Epson Moviemate?

The best way to know about the Moviemate is if you can test one out in your setup.
Where are you going to put it? What distance and screen size do you want?
Where will you get your sound from if you only get a projector? (do you need a HTIB, home theater in a box?)

Everyone on this forum hems and haws about these products. Many of us never buy or talk for years before actually upgrading. Some are constantly upgrading.

Whichever you get, you will enjoy it - if not, return it and try something else.

BUT - If it looks good to you and fits your situation, STAY AWAY from the forum for a while.

Seriously. Right now the options are fantastic in this price range compared to a couple years ago.

Good Luck,

Paul

I have the Moviemate and love it....the picture is excellent. I also feel that the sound is pretty darn good (I have the optional Subwoofer) for an all in one unit. I would recomend the Moviemate to anyone.

My only negative is how quirky it is. The power cord plugs in at the front of the unit and so does the sub woofer wire. That forces you to keep the front latch open permanently. The HD cables plug in to the side of the machine. Overall I feel the unit design is a little sloppy.

In the end if you want an all in one unit that sounds great with little additional cost in speakers,DVD players,Stands etc.... Then the Moviemate is a solid choice.

all i will say is, you will get the upgrade bug once you get the projector no matter what it is, unless you buy a fancy D-ILA projector, as for the optional sub, i have been spoiled by my SVS! The Movie mate sounds like a good first projector though, you can probably get something that has 720 resolution for the same price, minus the dvd player...but then all you need is a hd/blu player and you will really be blown away

Hello All,

Hope you are all well. I have just purchased a MovieMate 30s. Since I have a good sound setup already I did not buy the 33s package.

I went through all that pulling of the hair that you did, and am still pulling my hair...lol. Hopefully this pulling stops once it arrives and I set it up.

I purchased a Samsung DTB-H260F HDTV tuner to go with it, and a roll of 53" by 12 yard Super White Photo background paper for a screen. On a tight budget here, so keeping costs as low as possible.

When it comes, hopefully by Thursday next week, I will just be taping the paper up on the wall between 2 windows to see how it looks.

I bought it now because it seems that everyone is running out of stock on them, and the price is so low right now. I was afraid if I waited any longer I would not be able to buy a new one, and have to go refurbished. Epson store in the USA is out of stock, Epson Canada lists these as discontinued. So, either Epson is not going to make an all in one anymore...or a new unit is in the works. Even if a new one was to come out, I doubt it would be anywhere near the low cost of these at the moment, so I am not worried about buying this older version.

These MovieMates just look like fun to my Wife and I, and when we upgrade I will use it for my Wii and for Kids DVDs in their rooms. The kids will love it as a hand me down.

We looked at the inexpensive 720p DLP units, but it would have to be ceiling mounted...and our room has a ceiling fan...so...um...no. The offset on the all in one DLP units did not work for us either. So, the Epson was the only real choice for us.

I will post here when the unit arrives with my opinion on the unit.

Later

Tony

Tony,

The one thing you will need to get is an "Optical in" cable for your sound system. My older Denon reciever didn't have the "Optical in" feature. So I was a little bummed at first. Surprisingly the sound that the unit produces is so good that I haven't missed it....nor the extra cables running to the machine. Good Luck!!

Those that are interested in a Moviemate projector may want to keep an eye out for Epson information around Cedia time.

When I was looking for an all-in-one projector, I looked at the Moviemate and the Optoma Movietime DV10. The Epson had all the features I was looking for, longer zoom (but still not much), lens shift, and better sound. Unfortunately, I simply did not like the picture it threw. The screen door effect was enormous and the contrast was much worse than the Optoma.

I ended up buying the DV10 (since replaced by the DV11) and couldn't be happier. We use this projector all over the place. Family room, basement, outdoors, at friends' homes, on vacation, virtually anywhere. It never ceases to amaze anyone who sees it. My wife usually hates when I make a new electronic purchase, but this is the one item she really loves. We have five young kids and the portability really is a bonus. When we're done watching, I simply pack it in its bag and put it away.

I think you'll be happy with either. Amazingly, the Epson has probably the worst picture on any currently available projector (it's the only remaining 480P LCD). But the picture is certainly OK for what its target audience is.

One thing to consider though is that the primary purpose of these projectors is their portability. If you're going to permanently mount a projector and audio system, other projectors are a better buy-the IN72 at the low end and the HD70 or Mitsubishi HC1500 for slightly more money (both of which are high def).

Finally, if DB2 means that Epson may be coming out with a 720P portable projector, you might want to wait until after Cedia to make your choice.

Jim

Hello All,

Hope you are all well. Yes, I have a Harman Kardon AVR630 which has this well covered. Thank you for replying.

As far as new units coming from Epson at CEDIA, the price would be much higher and out of budget, MovieMate 25 and 30 series premiered at I believe MSRP around $1,200, which would be way out of budget for us. A 720p unit would indeed be an ideal all in one unit. Who knows, maybe they could stick an HD DVD player in it...that would be something. We will see CEDIA right around the corner.

We know the picture is not state of the art, we are not kidding ourselves. The unit still looks like fun, and we will enjoy it I hope, while we go through our favorite DVDs.

