Home Theater projector

[Mac_in_Taiwan]

Anyone has a good suggestion on home theater projector? my budget goes from $1000 - $1500. One more question, will I be able to use PB 12' to play movie with that projector ? how will the resolution change?

Thanks in advance.

 

[bcstanding]

Anyone has a good suggestion on home theater projector? my budget goes from $1000 - $1500. One more question, will I be able to use PB 12' to play movie with that projector ? how will the resolution change?

Thanks in advance.

I just bought a Sanyo Z1 for $900. It's an awesome projector for DVD/Xbox and pretty good for HDTV as well. However, in your price range is the Sanyo Z2 and Panasonic PTL500U - they are both a step up from mine. www.avsforum.com is a great place to research audio/video stuff.

 

[blackfox]

Anyone has a good suggestion on home theater projector? my budget goes from $1000 - $1500. One more question, will I be able to use PB 12' to play movie with that projector ? how will the resolution change?

Thanks in advance.

While I may not be able to give up-to-the-date recommendations on projectors (the above posters suggestions are great BTW), I can recommend some older projectors which might be had on the cheap.

These include the Sanyo PLV-Z1 (what above poster bought), Panasonic PT L300 (above poster recommended the later L500), and the Infocus X1 (probably also updated). Another great projector, which while originally out of your price range, might have come down some, is the NEC LT240 or the Sony VPL HS10, which is widescreen.

As to your question, yes your PB will be able to play movies via the projector, although you may want to invest in a dedicated DVD player (a nice one) to maximize your enjoyment. Most projectors (if not all) have at least a S-video and composite line-ins.

As for the resolution change, if you end up purchasing a SVGA projector, which has a native resolution of 800x600, your PB will just rescale itself to match. On my PB, it would merely make a smaller screen outlined in black (this was in mirror mode). Many SVGA projectors do offer attempts at non-native XGA resolution, but the results can be fairly bad.

In any case, XGA projectors may be more common (and cheaper) now, in which case, none of this matters - you will be matched up perfectly.

Sorry that I cannot offer more recent info, my purchases and expertise are from a few years back.

Hope I was helpful.

 

[Thomas Veil]

Remember to look beyond just the cost of the projector. Make sure your dealer is up-front with you about maintenance costs.

Many projector lamps have about a 1500-2500 lamp life. That's not bad if you use the projector only for special events, like watching movies...but if it's your primary video display, and you use it the way many Americans do (three hours a day is being conservative), you could find yourself replacing the lamp in as little as 16 months...maybe less. And the lamps can be anywhere from $200-600 each. (And you'll burn the lamp out much faster if you're the kind of person who shuts off the projector without allowing it to go through its pre-shutdown cooling cycle.)

 

[bankshot]

One more question, will I be able to use PB 12' to play movie with that projector ?

One thing to consider is that with the PowerBook, the sound output will only be stereo. Presumably if you're buying a projector, you already have a surround sound system, so you'll lose that aspect of the viewing experience. Should work fine though.

 

[budugu]

May be slightly off but take a look at this!

http://www20.tomshardware.com/howto/20041113/index.html

this could be byfar the cheapest option!

 

[Inkmonkey]

Great Movie Watching Marmosets!
What is the noise level with projectors these days? They fairly silent?
I'm pretty interested in this type of set-up in my basement but I'm concerned about the sound.