[srauly]

For the many of you who watch movies with your projector sitting on top of your coffee table, do you leave it there wired up all of the time or do you keep it stored away until your ready to watch a movie?


Once we move, I'm thinking of going with an LT150. I have a 3 year old daughter. I'm thinking of keeping the projector stored away and the cables hidden under the couch. When we're ready to watch a movie, I could stick it on the coffee table, pull the cables out from under the couch, hook it up, and go. But I'm worried that I might have to retweak a lot of settings every time. If any of you do this sort of thing, can you comment on what you do to minimize/eliminate setup time?


Scott

 

[tpfarr]

I keep mine hooked up all the time. But I don't have kids running around. I don't think that any tweeking would need to be redone just due to positioning and wiring. Positioning and focus are pretty simple and the wiring should be straight forward to connect and disconnect.


My 2 c.




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Tom Pfarr
http://www.toad.net/~tpfarr/Hometheater.htm

 

[catullus]

If your daughter knocks the projector off the table or lets her Eskimo Pie melt into it, goodbye warranty. I would set the projector up whenever I used it, then put it away. Takes only seconds to do. Another thing to remember is that this is a BUSINESS projector, by design. It's built to be plugged in, unplugged, carried around, all the time. My own projector is used both at home and in the classroom. I have built a nice stand on casters that I roll into position in the great room when I watch movies. When I turn the projector off and it cools down, it goes back into the carry case and off to school the next day. No problem.


Mike

 

[bbordner]

If possible, put it on a lower shelf, or use a "stereo enclosure" to hold everything. I'd worry about kicking the thing when I put my feet up!

 

[Bill Wilkins]

If you are worried about your daughter or friends dumping ice cream or drinks on your projector or other equipment, talk to your homeowners insurance agent about scheduling your equipment. Scheduling electronics on your policy provides more coverage than the standard policy and costs approx. $1 to $1.50 per $100 of coverage. ex: a $5000 proj.

would cost between $50-$75 per year. There is usually no deductible when scheduled and it would cover dumped ice cream or mixed drinks taking out your electronics.

 

[Randall Morton]

I leave my 150 on the table all the time. When I bought it I thought the same thing, that I would put it up each time. If I weren't using it so much I would. I have a 5 year old and kids are around all the time. They haven't bothered it yet but I have lots of other places for them to play.

 

[Gary McCoy]

When my daughter was a toddler I found it wise to totally child-proof the room as far up as she could reach, and when she started climbing chairs, to finish the job. Although we left her specific things to play with in every open room (including one base cupboard in the kitchen with noisy but harmless metal pans to enjoy) she sooner or later investigated every item in the whole house she was allowed access to. There were rooms she never entered without an adult, however, and these had locks she could not reach. One was the basement rec room with my original credenza-style Kloss Videobeam CRT projector and stereo gear. I think I saw every episode of "Fraggle Rock" ever filmed with my daughter in my lap, in glorious NTSC interlaced video on a 10' diagonal screen (a white bedsheet). It was a sad day when HBO scrambled the "C" band satellite signals and we had to give this up, some 18 years ago (damn I've had this hobby a long time). She is now gainfully employed in another state, wheedling Dad for his old A/V gear for her apartment.


Consider that even if you can avoid the food and drink spills, your projector has hot spots to touch, lenses to fingerprint, and cables to trip over. If you must keep it on a coffee table, I would exclude the kid from the room unless you were there 100% of the time.


Even better, now is the time to think about a more permanent projector home and avoiding setup time for movies. I purchased a ceiling mount for my present projector, then used it to suspend the unit inside a dustbox/hushbox which is placed on top of a seven foot tall bookcase - hard to even notice among the stuffed panda collection (the wife's not the kid's). This cost a weekend of work to build the box, about $150 in long cables, and is purely and simply very convenient.


Gary

 

[tlastrange]

I've had my NEC LT150 for a week and it's been on the coffee table during my screen material tests .


I spent about $2 at Home Depot this morning and mounted it under the coffee table. Turned out quite nice for the price http://www.avsforum.com/ubb/smile.gif I may end up cutting a notch in the table to raise the projector another three inches but we'll see when my screen shows up.


Photos at the bottom of this page: http://www.lastrange.com/ht/pictures.shtml


I don't have to adjust the projector anymore. Now I have to adjust the table...


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Tom L.
my-soontobe-home-theater

 

[Mane3215]

Thats a real nice set up you have there Tom. Because of your great test and photos I am about to purchase the LT150 as well. With all the hype and the price I cant resist anymore.


One question though, how do you plan on getting the wires from the coffee table to your a/v gear without having them lay ontop of the carpet?



Chris

 

[dlptheater]

When I had my DL450, I placed on the bottom shelf of our coffee table and left it there. The bottom shelf also helped with masking noise the projector made quite a bit. I also had my HTPC placed on the bottom shelf right next to the projector so I could use a 8" video cable to connect the two.


For me it was too much of a hassle to hook it up each time. Before I had it on the bottom shelf I used to place it on the top of the table each time (and put it away).




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lance

I'm looking for a job once I return from Europe (January 2002).

Resume online at http://resumes.dice.com/lkstitch

 

[tlastrange]

Quote:

Originally posted by Mane3215: One question though, how do you plan on getting the wires from the coffee table to your a/v gear without having them lay ontop of the carpet?

They'll lay on top of the carpet and will only really be visible between the coffee table and the couch. I'm thinking about getting a runner carpet to place between the coffee table and couch. It'll catch foot traffic and hide the cables...


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Tom L.
my-soontobe-home-theater

 

[dlptheater]

Quote:

Originally posted by tlastrange: They'll lay on top of the carpet and will only really be visible between the coffee table and the couch. I'm thinking about getting a runner carpet to place between the coffee table and couch. It'll catch foot traffic and hide the cables...

I did pretty much the same, I had about 1.5-2 feet of wire showing from the bottom of the coffee cable to the couch. I bought some cable cover (its round black flex plastic with a slit cut along it where you can insert the cables) from RadioShack to cover the wires to make it a cleaner install. The coffee table install worked great for me since I didn't have power near the ceiling and didn't really want to put holes in the ceiling either (not a dedicated room)


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lance

I'm looking for a job once I return from Europe (January 2002).

Resume online at http://resumes.dice.com/lkstitch