110" Studiotek, IMO.

The RS1 prototype was farther from D65 than the Sharp was. Clouds had a visibly pink caste to them and flesh tones were overly golden. It was far enough off D65 that I found it distracting. The good news is that the corrections to these inaccuracies should actually increase the brightness of the projector at 100 ire without affecting the black level. I detected no color caste at Black. I detected no uniformity problems great enough to be visible in the one movie that I saw. White was clearly brighter on the RS1 than it was on the Sharp (Sharp set to High Contrast & High Bulb Power). There are no bulb power or iris settings on the RS1. (A HINT TO JVC) A bulb power setting would be a welcome addition as it provides a way to keep image brightness more constant over the life of the bulb. The Normal gamma setting is nominally 2.2, and thats how it looked to me. The other three gamma settings have yet to be determined. Fan noise was pretty loud, but Rob, the JVC rep. stated that the production model of the RS1 would be no louder than the HD10K, which is about average in fan noise, I think (I haven't measured an HD10K). This remains to be seen. The Sharp was much quieter. The RS1 vents from the front. The RS1 has gain and bias controls so that it can be fully calibrated in the field. If I remember correctly the RS1 has color controls that should allow a calibrator to remap the Primary/Secondary colors to match the applicable standards. The image from each panel can be shifted in single pixel increments vertically and horizontally, so that misconvergence can be adjusted to be less than a single pixel. JVC claims 700 lumens at 15K:1 on/off CR after calibration to D65. We will have to see if that pans out to be accurate when the production models are released. Be cautious about selecting a screen until the brightness of the production samples is known. In the past, JVC has been pretty accurate with its specs. Shadow detail was exceptional in the Normal gamma setting. The image was very sharp and detailed overall. The zoom has a very wide ratio and the amount of lens shift available is huge. This PJ should fit into the vast majority of HTs. JVC stated that the RS1's light output is constant at all zoom settings. The RS1 has Gennum processing and can accept a 1080P signal at 24 hz. There is a lot to like about this PJ. JVC is packing a ton of capability and performance into it.

Glenn

I don't know if this was answered before.

Will RS1 have a HDMI 1.3 input?

Personally, I'd rather wait for a few months more to get the JVC with the HDMI 1.3.

If JVC will not integrate this into RS1, I believe it will be obsolote pretty soon when other companies come out with with HDMI 1.3 equipped projectors, processors and DVD players.

I hope JVC will reconsider it and include it before its release early next year or at least make it in a way that it can be field upgraded in the future.

Mark Petersen,

First let me thank you for your efforts they are truly appreciated by all of us.

Reading through all this info makes me wonder about the JVC/Sharp comparison.
This is by NO means any hint about the guys at JVC trying to screw up the 21K, but just wondering if the 21K was at it's best form. It takes time to bring it there...

I'm also not trying to defend the 21K which I own, in fact I made inquires about purchasing the JVC if indeed it will turn out to be this good.

The punch which was lacking in the 21K (Tom) is probably due to the difference in brightness between the 2 projectors.
This can be a case of different hours on the lamps OR the fact that the lamp was on Eco for the Sharp which is 20% less light output than the regular mode.
More over I wonder what Gama was used with the Sharp and if the Auto Contrast feature was used or not. I find the Auto Contrast feature to work very well.

After reading Tom Stites report on the Pearl/JVC comparison I'm even more puzzled on how he thinks that the JVC and Pearl look exactly alike except for very low APL scenes, and the JVC is clearly superior to the 21K (as others noted).

I tested my Ruby against the 21K for 6-7 hours projecting on the same screen with the same material.
We were 5 guys all with projectors and experience and not once did we prefer the Ruby. In fact it was no contest. The 21K was sharper had more image depth at low and high APL scenes and had these super accurate colors.
More over the advantage in uniformity was also quite clear.

I'm still betting the JVC is a true winner, just not to sure about the comparison.

Best,

Ran

Yes, this has me confused/concerned as well. Hopefully Tom was just being modest about the RS1 and throwing some kindness towards the Sony.

What Gennum chip will te RS1 use? The newest one previewed by Gennum at Cedia?

Great reading all!

Mark -
You've really gone OVER-THE-TOP, and I'm sure it's very much appreciated by all! I must say it was great to meet somebody who has as much enthusiasm for Home Theater as do you! It's catching. Hope to meet again if you can put together that San Diego projector shoot-out. Hey - if you wait just a couple months you should have your RS1 by then!

Glenn -
Great review from a different perspective. I thought the Sharp 20K had a great picture too. However the RBE was almost more than I could bare. It affected those around me as well. It even irritated me (peripherally) while I was trying to concentrate on the RS1! Even if performance wise they were equal - and it looks like the SR1 will be superior in several key areas - the deciding factor to me, and many others is cost. That the RS1 is HALF the (MSRP) of the Sharp (and Marantz). This puts it out there to the masses. It's affordable (as is the Pearl). And me personally - well I don't want to spend an overt amount of cash ($8-12K) on a projector that will be outdated 6 months later. And the way this technology is moving - that's certainly gonna happen.

"5. We did compare the Pearl side by side with the RS1 at night after the show closed...this was the first time I personally got to see the two units side by side and I will say that after considerable tweaking on the Pearl, the color and overall picture quality on the two was such that you might have thought you were looking at two RS1's or two Pearl's...this on a variety of medium to high APL scenes. With a total fade to black or a very dark starfield, the RS1 was noticeably blacker in any Iris mode and certainly as bright in a bright scene. The observations were made strictly using HDDVD source material, we didn't evaluate SD scaling or other factors, just colorimetry, brightness, black level and sharpness. There did seem to be a little bit of color non-uniformity showing up at the corners, but it was very minimal."

