[SimpleTheater]

I could sell you my HD81. Everything is working fine.

 

[MrHollywood]

hi there, are you selling the optoma hd81 scaler?

 

[MrHollywood]

I just received an HD81 projector and the controller from a friend. When connected together the controller had no response other than a blinking red power light...nothing else. The projector had a solid red power light and blinking blue lamp light. No other functions would work....no power, no light from lamp, nothing. I am using a 50 ft length of male to female serial cable with a gender changer on one end if that matters. I've read all the issues about the lamp dying early, or the controller's HDMI problems, or the controller dying early as well. I don't really need the controller as my pioneer Elite receiver handles all the HDMI switching for me, and I was looking for a way to connect the receiver directly to the projectors single HDMI input and let the receiver handle everything else. Problem is that as it is the projector and the controller are married together with that serial cable and neither will work independent or each other.....or so I thought.


I opened my projector to see if I could find a remote IR sensor connection so that I could just rig an IR blaster to control power on/off. What I did find inside the projector are 3 surface mount momentary switches - one of them being a power on/off switch. I connected my bluray player directly into the projectors single HDMI input, left the serial cables unplugged, and pressed that little power switch.....BAM! The projector powered up just fine and was playing my bluray with no issues, and more importantly without that POS controller. Better still is that all previous calibration and color settings have been retained inside the projector! So at this point I purchased a small momentary switch and soldered 2 small wires to the switch on the board itself, and mounted that switch on the rear of the projector panel. Sure, I have to manually turn on the projector by pressing that new switch, but a $2.00 switch, and the removal of that processor, I think I can live with that.


I'm still trying to figure out a way to get am IR sensor attached to the projector. There has to be a plug somewhere inside as the HD81 and HD80 are basically the same units and share the same interior, and the HD80 has the sensor. Finding this IR sensor is the only way to access the projectors color settings, etc.


Anyway, easy fix if you lost your processor, and a definitive answer about the projector being used without the processor - it can be used standalone without the processor.


Jimmy

hi are you selling the hd81 scaler?

 

[SebasSF]

I ended up buying an Optoma HD 50. Why another Optoma...well, it fits in my custom projector lift and the throw works. The image is great for home theater after calibration...I would call it an upgrade from the HD81 in many ways.

So long HD81 thread, and thanks!

 

[urbeenjammin]

Can you give us your perspective of the brightness in 3D with the HD50?

 

[SebasSF]

The HD50 is much brighter, but I had an HD81, not the LV. I'm really enjoying the HD50.

 

[Nav Sandhu]

Projector no lights, controller is blinking red

The kids were watching the projector and the projector just shut off. There are no lights on the projector, on the controller I have a blinking red light. I rebooted the equipment and it's still not working. The bulb is fairly new (

 

[Nav Sandhu]

Update:

The VXD is blinking RED, while the projector has no lights. I opened the unit and found the On button, that didn't work either. Do I need to have an HDMI signal to get that to work? I just had power. Please help.

 

[alzullig]

Where on projector are service mini-switches?

Ok, took a really nasty crawl and took the projector down. Opened it up and tested it using hdmi in and the service on switch...runs fine!
Bad controller I guess?
Any other ideas for controller issue repair?
Has anyone figured out a way to use the controller IR on switch and bypass some of the other parts so you can turn on the unit with controller IR? Figuring out a way to use the switch in the projector does not sound like fun...
Does image suffer without the controller?
Thanks, Sebastian

My LV-81 has the classic won't turn on problem. Hitting it worked for a while, but no longer.

I was wondering if someone could tell me where the mini-switches are located on the projector itself. Are they accessible from behind the rear panel? Or does the projector shell have to be removed to access them? My projector is ceiling mounted upside down, and I'd like to know if I have to dismount it to get internally into the mini-switch location?
Thank you very much in advance...Alan

 

[hdcl]

I have two projectors and two controller boxes. Both have exhibited the "failure to start" phenomenon. When i experienced the original failure of this type, i returned the whole system to Optoma. They changed boards in the projector and repaired the controller. They charged $800.00 for the repair. The returned projector worked well for 4 months then failed. I bought a refurb projector and controller from Optoma for $2,450.00. That controller worked fine with the old projector but eventually failed. I had two good projectors and 2 bad controllers. One night I gave one of the controllers are hard smack on its top. After that, it has worked for 6 months. The bulb in the projector I use, the one Optoma returned for the $800.00 repair, has 2400 hours on it. Picture is OK. The other controller box has not worked regardless of how I hit it. I suspect that a relay in the box becomes stuck but who knows. My son in law just bought a new Epson 5220 3D projector with 3 panels. I swear that my picture is sharper and does not suffer from the convergence issues that are clearly apparent on 3 panel units.

I just had the issue where my HD81 would fail to power up. Both with the remote and the front panel switch, the VXD would go from red to blue but then after about 30 - 45 seconds would go back to red. The Projector has a red light and would not power up. I figured the VXD was not transmitting the on/off signal to the projector and was going to try all sorts of diagnostic steps till I rediscovered this thread again. I gave the VXD a couple of good hard smacks with a rubber mallet and voila - the projector powered up just fine.