This purchase allowed us to purchase the HDTV Tuner, we get wonderful OTA HDTV reception where we live on our TV, the projector, and the paper to make the screen. All within our allotted budget.

Later,

Tony

my brother has one and likes it, but he brings it with him to his lake home.
if its going to be a fixed unit, then I would get the optoma, but its a good choice if you need portability.

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

Portability was a factor, not just going to use it as a permanent install.

Yes, the Optoma DV10 was on our radar, but my Wife sees rainbows and they give her headaches. The offset of the DV10 was also too much for our primary viewing room, I did not want to use keystone correction.

In the primary room we will do our casual viewing, will take to different room for larger screen viewing. Portability in this situation suits our needs more than a permanent fixed solution. Can only get a 68" diagonal in primary room between the windows. Other living room has no windows on one wall, so will go big screen in there. Later on, we will get a higher resolution projector for the bigger screen room, and leave the MovieMate on the smaller screen for Wii and regular tv watching. Step by step we will end up with 2 projectors, will wait on affordable 1080p before we leap to 2 projectors.

Big factor on purchasing the MovieMate was how inexpensive the replacement Lamps are. This is a huge cost savings.

We also want to take it outside for some outdoor theater.

Later,

Tony

The offset angle is very aggressive on the Optoma. In the basement, it literally sits on the floor in order to correctly throw to a screen in a basement with a 7 foot ceiling. And susceptibility to rainbows can often rule out any DLP for some people.

One other all-in-one projector you may want to look at it the Toshiba ET20U. This has a very short throw lens, creating a 100" picture from only 4 feet away. It is a very nice unit with a high end video processor in it. If I had to do it all over again, this very well might be the projector I'd pick.

Jim

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

Yes, aggressive is an understatement on the offset of the lower end DLP units.

The Toshiba was much more expensive than the MovieMate with the current deals available, about 2 times more expensive. Of course I can't post the price I paid here.

Also, the Toshiba is still DLP, and that was ruled out by my Wifes sensitivity to those units.

We had a DLP rear projection TV and she was getting headaches, we did not know why. I stumbled on this site and started reading about Rainbow effect and how it could cause headaches. We decided to get a small CRT and sold the DLP rear projection TV, her headaches went away...that was fantastic.

Now we want our big picture back, so we decided on the all in one MovieMate. We are not going into this blindly, we had a very small budget for the purchase and we managed to get all the stuff we needed to get into Front Projection. We fully plan on upgrading, and handing down the all in one to the kids. If we did not need the HDTV tuner and other accessories we would have gone with the Epson Home Cinema 400 with the current huge rebate, but we needed more than just the projector. All of this stuff will be used with the next projector we purchase, so money well spent.

Looked at FedEx tracking, packages scheduled to arrive by 4:30pm EDT Wednesday. We are excited.

As I stated above, I will post my impression of the unit after I play with it a bit.

Later,

Tony

i'm in the market for an all in one, but price is a factor. I just want something to bring with me to buddies houses with the sound built in for videogames. I don't even need the dvd player. Maybe they can make one like that (especially for me?)

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

If you don't need a DVD player take a look at an inexpensive business projector, most all, if not all of them have a built in speaker of some kind. You might want some muscle to overcome ambient light too, unless you play in the dark. 2000 Lumen output would be useful to you.

Although the current price on a MovieMate is beating many of the lowly 800x600 business projectors, even with the built in DVD and JVC stereo sound. However, it does not have 2000 lumen, or more, output. You have to weigh what is more important to you.

Later,

Tony

Tony,
that's actually a good idea, but for the dlp models aren't rainbows an issue with most business projectors as far as gaming goes?

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

Yup, you would have to see if a 3x or so color wheel is fast enough for you to prevent you seeing rainbow effects. If not, you would have to decide if the lower contrast ratio of an LCD unit would suit your needs. LCD will also give you a less noisy picture than a DLP unit in the darker areas of a picture, which might be a benefit, since we tend to sit much closer to a screen while gaming, where noise is easier to see.

In an environment where there is modest ambient light the contrast ratio is going to be low no matter what the contrast rating of the projector.

Later,

Tony

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

TwilightZ, no problem. I am quite excited to see what this little projector can and can not do.

I too very much doubt the next generation MovieMate will have any sort of HD DVD player. However an upconverter could very well be possible.

What I would really like to see is an integrated ATSC over the air HD tuner built in. That would be awesome. Stick an antenna on it, and away you go, truly all in one at that point, well...except for the antenna.

Later,

Tony

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

I find that I do not like waiting. Wednesday seems like next year at the moment.

Packages left Newark, NJ at 3:30pm EDT.

Later,

Tony

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

Was looking through the manual to be all prepared for the arrival of the new projector, and on page 66 it states that it uses Pixelworks DNX processing chips.

I figured they would hype this more, but it is not even listed on the Epson 30s specifications anywhere, except buried here on page 66.

Later,

Tony

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

This is great news for all in ones.

I am glad that Epson is continuing the MovieMate line. If I like my current one on arrival, I will definitely be looking forward to a 1080p in 2 to 3 years. That will give me a 2.25x Horizontal and 2.25x Vertical resolution boost.