The above is a quote from tstites post.

Tom, the color non-uniformity you mention, are you talking about the JVC or the Sony, or both?

As a B&W movie fan - uniformity to me is of the UTMOST importance. More so than just about any other spec. Main reason I passed on the Pearl, the other being it's rather short 1.7 throw. I am really hoping JVC can nail this down w/ the RS1. I saw a gray scale on the JVC 10k at the show - and it looked impeccable. A little less so on the RS1.

Here's to hoping these JVC quotes come to pass:
"Outstanding gray scale reproduction" and "Automatic shading calibration during production"

How big of a deal is HDMI 1.3?

I have been researching a HD-DVD player and the Toshiba HD-XA2 will be having it. My biggest concern is how does it work with a HDTV that does not have 1.3 capabilities?

The same concern is in the projectors that I am researching.

Always great to get the opinions of an experienced professional with a trained eye. There has been a lot of speculation on the sharpness issue. Your comments are important for those of us who will not have a chance to see these units in the same setting.

Thanks

Indeed. Where did the second quote come from? The Expo?

Thanks Mark for the detailed reports.

This is providing that the unit is fed 24p natively, correct? As of the moment, understanding if the on-board scaler will do 3:2 reversal from 60i sources is still TBD I believe.

Also, apologies if I missed it, but I assume this is tacit acknolwedgment that the unit will accept a 24p input. Is this on both HDMI and component?

Congrats to JVC and the team.

Exactly! I agree 100% Even if the Sharp 20K was slightly better, there's no way I could justify spending several thousands more for it (street), especially at the rate all this is changing. If this was as good as it would get for say 5 years, then yea I'd plunk down the extra $. But as you said things are changing so fast its just not worth it to me. The deal on the JVC is incredible. If you are serious about this pj and haven't checked in with Jason yet you owe it to yourself to give him a call!

IIRC it wasn't too long ago that Greg was saying what he wants is native 15,000:1 with no dynamic iris and its ill side affects. If the JVC specs hold true, its here (or should I say will be here in Feb)!

Glenned
Your prayers are already answered. In the sit down with JVC Mark Petersen is communicating there will be two bulb modes roughly 20 percent apart.

mark haflich
Gennum 9351

Lets try not be a devils advocate with every quote on relative projector performance.

All:

Thank you for all of your input and comments regarding the DLA-RS1 projector. EHX was a great opportunity for JVC to talk as well as listen to our customer's. As a manufacturer, understanding our customer is a focus for the Professional Products Co. Display Division.

As JVC moves forward to delivering the RS1, Tom Stites will be plead to respond to your questions.

Lastly, what a great party!!! Much thanx for the invite and kudos to Kei for putting this together.

Lon Mass

I have been so please with my D-ILA projectors over the years that I bought a 56" 1080p JVC RPTV for my parents. It does have outstanding picture qulity and they are thrilled with a HD picture. Now I'm trying to talk my sister and brother-in-law into putting a HT in their basement and getting a RS1.

Also I'm willing to do a looooog term beta test the RS12 when it comes out.

There you go!

Oh damn... the pearl can be tweaked to look like the RS1... I was hoping for a noticeably better projector than the Sony Pearl or Ruby...

I saw some questions about what screen sizes may work with this pj so I did some calculations you may find helpful.

This is also based on the assumption that the RS1 does indeed put out 700 lumens @ D65 with a new bulb, and that over time an aged bulb drops by about 50% (nothing specific to JVC here). Keep in mind with most bulbs I think they hit their 50% drop off well before their rated max hours, so this further assumes that you'd replace the bulb once it got dim and well before the max rated hours...

First I present numbers for the StudioTek/Firehawk based on about 1.3 gain. Now if you go with a high power screen (essentially a must if you plan to go over 120") you can do pretty well assuming you can mount to get the high gain out of the screen. Just keep in mind that HP screens do not generally work well at all with ceiling mounts.

OK, so here are some numbers. Screen sizes shown diagonal measurements, 16:9 ratio.

For a 106" Firehawk screen, 700 lumens is 27ftL which on an aged bulb is about say 13ftL so that seems rather ideal.

For a 120" Firehawk screen, 700 lumens would yield about 21ftL, and say 11ftL with an aged bulb. Still acceptable by many standards.

Once we go up from there it gets dicey... For a 133" Firehawk screen, 700 lumens would yield about 17ftL and say 8ftL with an aged bulb. IMO this is still doable if you have total light control. I'm getting 8ftL now with my Ruby and its still very enjoyable and punchy.

If you go up to a HP and can get 2.0 gain (doable, but you better be sure!), here's how the numbers change. Note that with the HP the gain varies widely based on placement - anywhere from below 1.0 to as much as about 3.0. So I'm using 2.0 as a general average but you may be able to get higher say 2.5. Ok so here goes:

For a 106" HP screen with 2.0 gain, 700 lumens would yield about 42ftL, and say 21ftL with an aged bulb.

For a 120" HP screen with 2.0 gain, 700 lumens would yield about 32ftL, and say 16ftL with an aged bulb.

For a 133" HP screen with 2.0 gain, 700 lumens is 27ftL which on an aged bulb is about say 13ftL.

Hope this is helpful. If you have specific questions about HP gains send me a PM and I'll help you estimate what your effective gain is. Then based on that we can calculate an anticipated ftL level based on your desired screen size.

Disclaimer - these numbers should be used as a rough guide. Before making any decisions please be sure to check with your dealer as I can't be sure of these numbers and remember a lot of this is based on speculation on the specs of the RS1 at this point...

Are the above calculations based on screen width or diagonal? What is the aspect ratio of the screen 16 x 9 or other. Thanks for your help and input but the devils in the details.