Okay, my wife reworked my budget, and instead of the latest model the H78DC3 projector that I REALLY wanted from Optoma, we opted to get the H31. I ordered from an authorized dealer on-line out of Florida, and while I won't bore you with the shipping fiasco - let's just say - they'll remain annonymous.
The projector finally arrived with the celling mount, and it only took me about 30 minutes to install, level, power on, and aim the projector - VERY easy - I think anyone with a level, and a ladder could mount and aim this very easily.
The projector mounts with three screws and the mount I had was not the factory mount, so it took me some time to get the legs adjusted correctly - if I was doing it again, I'd by the Optoma mount, that's made for the H31 - fewer issues I would hope.
Powered the unit on, and plugged in my component cables for input. The projector is mounted approx. 15 feet from the wall, and the image was smack on the floor - so I did need to aim it up a bit, and use the keystone correction to get the image I wanted. The screen is a 16:9 format - widescreen, and is roughly 117" at this point. Needless to say - I'm happy - we were hoping for at least 100" or more.
The on-screen menu is very user friendly, it's just hard to work it "upside down" - since I mounted the H31 on the celling, I needed to invert the image. The projector has four options - floor or celling mount, and front or REAR projection - imagin, having a big screen style rear screen TV - that's 15 feet deep - no, I'll keep it mounted in front thanks!
Once that was done, I tinkered a little more with the keystone, and image settings on the menu screen of Gladiator (once I get the screen up, I'll spend more time adjusting the projector), changes and edits are live real time, and did not require a shut down and restart of the projector - was nice, didn't even need the book really, but I've had big screens TV's for a while, and am familiar with the settings. This was very similar to my Mitsubishi 65" - so it went fast, but anyone could get the basics done and be watching movies in less than an hour for sure.
Now, the IMAGE quality - was WAY beyond what I had hoped for, we noticed things in the film that we'd never seen before, the smoke detail in the opening battle was just "fog" on my Mitsu, and the intricate work on the swords, while always there before, were just very crisp and clean.
Even at 117" on full zoom, the image did not pixelize, and I did not notice any "rainbow" effect (the projector has a 6 segment 5x color wheel to avoid this) as some low budget DLP projectors have.
All told - I'M VERY HAPPY - tonight - it's Soprano's Season 5 - in the theater!!!
Features Darkchip2 Dlp Technology And 16 9 Aspect Ratio To Deliver An Authentic Movie Theater Experience In The Comfort Of Your Home. 850 Lumens And 3...More at Target
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