Projector Buying Guide

Projectors are clearly the highest level when it comes to Home theater entertainment, and the product mainly appeals to the Video and Movie enthusiast. They obviously are different in their technologies and form factors,  thus there are a few steps and things to consider when making a purchase. Obtaining the best optimal screen size, calculating your viewing distance and of course deciding budgets are very important, though one thing is for sure... once a good projector is bought and set there is only the necessity of a popcorn bucket...

DLP or LCD?
There are 2 broad categories in projectors, on the basis of application, and then there are 2 broad categories again, on the basis of technology. Application wise there are business projectors and Home theater ones. We need the latter for our discussion. About technology, the main types are LCD and DLP. There is something called LCOS, though this is a derivative of the LCD and DLP forms of projection.

The 2 types are different, and almost always have different video quality. I will not go into debate on which is better technology, though the Texas Instrument patented DLP chip does seem to have deeper blacks and nice saturated colors. The pixels on your screen itself are hardly visible, plus the video is smoother and more filmlike. On the flip side, DLP projectors have something called the rainbow effect.

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It is something that is decreasing in intensity through the years, but unfortunately it is still there. It is due to color wheels in the DLP projector, which make you see quick flashes of blue, red and green in white/bright projected content. It happens if you quickly move your eyeballs from left to right or top to bottom. These days color wheels have become faster and advanced, so the problem is not such a big one. Another disadvantage is the fact that a color wheel is a moving part, and can cause errors making color wrongly saturated.

LCDs too have their advantages - they are firstly a bit cheaper. They have nice sharpness, and actually display brighter images on the same number of lumens in direct comparison with DLP. They draw less power, throw less heat and are quieter. LCDs cons: Poorer contrast, Blacks come out lighter gray than DLP.