Today’s projectors turn living rooms into private cinemas

BERLIN - Going to the movies no longer means leaving home. All you need these days is a projector and a blank space on your wall to turn a living room into a cinema.

Despite the great picture quality, they remain a big investment, so don’t grab the first projector you see. It’s better to do some research and some soul searching. Does the projector need to be Full HD, or will HD-ready do?

Is the goal to project high-definition images in full high-definition? Or will a lower resolution do? What about brightness and image quality?

“Manufacturer’s figures about contrast and brightness are usually exaggerated and only somewhat hold up to close scrutiny,” says Markus Bautsch, who tests digital optical devices for Stiftung Warentest, a German consumer products rating organisation.

It’s key to check out the projector before settling on one. There are two basic technologies these days.

“The one is based on LCD technology, using liquid crystals,” explains Timo Wolters, editor with a German magazine about home cinemas. “The other is based on DLP technology, which uses about two million moveable micro mirrors.”

Regardless of which you choose, each has its pros and cons. One weakness of the LCD projector used to be problems with its basic black screen.

“It’s never been quite perfect, but it’s always getting better,” says Wolters. “The so-called fly screen effect, where there was a kind of pattern in the picture, isn’t so bad any more either.” With today’s projectors, you can generally only see that if you get right next to the screen.

But there can be limitations to a DLP projector as well, even if different people rate these problems differently.

“When there’s strong contrast in the image, sensitive eyes can see colours flicker,” says Bautsch. If one doesn’t look for it, one often doesn’t notice this rainbow effect. But people who do see it can be very annoyed by it.

One disturbance can be noise, a byproduct of the cooling system. “The smaller the housing, the louder the ventilator,” says Bautsch.

Individual expectations also play a role in picking a projector.

“You should make sure that the projector fits in with the room where it’s going to be used,” says Roland Stehle of the German Society for Entertainment and Communications Electronics gfu.

People also cannot be as flexible about picking a spot in the room for their DLP projector as they might be with LCD devices.

“LCD projectors don’t just have a stronger zoom, so you can make the image fit the chosen projection surface, but they also have the lens shift function,” says Wolters. “That way the lens can be angled so that, if the projector is sitting a little to the side of the screen, the picture can be shifted without leading to disruptions.”

A projector’s light bulbs tend to work for about 3,000 hours in eco-mode. But when they burn out, expect to shell out a bit for a replacement.

“They still cost between 250 and 500 euros ($322 to $645),” says Wolters. “If your projector is already a few years old, it’s often worth it because of advances in technology, to just get a new one.”