Home Theater Geeks 461 Transcript

Please be advised this transcript is AI-generated and may not be word for word. Time codes refer to the approximate times in the ad-supported version of the show.
 

00:00 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
In this episode of Home Theater Geeks, I chat with Phil Jones of ProjectorReviewscom about the recently conducted UST Projector Showdown. So stick around.

00:16 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Podcasts you love From people you trust.

00:20 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
This is TWIT. Hey there, scott Wilkinson. Here, the Home Theater Geek of ProjectorReviewscom, about a recent showdown that he conducted of UST projectors. The showdown was conducted in conjunction with Projectorscreencom, an online retailer of projectors and screens, and Phil and his website, projectorreviewscom, does what it says reviews projectors. Hey, phil, welcome to the show.

01:10 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Hey, how are you guys Doing?

01:12 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
good.

01:13 - Phil Jones (Guest)
It's good to see you, Scott. It's been a while.

01:14 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
It's good to see you too. You've been on the show before, but it's been quite a while, so I was sure glad to have a chance to have you back on. Oh yeah, it's a pleasure. Sure glad to have a chance to have you back on. Oh yeah, it's a pleasure. So you are the technical editor and lead reviewer of ProjectorReviewscom, so you've got a lot of experience with projectors, and you put this event together with Brian Gluck, who is one of the principals anyway, if not the principal, at Projectorscreencom. So let's start with making sure that everybody knows what a UST projector is.

01:54 - Phil Jones (Guest)
So UST stands for Ultra Short Throw Projector, and a lot of times you may hear them referred to as laser TVs, and what that means is an ultra short throw projector that uses a laser light source, that has built-in speakers and smart features. It's basically a TV replacement for someone who's looking to utilize a projector in an environment where you would normally have a television. And because it's an ultra short throw, the projector could be literally six inches away from the screen and still project an image approaching 120 inches. So kind of a cool growing category in projectors, and a lot of companies are now making these types of models.

02:42 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
And they also use a special type of screen, right? I mean, a lot of people would say, oh, just put the projector up against the wall, shoot it up against a white wall, no good idea, right?

02:55 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Well, the screen. If you think about a projector, there's three parts, three things that basically impact the performance of your projector the projector, your, your room and the screen. Those are the three things. The screen ensures that the image is perfectly flat. On an ultra short throw projector, because the distance is so close between the screen and the projector, any waves in your wall is gonna look like distortion.

03:19
The next thing is to project the materials. There's different type of fabrics you could use and what they do is some of them, which are ultra short throw specific, can reject ambient light because they're only going to accept light from a very steep angle from the projector if it's from below the screen, from below the screen at a very steep angle. So anything in front of it, above it, to the left, isn't, doesn't impact it, so that what you end up with is the ability to utilize the projector during the day. So if you have a bright one of these units and you have a good screen, it literally can be a TV replacement. The units that we chose sometimes they're bundled with the screens, but the units that we chose for this unit, for this showdown, actually are standalone units, which gives you the flexibility to buy the size of screen and the type of screen motorized up, motorized down, fixed, whatever that you want to utilize for your home environment.

04:19 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Right, right, okay, so tell us about the shootout. How did it come about? What were the basic premises that you were using, that you wanted to achieve?

04:31 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Okay, so let's talk about it. I do a lot of reviews of projectors. Right, I'm projecting reviews, but the issue is it's very difficult to determine the differences or the advantages. To determine the differences or the advantages, disadvantages of one projector over another based on testing, previous testing and your memory. So, because there'll be times where I'll review a $3,000 ultra short throw projector and it could be two months before I get another one and while trying to remember which one had better color, it's not really going to work. And then also, testing doesn't really apply a lot of times to the real world.

