Not fucking likely!
^.^
About a week and a half ago, I posted this picture:
And I provided no explanation.
Today, I’ll correct that.
What you’re looking at there is an 80″ diagonal, 16:9 format screen. If that’s just the screen, where’s the image coming from?
From here:
A Sanyo Z3 LCD Home Theater Projector. (That link’s in Japanese, but you’ll get the idea.)Why on earth would I go and buy such a thing? Isn’t a regular TV good enough?
Hell no! ^.^
TVs are nice and all, but they’ve got their limits. When I got to Japan my school had provided a 24″ TV for my apartment. Decent enough, but not as big as I’d like. We had a new teacher coming to our school and they needed stuff to set up her apartment. I wanted a bigger set, so I suggested I could just buy a new one for myself and they could give her the set they’d provided for me. Everybody agreed that was a reasonable solution.
So I went out shopping. I’d found some nice sets, mostly in the $700 range or so. Good, 16:9 ratio screens with lots of hookups. Then, one day when I was scouting out stuff in Bic Camera I took a wander into the projector room.
Oh. My. God.
These things were gorgeous! Huge, high resolution pictures! Great image quality! High-end hookups!
And high-end price tags.
Yes, they cost a fair bit more than TVs, but the prices aren’t unwarranted, certainly not for what you get. The model I picked up was more than I was initially looking to spend, but there was a hell of a deal on it the night I’d gone out to buy one. 20% of the price in store credit (nearly $400) and a free 80″ screen (normally about $150). How could I pass up a deal like that?
I couldn’t.
But the projector’s only part of the system. What is it that gets the images to the projector?
Here’s the rest of my setup:
1. iMac DV/SE – the download slave (Keeps the iBook G4 free for “real” computer use.)
2. PSTwo – Japanese model, not modded
3. Gamecube – US model with Korean Gameboy Player (not presently attached) (Action Replay for playing non-US games)
4. Cyber Gadget System AV Selector Pro – Yes, it costs as much (or more than) a game system, but it’s worth it. Man, is it worth it. [b]8 inputs[/b], handles component video (RGB and D-Terminal), s-video, composite video, network, L/R and optical audio and even comes with its own remote. If you’ve got a high end display (TV set or projector) you’ll want to use component video from any device that can output it. And if you’ve got more than one such device, it’s more than worth the money to invest in a switchbox like this. Give that $20 s-video one you got from Gamestop to your little brother. You’ll never need it again.
5. VCR – I don’t watch much stuff on tape, but it’s useful as a TV tuner since my projector doesn’t have a tuner of its own. Also handy for taping weird stuff off Japanese TV.
6. Xbox – Korean model, modded, 120GB hard drive. Used for downloaded movies and TV shows as well as the occasional game.
7. Philips DVP-320 DVD player – region free enabled.
8. PSOne – Korean model, modded.
9. Firewire hard drive (120GB) and DVD burner (dual layer) – both connected to the iMac.
The Xbox and DVD player are connected to the switch with RGB component cables. The PSTwo and Gamecube are using D-Terminal cables. (D-terminal is a small plug for running component video. Tidier than RGB cables.) Thankfully, the switch knows it’s all component and I only have to run one set of RGB cables to the projector to handle all the outputs. Why use RGB to the projector instead of D-Terminal? It’s a lot cheaper. My 10-meter RGB cable was $40. A D-Terminal that long is well over $100.
The VCR and PSOne are using regular composite video. I could connect my PSOne (and Dreamcast when I take it out) through s-video, but that would mean running another cable to the projector. The image is good as it is now, but I may still do that for a future upgrade. (Though probably not unless I get a VCR that supports s-video, and that’s not all that likely to happen.)
Audio is my weak link right now. I’m using a Logitech 2.1 setup. My apartment’s really not suited to a 5.1 arrangment, and I get enough thumping on the ceiling from my upstairs neighbor the way things are now. Everything sounds great, so I don’t really mind not having full-on surround just yet.
Movies, downloaded TV shows and games all look phenomenal on this setup. I really can’t imagine needed to get anything else home theater related anytime soon.
But I’m sure something will catch my eye before I know it. ^.^