Later,

Tony

I bought a MovieMate 30s last Nov. and like it. We enjoy watching movies with it a lot. We went thought NetFlix rentals at twice the rate as before getting it. In fact, it's the only gadget I've ever bought that my wife likes too. The picture is great in our dark basement and the sound is decent even without a sub.

The only issue I have with it is the lack of any digital input. So the new 72 is like my dream comes true. Too bad it's in black so I can't just replace the 30s with it without my wife knowing.

Look in your box....you should have an adapter for HD cables. Is that what you mean by digital input?

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

CrimsonDisciple, I believe he is referring to HDMI or DVI digital input, not the HD15 to component cable you are referencing.

On another note....

My brand new 30s has arrived, Wife helped me hang the "screen", (aka super white photo background paper). Have not had much time to play with it yet, have a 1 and 3 year old, my Wife claims she has a 1, 3 and 5 year old....the 5 year old being me, lol.

First impression, is that this is a quality product, very large and heavy...definitely not a grab and go. Large is good in projectors, allows good thermal cooling.

I am projecting a screen of only 70" diagonal, that makes it 61" wide, giving us a perfect 30 degree viewing angle from 9.5 feet. This viewing angle puts me at the SMPTE recommended 30 degrees and puts me in the middle of the 26 to 36 degree THX recommended viewing angle.

I do not find a problem with screen door at this range, which is 1.87 screen widths. At 7 feet, which would be 1.3 screen widths the grid is very easily seen, and would impact enjoyment. A slight defocus, just enough to lighten the dark area between the pixels works very well at my standard seating distance.

I have just watched all of Star Wars A New Hope, and the sharpness of the optics are very good. Fine hair detail is very clear and crisp. Color is spot on with very minor adjustment. I am using the Theater Black Mode, and it has lumens to spare at this small screen size. Black levels are not black, but I did not find it objectionable, my room is all White, so not ideal for reproducing blacks with any projector.

One thing I really enjoyed was the lack of any reflections on the screen, with the old CRT I could always see my whole room reflected in the screen even with the lights off.

When I first saw R2-D2 and C3-PO in the opening sequence of the movie, I was struck by how sharp and how real the image looked. I was not expecting that from such an inexpensive product.

Earlier I ran World News for my Wife, and we watched Wheel of Fortune in HD from the Samsung HDTV tuner. Stunning HD quality, looked much better than the 1080i 26" CRT we are used to. I really don't think that CRT got much past 800 horizontal lines, so we are experiencing more horizontal lines of resolution with HD I believe. I am going to enjoy football season, that is for sure!

If you have any questions, I will try to answer them.

Later,

Tony

The Moviemate is only capable of displaying 480 lines of resolution. That's its physical limitation. HD does look exceptional on a 480P projector, but it's not truely high def. And yes, you're going to love football this year, nothing looks better in widescreen than football.

Jim

Hey Tony,

If, when you decide to get a screen what type of material do you think would be best for our projector? Currently I am using a matte white screen that came with my projector. What gain for ambient light would be best?

Thanks,

CrimsonDisciple

Go Cougs!!!

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

BuffaloJim, yes it is only capable of 480 vertical lines of resolution, I was referencing its 854 lines of horizontal resolution. The CRT manual stated that even though it was a claimed 1080i display that it was only capable of 800 lines of horizontal resolution, so in theory I am seeing 54 more lines of horizontal resolution than before. I am not comparing it to true HD, only to what I was watching before. The human eye is more aware of horizontal than vertical resolution, so this is quite beneficial.

Plus on the small 26" display I was unable to take advantage of an HD image, due to it being too small for the human eye to resolve an HDTV image at a distance of 9.5 feet.

Later,

Tony

Hello All,

Hope you are all well.

CrimsonDisciple, in my situation I am projecting on super white photo backdrop paper, in a completely white room, onto only a 70" inch diagonal screen. I will wait and see how dim the projector gets at about 200 hours, then decide if I want to dim it down more. If it is still as relatively bright as it is now in Theater Black Mode, I was thinking on a XFS Black Flame Screen. From what I have seen I believe this is a great economical screen on a rigid sintra substrate that I can just velcro to the wall, MSRP $250 up to 90" diagonal + $25 to ship it. This would be a semi-do-it-yourself, since I would have to do borders and masking myself.

For right now the super white photo backdrop paper is giving a very good theater like image, much better than I was expecting. Actually the whole package is performing much better than expected. For sure, I would not be able to purchase a 70" alternative for what I paid for the projector, HDTV tuner, and paper screen. Even with full lights on the screen at this size is perfectly watchable, and I really was not expecting that at all. I believe all the research I did has paid off, and even my Wife appears happy, and that is good.

As far as gain for your screen, only you can answer that, is it bright enough for you? If not, try a screen with gain...and see if you can live with the viewing cone of a high gain screen. If it is bright, and you think you can dim it a bit, try a Grey Screen to boost your black levels a bit. Some don't like the overall dullness of a Grey Screen though, this is all personal preference, and if at all possible get screen samples before purchasing anything.

Later,

Tony