Why I got side tracked

[Generic Eric]

Is this from the Star Wars phone booth?

[darthpaul]

No, it's the entrance to the Theater, which is one of the things I want to eventually change

[Cobolisdead]

Awesome job man! Speaking as someone that haphazardly threw a projector in the living room, I am totally jealous of your garage conversion! What size screen are you using?

Here is a crappy pic of my cheap screen I mounted all by myself.



The one good thing about this cheap screen is that it is motorized.

[BadMouth]

lol, was coming to this thread to post about my own projector project that has sidetracked me.

The story goes....
I bought an old XVGA projector for $50 to trace images onto canvas because I have very little talent and would like to do something other than Bob Ross landscapes.
A week later I'm at the fabric store and blackout fabric is on sale for $3.50/yd.  So I figure I might as well make a screen to get some more use out of this thing.
I end up with a 4ft tall 4:3 screen based on wanting to do the least amount of cutting (work).
Then I get tired of moving the projector around and worrying about something damaging it, so I buy a ceiling mount.
At this point I have around $100 in everything and something like a 80" 4:3 screen.

The DVI input on the projector won't partake in all this HDMI "handshaking" BS, so I'm forced to use either the VGA or component video input.
It works ok with an old Seagate media player, but the player only does Netflix and Youtube.
So I spend another $35 on a used HDMI to component adapter which much to my surprise works wonderfully.
The picture is better than expected for being 720 or less...whatever this thing is putting out.

So the picture looks good, but now I've got an even smaller 16:9 image on the 4:3 screen.
While watching a movie, I enlarged the image to use the full height of the screen and run over the sides.
Now I'm impressed.  This feels like a theater rather than just a large tv.
I believe it would be around a 100" 16:9 screen at that point.

....so now I kind of want to build another screen......and buy a better projector.....and get some new furniture.....all because I picked up a $50 used one to trace stuff with.

[Le Chuck]

^ if you give a mouse a cookie lol. 

[Cobolisdead]

LOL! It happens! You can get good Projectors for cheap now. For under a grand, you can find a 1080p 3D projector, hook that up to a game console for Netflix, Blu-rays, and gaming, and throw in a bit of paint to make the wall into a great screen, and you are golden. 

[pbj]

Two things every projector owner can tell you at any time:

1.  How many hours they have on their bulb
2.  How much a replacement bulb costs

[Cobolisdead]

Two things every projector owner can tell you at any time:

1.  How many hours they have on their bulb
2.  How much a replacement bulb costs

Oh yeah! 3600 hours and counting on my bulb, and the replacement is around $200 unless I want to try to reuse the harness.

[AzureKnight]

This project is incredible, I love, nice work.

I must say that I personally enjoyed the original Death Star playset on display.  Is it still hidden in the cabinet?

[yotsuya]

Two things every projector owner can tell you at any time:

1.  How many hours they have on their bulb
2.  How much a replacement bulb costs