Need Advice, new HT 15k budget

S

Senact

Audioholic Intern
I'm doing a lot of reading on different projectors, checking reviews, comparisons, and although there are some minor variances between reviewers, the general consensus I'm seeing is the AE8000 offers good-great performance across the board, it doesn't really do anything poorly, but nothing superbly. The JVC or Sony's in that price range offer their own advantages, better blacks, image processing, excellent 2D performance, but as you mentioned, the JVC suffers in 3D performance, and the Sony is about 20-25% more but offers respectable 3D. One thing I find a lot of reviewers leave out is the gaming lag, as this will be a good chunk of my use. The 8000 has acceptable gaming lag, but I haven't found numbers on the JVC or Sony yet.

Admittedly, most of my viewing will be 2D, however, on the occasion I want to game or watch a movie in 3D, I want the experience to be tolerable, from the sounds of the JVC, it would be so poor, that I would never want to use it. Tough decision...
 
AcuDefTechGuy

AcuDefTechGuy

Audioholic Jedi
I'm doing a lot of reading on different projectors, checking reviews, comparisons, and although there are some minor variances between reviewers, the general consensus I'm seeing is the AE8000 offers good-great performance across the board, it doesn't really do anything poorly, but nothing superbly. The JVC or Sony's in that price range offer their own advantages, better blacks, image processing, excellent 2D performance, but as you mentioned, the JVC suffers in 3D performance, and the Sony is about 20-25% more but offers respectable 3D. One thing I find a lot of reviewers leave out is the gaming lag, as this will be a good chunk of my use. The 8000 has acceptable gaming lag, but I haven't found numbers on the JVC or Sony yet.

Admittedly, most of my viewing will be 2D, however, on the occasion I want to game or watch a movie in 3D, I want the experience to be tolerable, from the sounds of the JVC, it would be so poor, that I would never want to use it. Tough decision...
Did you compare the BenQ W7000?
 
J

jostenmeat

Audioholic Spartan
I'm doing a lot of reading on different projectors, checking reviews, comparisons, and although there are some minor variances between reviewers, the general consensus I'm seeing is the AE8000 offers good-great performance across the board, it doesn't really do anything poorly, but nothing superbly. The JVC or Sony's in that price range offer their own advantages, better blacks, image processing, excellent 2D performance, but as you mentioned, the JVC suffers in 3D performance, and the Sony is about 20-25% more but offers respectable 3D. One thing I find a lot of reviewers leave out is the gaming lag, as this will be a good chunk of my use. The 8000 has acceptable gaming lag, but I haven't found numbers on the JVC or Sony yet.

Admittedly, most of my viewing will be 2D, however, on the occasion I want to game or watch a movie in 3D, I want the experience to be tolerable, from the sounds of the JVC, it would be so poor, that I would never want to use it. Tough decision...
Oh, I only thought in terms of "replicating the movie theater", but now all of a sudden I see that gaming is a good chunk of its use (or did I miss this before). For me personally, this changes the situation BIG TIME, and motion resolution is actually farther down my list of issues than you might think.

But if motion becomes a #1 priority all of a sudden, ATDG is right, you might consider DLP, as it's the best in this regard. This tech also gets you the best brightness typically as well. Compromises however include: possible RBE for a small portion of the population, placement inflexibility that sometimes borders on the comical, older technology that hasn't been known to make significant strides in recent years, loudest (brighter is always louder), lots of moving parts that may or may not lead to "catastrophic" failure, poorer black levels and shadow detail.

Now if it was ME, and I was FOR SURE going to do a lot of gaming, and it had to be on THIS system, I would think long and hard about forgetting the cinema, and going with a big plasma, 65" for the money. You will have the best motion rez, lag is only as slow as it takes an electrical current to excite gas, you will have the best black levels and shadow detail for both movies and gaming that this money can possibly provide you, when I think of gaming I think of someone leaving the unit of for many hours at a time, taking breaks, getting drinks, not watching a 2hr movie straight through no interruption and turning it off. You are probably not considering the expensive costs of bulb replacements, and you are also probably not realize how often they need to be changed. 1K hours is normal. If people are claiming to go well past that, and there are some out there, I bet they have stupidly low FL. I need to go to hi lamp as soon as 800 hrs, if not sooner myself. Oh yeah, then consider this, for best video calibration accuracy, you need to check in on it WAY more frequently than with other displays, and if you're gaming a lot, your cinematic quality will suffer if you're not addressing the compiling hours. The plasma will also be brighter.

