Looks like the minimum distance is 11.5 to 12 inches. It's so bright at that distance that it's difficult to tell where exactly perfect focus is. As with most projectors, the menus seem to outshine content for brightness.
So far, I have tried a DVD player with S-video and a laptop at native resolution through one of the VGA ports. The scaler is pretty decent, so standard def is soft, but watchable. With projectors, the quality of the content makes a big difference, so the best standard def results will be with a minimally compressed DVD. Animated content looks very good. Laptop testing was limited to the basic desktop screen with Netflix for the HD. I first checked out an episode of "House of Cards" and it seemed a bit dreary. I'll get to why in a bit. Then I checked out "The Lorax" and it was very nice, sharp, bright and colorful.
I haven't tried gaming on it yet, but that will be next. So far, I can say that it's a great value, but don't expect it to compete with units costing 10x as much. It has many of the same issues as most projectors in the range, as well as a couple extra which are related to the lens geometry. My testing was at about 12' diagonal, so image intensity will be better at smaller sizes. But even at that size, it is quite acceptable in a room with subdued lighting. Blacks, particularly surrounding the image, are not very dark. If this bothers you, then you might want to frame the image with something which doesn't reflect well. Reds seem a bit weak, Blues are decent, and Greens are strong. This is pretty standard for a projector in this range. The good news is that there are advanced color adjustments which let you tune the primaries and color temperature, so it can be tweaked very nicely. There is also a "color mode" setting, but I found that "dynamic", which is the default, was really the best option. Dark content seems a bit muddy, due to the lower contrast. Content with a lot of these types of scenes may not be especially appealing, but it's certainly viewable. The speaker would probably be fine for classic arcade games, but don't expect much from it. It might be ok in a small room, or if you are close to the unit, but it's not "loud" as described by some. The remote is very low-end, with small buttons laid out in calculator format. Very difficult to navigate menus, especially in a darkened room. There are also a few extras, like freeze frame and digital zoom, as well as the ability to grab a frame of video as the boot screen.
Even with the faults inherent to range, it's still a very nice little unit. As a first projector, for use in a smaller room or for a specific application, you won't find better for the price. I have seen this unit referred to in a "projectors for gaming" roundup, and there were no mentions about any serious lag. The author of the article stated that it was important to minimize image processing for all of the units he tested, so I expect that there won't be much of a lag issue running at native resolution.
Don't take my criticisms too seriously, as I am spoiled by the PT-AE4000 hanging in the room. It really is a nice little unit, and much better than the one I paid $2k for about 7 years ago.
*edit*
....out of stock again.....
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Topic: Refurb Epson 2000 Lumen WXGA 16:10 Projectors - $199 & Free Shipping!! (Read 5391 times)
