Infocus has long been known for making the most inexpensive business projectors, but they’re shifting gears and changing direction by entering the home cinema specialty market with their new 720p projector, the Play Big IN78EX. While details are slim, the basic idea is known. The Play Big IN78EX will go up against other specialty projectors such as the Epson’s PowerLite Cinema 810 and Planar’s new projectors. Since features are more important than specifications in the specialty market, Infocus is shying away from the details, simply letting it be known that the brightness is 1000 lumens. As for the features they feel are more important is the D65 color calibration and Pixelworks DNX technology. While a bit expensive at $4,499 USD, Infocus expects it to be quite a hit among home cinema enthusiasts.

[via marketwire]

With CEDIA starting, we’re going to be flooded with new projectors over the next week, which is great news for consumers. Competition is going to be extremely heavy for the next year as manufacturers fight for your wallet. With the options of 1080p, 720p, and 480p, there is a home cinema projector for you no matter what the size of your wallet is. For instance, Optoma is releasing their new HD70 DLP projector, with 1000 lumens, a 4000:1 contrast, and a native 720p resolution all for under $1,000. The HD70 even includes an HDMI port which is hard to find even on projectors more than $1,000. Of course, while this is exciting, don’t think the other projector manufacturers are going to let Optoma be the only one to offer so much for so little.
[via prnewswire]

HQV is the word of the day, and you’ll find it with Cinetron’s new LCoS Projector: the HD900. Hollywood Quality Video processing is being touted as creating the best possible image from source material to be displayed on a projector. If that doesn’t really mean anything to you, maybe the specifications of HD900 will. Three 0.7″ 1080p LCoS chips, 1000 lumens, and a 5000:1 contrast mean that you’re going to be watching one crystal-clear image. As far as connectivity, they skipped out on HDMI, but give you everything else you need including DVI. The HD900 will be available next month for $5999 USD. It’s good to see new LCoS, SXRD, and D-ILA projectors entering the market to compete with LCD and DLP projectors.

[via businesswire]

CEDIA begins tomorrow, so we can expect lots of news about new projectors, pricing, and specifications, but Epson is a day ahead of everyone, announcing their new PowerLite Cinema 810 and PowerLite Cinema 810 HQV projectors. They’ll be displaying both at CEDIA, but they let some details about them slip today, mainly that they have a 1600 ANSI Lumens brightness and a 10,000:1 contrast ratio. Considering that Epson makes nearly all of the LCD panels used in projectors, it’s no surprise that this too is a 720p LCD projector. The optional Silicon Optix HQV (Hollywood Quality Video) processor has some serious processing power and is able to perform over one trillion operations per second, though all you really need to know is that it’s going to create the best image it can for the projector. The PowerLite Cinema 810 will cost $2,999.00 USD and the bundled HQV version will cost $5,999.00 next month.

[via prnewswire]

JVC has a yet unnamed projector they’re sitting on with some serious hardware inside of it. They’ve announced a new D-ILA (Digital Image Light Amplification) chip that is going to be used in their next 1080p projector. The three 0.7″ D-ILA chips used in their new 800 lumens projector are promising to eliminate the dreaded screen-door effect and offer a contrast of 10,000:1. D-ILA, JVC’s proprietary LCoS technology, is a favorite among high-end home cinema enthusiasts for the amazing pictures it’s able to create with minimal screen-door effects and without rainbow artifacts. The projectors utilizing these new chips won’t be available until 2007, but it might be worth the wait, since the price is estimated at less than $7,000 USD.

[via Engadget]

Breaking into an established market is tough, but Planar looks like they’re determined to make a name for themselves in the projector business. To follow up on their previous work-oriented projectors, they’ve released five new home cinema projectors. The low-end of their PD series contains the PD4010, a simple 480p projector with 1000 lumens listed at $1299. Their new mid-range 720p projectors, the PD7010, PD7060, PD7130, and PD7150 vary greatly in specifications and price, but all share a 1000 lumens brightness. Last and most importantly, Planar isn’t messing around and is showing that they mean business by dropping their 1080p PD8110 projector as well, beating most current projector manufacturers into the 1080p market.

[via businesswire]

If you need a fairly bright and fairly inexpensive XGA (1024 x 768) LCD projector for your company’s conference room, Toshiba just released a projector that has some nice specifications for such an environment. The TLP-X3000U provides enough brightness at 3000 lumens that it can be used in a well-lit meeting room, allowing for an audience to take notes about a presentation and such without having to strain themselves in the dark. While really nothing special or out-of-the-ordinary with the projector or its inputs, the price is amazing at $1739.00 USD, making it affordable for any office budget.

[via businesswire]

Lenses usually aren’t impressive enough to merit any more attention than a quick glance, let alone an entire news post, but Cinemascope lenses are very unique and very rare. Since most home cinema projectors are in a wide-screen 16:9 format, they end up conflicting with the Hollywood-friendly 2.35:1 format that some films were originally shot in. The result is black bars on the top and bottom of the 16:9 picture. Cinemascope lenses will change a projected image into 2.35:1, showing the film the way it was meant to be seen. Sim2 will be one of the growing number of manufacturers to offer a 2.35:1 Cinemascope lens on its high-end projectors such as the C3X and the HT3000. While rather expensive at $9k for the manual lens and $12k for the motorized lens, Hollywood has always had a high price for luxury.

[via gspr]

If having one of the best home cinemas in the world is on your list of things-to-do, there is a projector coming up that looks very promising. The Sim2 HT5000 looks like it’s going to dominate the high-end home theater market when it comes out in the next few months. With more specs to be released at CEDIA, what we know now is enough to keep an eye on it. The most exciting detail of the HT5000 is the three-chip DLP 1080p display system it uses, which is rare among home cinema projectors. Three chips are obviously better than one, especially since there is no rainbow effect, and also unlike most home cinema projectors, this one looks to be very bright, using either a single or double 300W lamp configuration. They’ll be announcing the price shortly, but count on it costing as much as a new car.
[via Engadget]

I’ve heard of LumenLab plenty of times when the topic of inexpensive projectors comes up. They’ve already have a popular website that shows how to build an LCD projector, as well as offering the supplies to do so. Well, for those who aren’t very good with power tools and such, they’re gearing up to launch a WVGA (854 x 480) LCD projector for $499 with a replacement lamp that only costs $30. While it may seem too good to be true, I think that it is highly likely that they might be able to pull it off. Their method of using a 150W HID lamp with a 6000 hr life expectancy seems very possible, and with the price of LCD panels falling, the manufacturing cost of the projector would also fall. For 1000 lumens and a 600:1 contrast, it would be fantastic if this became a realistic alternative to higher priced WVGA projectors. Still, in order for it to become acceptable, it needs to be thoroughly reviewed and benchmarked before it can really gain legitimacy. We can only wait and see how it pans out.

[via Engadget]