[shoot]

I was wondering if this would make a decent entry level CRT projector? Pricing is $500 and tubes have minor wear. I plan to drive the pj with a HTPC and use a 72 - 84" screen (wide). I have not been able to find much on the forum or elsewhere about this model. I understand it may be the same chassis as the 800 w/ smaller (7"?) tubes. Does anyone out there have experience with this model?


Thanks!

.

 

[wireburn]

You are correct. It is basically an 800 with the smaller (SD-187, I believe) tubes. I hope you got it very cheap or free. This is quite a low-end projector compared to most others.


-Mike

 

[Cousin.It]

The BG500 is what you get when you put a BG800 in a room with a BD600 for a few days...


Its basically a BG800, but with the SD-187 tubes like the 600 has and many other non-Barco models. I've always considered those tubes to be nice spunky smaller tubes that can make a decent picture if you don't have too big of a screen.


There is one thing to watch out for when buying a 500 though. Some were sold with limited capabilities as a direct replacements for some older Barco's. If the projector has the built-in keypad its probably okay, but what they did was leave off the keypad and made you use an RCVDS to control the projector, and they also only installed a quad decoder that could only be used with RGB inputs.


I would almost say that for $500 you should be getting fairly nice tubes. Have you seen the level of wear/burn yourself with the lenses removed?


Mark