new theater room ???s

[ferdie]

Hello to everyone, I am absolutely new to all of this and I have a few questions. I am currently working on a basement dedicated theater room as well as finishing off the entire basement. The theater room is approx. 9.5 X 16.5 feet,with complete light control. I'm on a very limited budget thanks to the current state of the economy. I have to keep the pj budget to about $1000.00and ive been looking at Optoma, Panasonic and Epson as they all have, according to what i've read, some good machines in that price range.
I would like to fill up the 9.5 ft. wall as much as possible, any thoughts?
Also how close can the speaker wire and the romex for 120v outlets be? Is there a certain distance the should be apart.
Thank you in advance for your time!

 

[lsiberian]

Optoma projectors have very limited placement options. So I don't suggest that route.

FYI 9.5 across 114" inches Giving a bit of space to each side a 120" image is probably a decent size.

http://www.projectorcentral.com/Panasonic_Home-PT-AX200U.htm seems to fit your budget unless you need a screen.

 

[BMXTRIX]

Generally you try to keep your wires about a foot away from power lines if possible. Not always possible, but you do your best.

The Panasonic AX200 is the best projector IMO at $1,000. You can find some which cost a few hundred bucks less which are good, but they aren't going to have the lumen output of the Panasonic at the size you are looking for.

I would say that you want to make sure that if you are getting close to the walls in your light controlled room that those walls and the ceiling need to be painted a very dark and flat color to control the reflections. One of the worst offenders of light in rooms after sunlight is reflected projector light.

Anyway, you should be good with the AX200U at your budget and it should work really well.

 

[AVRat]

For acoustic reasons, you want your viewing distance about 122" from the front wall. This portends a 92" dia. screen, 80" wide, which allows just enough for L/R speakers.

 

[lsiberian]

Generally you try to keep your wires about a foot away from power lines if possible. Not always possible, but you do your best.

The Panasonic AX200 is the best projector IMO at $1,000. You can find some which cost a few hundred bucks less which are good, but they aren't going to have the lumen output of the Panasonic at the size you are looking for.

I would say that you want to make sure that if you are getting close to the walls in your light controlled room that those walls and the ceiling need to be painted a very dark and flat color to control the reflections. One of the worst offenders of light in rooms after sunlight is reflected projector light.

Anyway, you should be good with the AX200U at your budget and it should work really well.

How does the AX100 compare to the AX200 in your opinion?

 

[ferdie]

now I'm totally confused, I didn't realize there was a ax100. I looked it up and see that the price of the two are almost the same. Is one better than the other? Being the total rookie that i am I don't understand the differences.
Another question, The room will be painted a dark burgandy flat paint and the ceiling will be painted a flat black, it is a drop ceiling, the trim, base, chair rail and door casing I want to paint a gloss black is this a bad thing? or am I getting too picky?

Again thank you for your responses!!!

 

[ferdie]

Also, I check on a 5ft. x 10ft. sheet of wilsonart laminate for the screen, the cost was 100.00 from the big orange box. I have read about and saw some pictures with that setup and they looked pretty darn good. It is wilsonart designer white #d-354-60 I also priced it at a countertop fabricator and they wanted 150.00 any thoughts on this screen, looks pretty good for the money.

 

[BMXTRIX]

The AX100 is an older version of the AX200. They upped the lumen output a bit and they increased sharpness some. One of my pet peeves with the original implementation of the smoothscreen technology used by Panasonic was that it actually created a softening of the image which I did not like. The newer AX200 seems to really dial this back some and leave you with a really bright, and really sharp image at the same time.

At that price point, it is easily my favorite projector, and I would not be looking at the AX100 which has been out of production for over a year and likely is only available used. Used projectors are rarely a smart purchase.