Time will tell if this is a temporary fix or if the VXD is on its last legs. I was looking to replace the HD81 in about 3 - 6 months anyway so I hope I can get that much mileage out of it. I am on my 5th bulb now and it is getting pretty dim. I don't want to pony up another $500 for a bulb on a dying unit.

 

[PrimitiveLondon]

Sorry for reviving an old thread on an ancient projector.



My HD81 was working perfectly until yesterday. The VXP control unit will not power up at all. I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions.


Thanks.

 

[alzullig]

Is your control unit's red standby light on and won't turn on (to blue)?

Do you have a standby light on the projector unit itself?

Or is the control unit completely dead-dead even after unplugging and re-plugging a couple times?

Alan

 

[Aizensama]

Hi guys, I was wondering has anyone figured out how to access the projector menu without the av box? I just got my hands on this but it only came with the projector it self. I did open it up and used the internal power switch to turn it on and it's running fine just trying to figure out if anyone had any luck getting into the menu. Is there a way to use the service port to maybe configure the settings? Any help will be great. Thanks.

 

[alzullig]

I’m pretty sure you can fully control the projector including bringing the menus up by using the RS-232 Serial Port. Normally this serial cable comes from the scalar unit which also has both serial input & output ports that just pass through serial commands.

You would hook a computer to the serial port using a null-modem serial cable. Then open a Terminal program on the computer and issue the appropriate serial commands....Two problems though, most modern computers don’t have a serial port. This is easily remedied with an inexpensive USB-Serial Port dongle. Null-modem serial cables are also very inexpensive.

The second problem is finding what the various serial port control commands are. These are usually used by pro-installers in a whole integrated theater control system like Crestron... You might be able to find these commands on the internet or more likely, direct from Optima customer service....

Good luck,
Alan

 

[Aizensama]

I’m pretty sure you can fully control the projector including bringing the menus up by using the RS-232 Serial Port. Normally this serial cable comes from the scalar unit which also has both serial input & output ports that just pass through serial commands.

You would hook a computer to the serial port using a null-modem serial cable. Then open a Terminal program on the computer and issue the appropriate serial commands....Two problems though, most modern computers don’t have a serial port. This is easily remedied with an inexpensive USB-Serial Port dongle. Null-modem serial cables are also very inexpensive.

The second problem is finding what the various serial port control commands are. These are usually used by pro-installers in a whole integrated theater control system like Crestron... You might be able to find these commands on the internet or more likely, direct from Optima customer service....

Good luck,
Alan

Thanks for the help. I will look into getting the serial cable. I got few old pc's laying around so serial port wont be a issue.
I did come across few websites that have the codes but I'm not too sure if they're specifically made for a certain model or optoma uses them for all of their projectors.

 

[Aizensama]

I'm a complete noob at this, I did find some hex commands from optoma but they don't seem to be working or maybe I'm not using them correctly. I'm currently running them through perl to communicate with the rs232 port, but I'm not getting any response. Does anyone know of any program that might be better at communication with rs232? And sorry if this sounds dumb, but I found protocol for optoma HD81, can those be used to communicate with it or is that only through a certain receiver. I also wanted to know if 81-lv video receiver is compatible with HD81?

 

[alzullig]

I'm a complete noob at this, I did find some hex commands from optoma but they don't seem to be working or maybe I'm not using them correctly. I'm currently running them through perl to communicate with the rs232 port, but I'm not getting any response. Does anyone know of any program that might be better at communication with rs232? And sorry if this sounds dumb, but I found protocol for optoma HD81, can those be used to communicate with it or is that only through a certain receiver. I also wanted to know if 81-lv video receiver is compatible with HD81?

I’m pretty sure your serial cable has to be a null-modem cable...You are using that instead of a regular serial cable...right? Are you not getting any response from the unit whatsoever?

 

[Infinitenothing]

The "remote" commands are similar but not the same as the HD3000>HD81 communication. The best documentation of that is here: Communication between HD81 and HD3000
but there is still more reverse engineering work to be done. The good news is that it does seem entirely possible to emulate the scaler.

Also, yes, this is a likely solution to the issues documented above where the VXD light goes blue when you push the power button and then back to red about a minute later. No need to hack into the service switches

 

[Aizensama]

I still haven't been able to access any menu through rs232 on this projector. If anyone has any luck please let us know. I tried a null modem cable on Realterm and couldn't get a response. It is detecting the projector but the protocol functions I found aren't working. I did manage to fix a over heat issue I recently started getting. It would power down after 15 minutes or so and lamp started blinking with temp light blinking once it properly shutdown. Cleaned the whole unit, checked the fans, I still kept getting the fail after 10 - 15 minutes. I took the heat sensor that's attached near top left of the color wheel and lamp housing area and placed it back on. It was really tightened up so I just tightened it enough didn't force it in too much as it was earlier. Works fine now it is still flush against the air duck so it should read the temp. Figured I'll put this on here incase anyone else is getting power fail after few minutes.