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New member Username: HogwildPost Number: 4 Registered: Aug-05 | I'm setting up a basement home theatre. The drywall is next - so I need to define my projector and placement. I have little to no experience with home audio or theatre. I had a look in a couple of showrooms. In Front Projectors I've seen a high end LCD Marantz (loved it but $19000.00) a mid level DLP Runco $7000.00 (hated it) and a Sony vplhs51 LCD $5000.00 (loved it). All were in ambient light controlled showrooms on Stewart Screens. Having seen the Runco DLP, and only two LCD's, I have not been impressed by the DLP technology. So far - I would be happy with the Sony. Do you have any suggestions for other projectors I should look at - comparable to the Sony. |
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Silver Member Username: ZiggyzoggyoioiOutside Philadelphia, PA Post Number: 105 Registered: Jun-05 | The best resource for reviews and comparisons is http://www.projectorcentral.com I found that the Hitachi PJ-TX100 Ultravision is every bit as good as the Sony, and gray-market Ebay prices are ~$1300. While I normally wouldn't support gray-market sellers, the disparity between MSRP ($3995) and their prices makes it a no-brainer, even if I would have to pay for repairs out of pocket. Others seem to like the Panasonic AE700U but I found it to be pretty dull compared to the Hitachi and others. Sharp makes a fairly inexpensive DLP that's supposed to be pretty good, but I have not seen it to compare. Good luck. |
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New member Username: HogwildPost Number: 5 Registered: Aug-05 | Thanks for the information. It's really hard to find a showroom to view these. I live just east of Toronto Canada and travelled 60 miles to view the sony. If anyone has a setup near me I'll bring the beer. |
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Silver Member Username: ZiggyzoggyoioiOutside Philadelphia, PA Post Number: 108 Registered: Jun-05 | Rob, that is a problem. Even in my large metropolitan area (philadelphia) there are only about a dozen places showing projectors, and only a handful have more than 1 or 2. And even those typically only had 1 under ~$5k US. Here's a pretty good comparison article of 4 of them (Sony, Hitachi, Panasonic, Epson): http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/article.asp?section_id=3&article_id=802&page_nu mber=1 |
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Unregistered guest | Rob, since you live in Ontario. I have found this site that has very cheap prices for projectors (gray market). They are located in Hamilto, Ontario. I don't know how risky it is to deal with them, but the prices are very good. Check this: http://www.eastporters.com/index.htm |
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Anonymous | Grey market=NO WARRANTY=More money=UNSATISFIED. Buy only from authorized dealers and you can be sure of what you are getting and be protected by the manufacturers warranty |
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Silver Member Username: ZiggyzoggyoioiOutside Philadelphia, PA Post Number: 132 Registered: Jun-05 | Anonymous, that is a generalization that is simply not true in all cases, especially when the projector has a vastly lower list price in its home market. As I said re: my Hitachi projector (which works perfectly by the way), my purchase price was 1/3 the US retail price. The lowest price I could find from an authorized dealer was $3299 - or 2.5 times what I paid for mine. I would never buy from an unauthorized dealer to save $100 - in that case it's NOT worth it. But to save $2000? Any day of the week and twice on Sunday. That $2000 will cover a lot of out-of-pocket repairs. |