On Saturday afternoon I made it to an off-site hotel suite to get a sneak peak at prototypes of two of SIM2’s new 1080p DLP projectors with Greg Nicoloso of SIM2 and .Gordeon Sell PR’s Raney Nelson. Fired up at the suite were a Domino single-chip 1080p DLP targeted to sell at around $10K in November, and the HT5000 ($50K, available in November), which is the big dog, three-chip 1080p DLP with an eye-searing 4000-lumen rated light output.

So mighty is the HT5000’s light output that SIM2 showed it on 12-foot wide Stewart FireHawk screen and it sill looked bright and punchy and full of contrast. It was a colder day here in Denver, and the light off the screen actually warmed me up a bit!

The demo started with Blu-ray clips from Samsung’s rightfully maligned BD-P1000 player, which looked good in terms of depth, but had the characteristic noisy, grainy image that the player is known for. 1080p at 12-feet isn’t going let it hide anywhere.

Greg then switched sources to a JVC D-Theater tape deck (remember those?) and immediately the noise and grain left the screen. The projector was a very recently manufactured prototype that didn’t allow full adjustment of the image. Still, with the Samsung out of the picture I saw brilliant smoothness, clarity and depth, as well as impressive contrast, especially considering how bright the image was and how large the screen.

The HT5000 looks to be a formidable beast, and its certainly going to be aimed at the largest and most ambitious installations. UAV is anxiously awaiting a sample of SIM2’s single-chip 1080p projector, the HT3000 which is shipping now at a saner $15,995 and certainly isn’t going to require a cinema-sized screen.