05:12
You could test a projector and you're measuring its potential contrast ratio, brightness, but things such as your video processing has a major impact on how those particular capabilities are utilized. So you'll find a projector that actually has, on paper, more brightness, better contrast, better black levels on paper with the tests. But then when you play video on it, the one that actually has a lower amount of theoretically a lower amount of contrast seems to give you better blacks and higher brightness. So you really need to see them side by side. So when Brian said, hey, I got eight screens here, you know I sell all eight brands or eight brands or multiple brands. Let's compile a list of these and kind of come up with a showdown. Now we didn't award the best, because there is no best. It's all about the combination of features and what you want. But we wanted to give people a better understanding of what was out there so they can choose the best product for themselves.

06:19 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
So another thing that I found really interesting that you told me before the show was that you didn't actually do full calibrations. Yes, which I thought was very interesting, because normally in these shootout kind of situations, showdown situations, you would calibrate them all, but you didn't in this case, why not?

06:38 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, well, a lot of vidiots say, like, what to calibrate them? Right, what to calibrate them and get the client tool out, and how many you know what's the color gamut and all that type of stuff. And like, right next to me right now I have the big JVC, you know, which is $26,000, and the big Sony which is $30,000. Yes, you should absolutely calibrate those, but we have to be realistic to the target audience of the products we're talking about. Most of these laser ultra short throw projectors that we reviewed sold between $25,000 and $6,000, the median price being around $3,200 to $3,500. And it's quite rare that someone who's spending $3,000 for one of these units is going to go out and spend several hundred bucks to have it professionally calibrated.

07:28
So we want it to be more realistic Because I've been on both sides. Scott, you know that I used to work for a company that starts with an S and ends with a Y, and I've been with these, where one manufacturer will send eight engineers and get into the service manual and spend four and a half hours calibrating it, and then the other manufacturer would spend 10 minutes and all of a sudden, the one that has hours and hours of calibration wins the contest but, they don't manage to tell everybody that, yeah, there's no way, you're probably going to get that because you're not going to spend that much money or have those capabilities.

08:06
So we want it to be fair. We want to give um manufacturers a guideline. Hey, you know, your projector is better than us. You believe that your projector offers the best balance of color accuracy, brightness and black level detail. You tell us what the best settings are, based on what you believe, and and then we will use those settings. And then we will, because we've done that. Well, they go. I have it calibrated, they go. Why didn't you turn that feature off? Or why didn't you turn this feature on? We said you make the decision, manufacturers. And then we will gather a group of judges and pick the ones that deliver the best overall experience and what we've learned doing this showdown. Scott is a lot of times the most accurate one isn't the one that won really wow.

08:55 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
So am I correct, then, that you had the manufacturers of the projectors that were in the showdown come in and adjust their own projector?

09:03 - Phil Jones (Guest)
projector. Yeah, we gave them a couple of different options. So the first thing was we pulled. Brian insisted, and I agree, that we pulled the products directly from inventory because a lot of manufacturers will send you a golden sample, the golden sample, the golden sample which some engineer goes through and tweaks on it before he sends it off, right? So we said that's not real, that's not can um representative of what the normal person can buy, right?

09:31
so the first thing is he pulled them from his inventory and he sells all these projectors he sells all the projectors and many of them of the manufacturers said okay, if you pull them from inventory now it's open, we will replace it with another one kind of thing. So, first thing, pulled from it mentory, so it is a representative of a model you could actually buy. It's not a special unit. The next thing is we gave the manufacturers the opportunity to visit his facility and spend. We gave them a time limit of about 90 minutes and we also told them no fancy, you know test patterns.

10:07
You can't get into the service menu. You need to utilize things that the basic test patterns that the average consumer has access to. So, for example, I can go on YouTube and go to the Meridio website and get the contrast test, the contrast test pattern, the um brightness test pattern, the motion test patterns. Use the ones that the average person can, you can can utilize to determine what's the best approach. Um, and then then they would go in and say, okay, well, this is the best picture mode, maybe this color temperature, maybe the motion set to, and I'm going to adjust the brightness and contrast to this and I believe this is the best balance for this particular shootout. So some would come in, others would just provide the recommendations, but we did have one manufacturer that opted not to Really it, that opted not to and um and what we and and they should have came. That's the best way I could explain it and we'll talk about that as we get into the results a little later yes, exactly, okay, very good.