I know I like a greater than 40 deg viewing angle, if anything, even greater than that even with 1.78, but if 2.35 I'm not surprised if I'm pushing 50, maybe beyond. Yet for gaming, I can tell you for certain that I like it no bigger than 30 deg, and very likely even significantly smaller than that, perhaps 25ish even. That is a really huge difference between viewing angle preferences that I have. As I mentioned before, you should throw up the pic on the wall, to really know. Yes some games make this more of an issue than others. BTW, around 30 is still right around the full resolution of 1080p, and is still a bigger viewing angle than what 99/100 of anyone else has.

Like I said, that^ is just ME. But, I bet if you tried your games on the local higher end DLP driven theaters, you might think the same thing.
 
lsiberian

lsiberian

Audioholic Overlord
I play games on an LCD projector and I'd not give up the size for a plasma. I also don't like the pain that placing a dlp projector can be typically. I'm not saying don't go DLP or Plasma, but a solid LCD is excellent for gaming in my experience.
 
J

jostenmeat

Audioholic Spartan
I play games on an LCD projector and I'd not give up the size for a plasma. I also don't like the pain that placing a dlp projector can be typically. I'm not saying don't go DLP or Plasma, but a solid LCD is excellent for gaming in my experience.
To make your comment much more relevant to mine: what is your viewing angle, or how far do you sit from what size screen?

Because otherwise, plasma > 3LCD PJ at the same viewing angle, period, every which way you slice it. Size doesn't mean too much without distance.

Now if you're saying you think gaming is fantastic at a 45 deg viewing angle, ok, wow, because I can barely handle 30, depending on the game. Really depends on the game. 45 deg for movies, heck yeah. I've been to DLP theaters where 1/3-1/2 back was at least that big in viewing angle.

If not which way do you sacrifice? I would sacrifice for making movies too small, because it's still enjoyable. Once you get too big, it hits the point of being unenjoyable. Of course in reality I simply choose not to play most video games in my movie theater.
 
S

Senact

Audioholic Intern
I can't remember if I posted in one of my earlier messages, but my usage of the theater will probably be about 40% movies, 50% gaming, 10% music roughly. The panasonic that I already have on order (which I could still return) comes with an extra bulb and 2 pairs of glasses included with the sale price I got, so I consider that to be a good package for the price. They rate the bulbs for 4k hours, but I doubt it would ever hit those numbers, either way, I do have an extra bulb. Also, the amount of hours I'll put into this system would only be a few hours a week, so it won't be used heavily.

Your advice about the plasma is good, however, I have a 60" LCD already that has done well for me and I am really looking forward to increasing the screen size, so I don't think I would gain much with a 65" plasma. My viewing angle will be nearly straight on but I will read up on some DLP units too.
 
S

Senact

Audioholic Intern
Installed the screen from my brother, 98" manual pull down. I still couldn't center it in the room at that size while using the face of the bulkhead, but it's close. Will surely get the job done until I renovate the room and I've got about 30" for the center speaker and sub underneath. Speakers are to arrive this week and after some research, if I can get it for a good price, I think I will return the panasonic projector for the Sony HW50. I will have to wait another 2 weeks but should be worth it, I have to wait for my funk sub anyway. I will be redoing the lights too when I tear the room apart.
IMG_0709 (Medium).jpgIMG_0710 (Medium).jpgIMG_0711 (Medium).jpg
 
J

jostenmeat

Audioholic Spartan
I was about to type a lot, again, but I decided I better save my breath for the moment. Today is quick style.

1. Non tab tensioned pull down will suffer waving, very visible, very compromised. I give it a year. $100 screen? Say goodbye to whatever it is next year.
2. Plasma is the best possible choice in HT display for gaming, there is no second place, it is in a category all by itself. Actually, its just the best display period for the given viewing angle.
3. You mistake field of view "viewing angle" for off-axis viewing angle, though plasma is 100x better than LCD with that of course.
4. 65" is still more than a 17% increase in display size over a 60".

That is all for today, good luck.
 
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