Projector Reviews

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When manufacturers announced the first three-chip DLPs aimed at the home theater market, my first thought was, "I'm there!" One thing about even the best single-chip DLPs continued to bug me: those pesky rainbows.

I've been saying it since the first 1080p displays hit the market: There's no need for 1080p on a screen smaller than 65 inches. Your eye just can't resolve that kind of detail at the distance just about everyone sits from their TV. Resoundingly, no one cared. Where that level of detail is really useful is with projection. With a screen of 90 or 100 inches, you can use every bit of detail you can get. Texas Instruments was pretty candid about not needing to rush in to a 1080p front projector chip. After all, where was the competition? At CEDIA 2005, Sony forced their hand. OK, I honestly don't know if Sony's announcement had anything to do with TI's timeline, but I found it interesting that, at CEDIA, there were no 1080p DLP front projectors, and, at CES three months later, there were a half dozen. Sony's bombshell was their announcement of the VPL-VW100 LCOS 1080p front projector. At $10,000, it's a full $2,000 to $3,000 less than the 720p DLPs. Projector sales are 90 percent numbers, and 1080p is a big one.

My love affair with front projection began one fateful day in 2002. My safe, usually reliable RPTV was away at the repair shop, so a coworker innocently introduced me to the PowerLite TW100 from Epson. It didn't take long for this fling to evolve into a full-blown romance. The TW100 fit so easily into my lifestyle. And that picture—it was so detailed, so noise free, and so. . .big.

Walking around at CES 2006 it wasn't difficult to ascertain what's coming down the road in video: 1080P and lots of it. While in years past it's been simple to embrace 720P front projection due to the lack of 1920x1080 HD sources, that argument is losing some steam. There's more HD on satellite and cable all the time, and according to the companies involved HD DVD and Blu-ray will arrive in the first half of this year. And Marantz and all the other companies who are in the 720P DLP business made it clear that this year will see them enter the 1080P DLP business.