11:17 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Um, so they, you set up the projectors and they're all in a room, right, they're all lined up, all shooting onto the same're all lined up, all shooting onto the same screen. Yes, yes, not the same, the same make and model. Yeah, so I think.

11:30 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Spectra provided Brian with a multiple 800-inch screens. We chose 100 because that was the only way we could fit eight of them in a room. The screens are ambient light rejecting, and we also use think of them almost like blinders in between the screens to minimize the interaction between the two. So if you had two projectors on opposite sides of the room because they're ambient light rejecting, they would not see each other. They're more likely to be impacted by the one beside it.

12:04 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
So here we have the blinders. Yeah, here we have a picture of the room with blinders between the screens exactly, and we want to.

12:13 - Phil Jones (Guest)
If you notice, the ambient lights are up. So we reviewed, we uh, we uh looked at these projectors in two different environments lights down and lights up. Because a lot of people who buy ultra short throw projectors want to utilize them all the time, not just at night in a bat cave watching Harry Potter movies, they want to watch sports and things like that. So we wanted to evaluate them in not only darkened environments but also in brighter environments, so people can choose, based on how they're going to be using the projector and their budgets, which one worked the best for them.

12:51 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Yeah, yeah, very good. Now for sources. You had a Kaleidoscape Strato, which is a very high end streamer Movie player yeah. Movie player. You also had a Panasonic UB820, which is a really fine UHD Blu-ray player, and an HTPC, a home theater PC, as I understand.

13:15 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yes, most of the reason why we took the we utilized Kaleidoscape is consistency. We also had an Apple TV. The problem with Apple TV is you're at the mercy of your internet, and so you're not really sure if the projectors are being fed the best signal possible.

13:38 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Whereas with the Kaleidoscape you download the content onto a local hard drive and play it from there, and you're assured of consistency.

13:47 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Exactly. If you, we, I just did a review on the same model on project reviewscom the actual player and it it is actually the the best source. So, for example, even if you have a, if you have a disc, a disc has a finite amount of storage on it and that. So it works fine if I put in a 90 minute movie, because I could put the movie on there, the trailers on there, nine different languages on there, different surround sound formats on there, but if the movie gets longer, like Dune eventually start running out of space. So you have to start applying, you have to reduce the bit rate. That's on the desk, darrell Bock, more compression. Darrell Bock, exactly, a Kaleidoscape is consistent bit rate. So it doesn't matter how long the movie is, the file disk gets bigger.

14:28
So we wanted to make sure that the sources were the best source possible. The next thing is Brian even ensured that all of the bullet train cables, the digital optical cables, were the exact same length, so we got eight. I think they were 90 foot long. Optical HDMIs cables were the exact same length, so we got eight. I think there were 90 foot long um optical hdmis, so no, um, so that. So you wouldn't have one projector connected with a short wire and one projector connected with a long wire excellent, that's exactly the way to do it.

14:56
Yeah, okay, and then we ran, and then also we had the the blu-ray player. One of the reasons why we had the blu-ray player was it allowed me to. Um, the blu-ray player, of course, could do Dolby Vision, it could do. It can do HDR10, hdr10+ it can also do. It also allowed it because it had a USB that I can run some compressed pieces. So we took some stuff that was compressed down to about you know better, a little better than what you would get on Netflix at that bit rate, so we could feed those to the projectors as well, consistently, and that all went through a matrix switch, a high-end matrix switch from AV Pro.

15:37 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Right, a matrix switcher that lets you take any of those sources and send them out to any or all of the projectors.

15:47 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Exactly so.

15:47 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
it's all about this level playing field is what we were trying to do, and so what content did you use?

