Amazing Home Theater Projector!

I am a home theater nut and I just love a BIG screen! So, home theater projection was a natural for me. I never thought I'd actually have an 8-10 foot wide screen in my home, but about 5 years ago I bought an Infocus X1, which was very nice for its time. It cost me $1,000. I thought it was so great, but as time went on I picked on the blacks and contrast more and more due to read AVSForum's CRT projector site with them bashing digitals and always saying what great contrast and inky blacks they have.

This really intrigued me, so after owning the X1 for two years I upgraded to an ECP 4500 CRT projector which blew my mind. The contrast and blacks levels were amazing. Unfortunately, these sets are much more difficult to setup and maintain...not to mention they are freaking HUGE! lol.

With the ECP 4500 I was wondering how good HD would look. It wasn't resolving HD as well as I would've liked. So, I ended up getting the Sharp after I had gotten an Infcous 4805 and let me just tell you this projector is stunning!

The contrast is great. The on/off contrast doesn't match a CRT, but the only times you can tell are when the scene is extremely dark and low in contrast, but even then it generally looks plenty good with the iris on. The ANSI contrast is an improvement (that's mixed scene contrast). The colors are really vivid and the image just pops with 3D like depth with DVDs, HD, HD gaming, etc.

I love how I can adjust the iris with a touch of a button. If there is a little ambient light I turn it to high brightness mode and get a better picture. If the lights are off I put it in high contrast mode for deeper blacks and improved contrast (yet the brightness is still great).

I run an 8 foot wide 16:9 screen (about 9'2" diagonal). The offset on this projector is not very high like some DLPs, which means you can use it in a room with low ceilings without having to use keystone correction.

However, I have found keystone correction on this unit is not the devil like some people claim. Maybe back in the day keystone ruined the image, but on some newer units it doesn't seem to have much, if any, affect on the image to the naked eye.

This projector also gives you great control over the picture, so you can calibrate it to near perfection. You'll think you brought a DLP cinema right to your home. I'm moving and I'm planning on moving my screen from 8 wide to at least 10.5' wide (hopefully 12' wide).

One final thing I love about this projector is it has a short throw lens which allows you to get a large image without needing as much room. www.ProjectorCentral.com has an image calculator so you can figure out what screen size you will get at a given distance.

Bring the movie theater to your living room, bed room or whatever room you wish with this projector. Pair it with a surround sound system and you won't know what hit you! Your friends' jaws will hit the floor.

The projector uses about a $400 lamp, but if you look online you can find some better prices usually.

A few more things. This projector has a 4,000:1 on/off contrast ratio and don't be fooled by a lot of LCD projectors claiming 6,000:1 or higher like the AX100U. That's a nice unit, but it uses auto iris tricks to claim a higher on/off contrast, but the reality is the the Sharp has a higher NATIVE on/off contrast and you can tell it's higher contrast looking at the image.

Rainbow effect in DLPs may be a concern for a very small percentage of people. So, be warned. I rarely see it. If you see it give it a little time and it may go away. Go see a DLP tv or projector before buying.

Screen door effect (which is being able to see the lines between the pixels) is virtually a non issue with this 1280x768p projector. Sit about 1.5x the width of the screen and you should be fine. Although, I personally could sit even closer if I wanted to and not be bothered.

Loudness. The fan on this unit is quiet until you put the lamp in its higher operating mode and then it's noticeable, but during a movie you shouldn't notice it much if at all.

Heat. This projector puts off a ton of heat and will probably heat the room up by about 10 degrees overtime. lol.
The funny thing is, I believe that is actually true.

The remote. The remote is nice and compact. It's very nicely setup and easy to use.

The resolution is 1280x768p, which means it's a computer resolution at 16:10 ratio. A typical 16:9 image will be displayed inside the 16:10 image area (will have tiny black bars on the top and bottom, easily masked) and you can move the image up and down inside the image area to lower your offset for 16:9 or 2.35:1 material.

Scaler. The scaler seems to work pretty good. I have no complaints. Everything looks wonderful.

This projector is bar none THE best deal in all of home cinema. Period. Don't waste your money on a 1080p LCD costing 3x the price. They are not that much better. In many cases they come up short in some areas in comparison.

Brightness. Don't be fooled by the super high brightness of some projectors you see. Many units are business projectors with overstated lumens and are not ideal for a quality home theater image. This projector delivers a very bright image without sacrificing home theater image quality.

This projector can be ceiling mounted, floor/table mounted or even used in rear projection. It's very versatile.