3D Projector Reviews

Full-On/Full-Off Contrast Ratio: 1,132:1

Pre-calibration measurements were made in the User mode at the default settings. Post-calibration measurements were made in the User mode with Auto color space selected. Maximum contrast measurements were made with the Lamp Low Power mode active and White Intensity set to 100. With these settings, the SP1080’s black level measured 0.033 ft-L and peak white 37.36 ft-L, for a contrast ratio of 1,132:1. Most of my 2D evaluation was done with the White Intensity set to 0 or 10, which reduced peak white to 15.07 or 17.1 ft-L, respectively.

Highest peak brightness was delivered by the default settings in the aptly named Bright preset: 102.1 ft-L. Fan noise in this and other modes with Lamp Low Power set to Off was notably higher than with the Lamp Low Power mode active. Before calibration, the SP1080’s Warmest color temperature preset in Auto color mode delivered a bluish grayscale with poor tracking. The Delta E of its pre-cal grayscale averaged out to 6.4. Calibration with the projector’s White Intensity adjustment set to minimum greatly improved things to a 1.7 Delta E, with a high of 2.8 at 20% brightness. (Delta E is a figure of merit that indicates how closely a display adheres to the Rec. 709 HD color standard. Experts generally agree that levels below 3 are visibly indistinguishable from perfect color tracking.)

The Delta E of the SP1080’s color points in the Auto color space mode averaged out to 10. While the projector lacks color management system adjustments to tweak color points, switching off the White Intensity setting resulted in much-improved red color-point accuracy.

With the Film Gamma preset selected, gamma in the User mode averaged 2.0 and displayed mostly even tracking. Post-calibration, gamma remained linear and averaged 2.2.

Picture uniformity was very good. The InFocus passed all of our high-def video processing tests, except for 2:2 pulldown. Fan noise was also relatively low with the Lamp Low Power mode active.—AG