Until recently I had an old projector inherented from a university to use for movie nights, but after a rather expensive bulb change the picture started flickering and it is now pretty much unusabe. So I am looking for a new one.
Things I want:
- HDMI or DisplayPort
- A standardized bulb of sorts, if possible - changing the bulb in my old projector was very specific and therefore expensive
- Reasonable brightness - I want to project across the room onto a white wall
- Somewhat silent - we have the projector behind us watching movies, so it’s good if it’s not very loud.
- Available in Europe
- Affordable
Things I do not want:
- Smart functionality or any form of spyware
It doesn’t need to be super compact, but a smaller form factor is of course an advantage. Most importantly I just want a no-nonsense projector that does the job, is as repairable as possible if something breaks, and ideally doesn’t cost a fortune.
If there’s a projector that’s reliable enough that it can safely be bought second hand that would be great.
Edit: I would ideally not pay much more than €600, and I am not very picky when it comes to picture quality - I just want to watch some movies now and then without having to buy a piece of trash with Android on it. I want a projector because I don’t want a TV in my living room, not because I want a full-blown cinema experience at home. I’m sorry I didn’t make this clear right away!
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I was advised to try getting hold of a good screen (there’s some ”level of reflectiveness” measurement if I remember correctly) to project on. Then even a moderately bright projector will do
It’s far out of spec for OPs requirements however I purchased a Hisense PX3 Pro for home use and have never been happier with a projector even though it broke my budget.
It’s just amazing and has revolutionized “family movie night” (which has actually been Anpanman movies on Netflix for the last month or so).
With a smart tv(or projector) set up a temporary guest network on your router if it has a mandatory update. Then disable it and never connect to the internet again. Worked for me.
Yeah, I’m just radicalized to the point where I would rather go without watching movies than to buy some product I have to fight against in order to have it work for me. But it’s true that as long as there’s HDMI input there should always be hope.
benq w1070 series lamp ~$10 on AliExpress
why? long life, no bulbs, sharp image, lots of standard ports, no smart crap, 5k lumens, adjustable lens.
I should probably have been more precise about budget, but more than a thousand dollars is a bit outside of my price range. Seems like a great projector though, thanks!
We have an Epson 3200 and it’s been pretty great. You’ll need speakers though. It uses LED bulbs that can be replaced, it’s super bright and the bulbs last thousands of hours.
I’ll use a separate sound system in either case, so no built in speakers is more of a feature than a bug. Will check it out, thanks!
Be sure to filter for three chip designs when going for a DLP based system. Nothing more annoying than color fringing and shifting on a single chip beamer. The Epson 3200 is a good suggestion.
Thanks! That’s very useful in order to know what to look for. The Epson 3200 seems to be a solid recommendation, but it doesn’t appear to be available in Europe and also seems to be a bit on the expensive side I’m afraid.
I think there is an European version, it’s the EH-TW7000. I’m not sure it’s going to get much cheaper and still be any good.
Thank you! It seems to sometimes be on sale for a little less than €900, which is a lot but if it’s the only decent alternative out there I might have to consider it.
It does have features like resolution well above full HD and support for 3D though, both of which are completely lost on me. But it seems you’re right there’s not much to choose from at a lower price range without opting in for a bunch of anti-features.
It doesn’t actually do anything above full HD. They use a pixel shift technique that kinda sorta gets a higher resolution. But it’s more of a gimmick. I would consider it a full HD beamer.
Have you looked at laser projectors? No bulb should be great.
Laser sounds ideal, but all the ones I can find are either very expensive or very cheap and shipping with Android TV. I might end up getting something created for displaying powerpoint presentations in office settings, as the consumer market seems to be perfectly divided between products for rich cinephiles and cheap trash.
LED projectors FTW
The color brightness improvement over DLP is night and day difference.
Price? I got an Epson 3 LCD 6 months ago that I like. My previous color wheel projector was never great. I could always see rainbows on fast moving objects.
I should absolutely have specified price in the post - I underestimated how fancy set-ups people get for home use. Paying more than around €600 would start getting painful for me. Maybe that’s unrealistic, but I was hoping there would be some option on the market where I don’t have to pay twice the price in order not to have smart functionality.
I don’t care too much about picture quality - my old projector was more than 10 years old and more than good enough (except that it was too old for HDMI) - I just want build quality.
The Epson 3200 3LCD seems to be a popular choice throughout the responses here, but it’s on the expensive side. It also doesn’t seem to be on the market in Europe, which is another difficulty I didn’t forsee. The only affordable-ish Epson 3LCD I’ve found without Android for sale in my country so far is the EB-X49 XGA, and I’m not entirely convinced it’s great.
I currently use a cheap one by Elephas which has proven good for the price.
