What do you guys/gals reckon?
My TV recently died and I have $600 or so to spend
The room is probably perfect for a projector in terms of light coming in and wall colour.
Choice boils down to
Benq or Epson projector around the $500-600 mark vs 42ish inch crappy brand tv (soniq etc) around $300-400
The projector will eventually need a lamp replacement
Uhuh. In 10 years. And it will be much cheaper than a TV. A nice thing about projectors is they don't change much unlike TVs.
Walls are fine to project onto. In fact some projectors even come with off-white correction filters specifically for walls.
A $600 projector is low end and won't be Full HD. Lamp life might be about 5000 hours so I guess you could keep on using it for 10 years if you used it for less than 10 hours a week. But I honestly think you would want to go back to a tv after using a $600 projector.
Few years back we were using a 720p projector and the lamp life was only 2000 hours and a new lamp was $500 online. Looks like a lamp for a $500 BenQ projector is about $190 on ebay.
I figure the TV will also die just after warranty expiry.
Anyone got a projector for their bedroom that they project onto the ceiling? I have a feeling I wouldn't move my corpulent frame out of bed if I got one
that would be the dream, right? interested to hear about the hacks of others to achieve this
Set up one when I first moved out. Turns out its really uncomfortable staring up at the ceiling for long periods of time.
Having the light in the middle of the room didn't help either
And all the dust slowly collecting onto the lens of the projector because stupid gravity.
Voted projector: can't beat the big screen. Ordinarily I'd say no but that's only because people's space isn't good for it.
I would say do your research though and make sure you really are OK with the arrangement you may need for a projector in terms of locating it etc.
Voted TV:
They've gotten much better in quality in terms of glare, brightness, refresh, contrast, resolution and colour accuracy.
You may find a projector at a similar price to a TV, but I don't think the projector can compete with a TV at some or all of those fields.
And this is coming from a guy that wants a LaZboy and a 90" display for some hardcore OzBargaining.
To make the most of a projector you need a screen, receiver and speaker system.
I'd say TV only because I always feel the colours on projectors are quite dim compared to the colours and picture quality of TVs. It's probably best to go into a store where you can see both of these side by side and decide which is more suitable for you.
see if you can get a benq w1070 awesome projector for the $$,
As someone with both projector and tv, and someone who sold projecter screens in the past.
Go projector! 42" tv will be rubbish. You don't need a screen, a basic white/offwhite or grey wall will be fine.
Panasonic pt-ar1000u is a good bet or benq w1070 also great. Make sure you get something with 2500+Lumens and 1080p resolution.
Also be aware of how you will mount or place your projector.
projector central is a great site to see the expected size of your screen, using their calculator for the projector you wish to buy.
Well, it kind of matters what you are going to display on it.
If you are just watching FTA TV then an LCD TV is fine. However, if you are looking at movies, etc. then the projector will massacre a 42" TV (I've got both).
Remember that with a projector you are also going to need an AV Amp and speakers, they don't tend to come with anything decent if they have anything at all.
Yes you can project onto a wall, it works fine if it's white. And the bulb will last years if you are not hammering it (eg even 4 hours a night would last 3-4 years).
mainly movies and shows via hulu
I have a good sound system too
go projector.
The projector will eventually need a lamp replacement which is expensive. Also, it's not ideal to project onto a wall and a proper projection screen can also be expensive.
I think a projector will be hard to eventually sell compared to a tv.