15:55 - Phil Jones (Guest)
well, that was. That was one of the see. Brian worked on setting up the room and his brand, and the guys at projector screens, projector screencom, got to give them a shout out. I mean, you're talking eight screens, stands for the projectors, all the switching, all the wiring the lighting and everything.

16:11
So they did a lot of that. It's a monumental task, it's a lot, it's a big task. So what I tackled was trying to determine, you know, what are the categories we were going to test and what were quick things or examples of things that we can test. Now, a lot of stuff that I picked were stress tests, because we're trying to see which one excels in this particular thing. So I admit I have to pick stuff that was really challenging.

16:38
Right do for things like black level shadow reproduction brightness, highlight, detail, all of the motion, all of those types of things. I also limited the amount of test patterns. I think we used one motion test pattern and then we switched. But we also did a motion movie which showed all of those things and, I think, used a a couple of photography shots of like a 4k newspaper when we're talking about 4k resolution and edge to edge sharpness, but which? But the majority of stuff that we used is real world content, because you can do great on a test pattern and look horrible in real life. So we said let's stick to real world content.

17:22 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Yep, yep, good, good, okay, so you had all these projectors. We're going to explain which of them you had there, but let's also give a shout out to the judges. You had six judges who were there to evaluate these projectors, and here they are. Give us a quick rundown on the so.

17:50 - Phil Jones (Guest)
So what we tried to do is we tried to grab people, because a lot of times you go to these and it's just hardcore video people, right, right and but we said, okay, we want to get kind of a mix of people. So, yes, we had some calibrators and some video reviewers, but we also had just some people who just do entertainment technology, so we can get kind of a more well-rounded understanding of how this product is perceived, right, because I always say this reference and preference.

18:22
And a lot of times. If there's a lot of times, people will go after the reference, but it doesn't look very good. So we said okay, and that was the thing we told the manufacturers. If more saturated colors look better in a room with ambient light, may not be accurate, but it looks better in a room with ambient light. So you have to have that fine balance between absolute reference and what actually looks good and and um, because if that was the case, there wouldn't be any bass knobs on on stereo systems, right, and you wouldn't be able to turn your subwoofers up right.

18:57
there's reference and there's preference, and man, that that's really good I I will remember that yeah, so and um, and that was, and it yeah, and we learned that as we went through Like, for example, one of the projectors was most of these projectors had tri-laser, rgb laser light sources, so they can display a massive amount of colors. The problem is, when you're watching SDR material, you don't need that much, so it's like you only need the eight box of crayons. But you got a 500 box and it's really easy for someone to grab the brightest red crayon in the box instead of the one you actually need, and this projector would do that. So colors, extreme colors, really bright reds, really bright greens, really bright blues, like pow, they really stood out right, it wasn wasn't accurate, but everybody was like oh, it's not accurate, wow, I really like the way that looks.

19:47 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Oh man. You know how many times have I gone into somebody's house and their tv is in vivid mode, right? Exactly, I said oh man, that's just way too bright. They say yeah, but I like it I like it and that's.

19:59 - Phil Jones (Guest)
And that's the thing. Like in a darkened room it's. It may bother you, but in a room with some ambient light, having the reds and everything a little bit more punchy just makes it nicer to look at with the lights on. So there's a reference and then there's preference, and then there's a preference, exactly.

20:15 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
I will remember that, okay. Well, let's list the competitors then. Okay, we had two from Hisense.

20:26 - Phil Jones (Guest)
So the first one was the PX3 Pro. That is kind of their newest model. Hisense is probably the biggest manufacturer of what they call laser TVs or smart ultra short throw projectors with built-in sound systems. Right, they kind of started this whole category. The whole name laser comes from them. So the PX3 Pro is their latest unit that does not ship with a screen. So perfect for this, because we want to pick projectors that can come with a screen. Then you also had the PL2, which is a blue laser, phosphor, basically single laser, so it cannot produce the crazy amount of colors that the PX3 Pro could, but most content does not have that. But it's a very approachable price point.

21:19 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
It's much less expensive. The PX3 Pro is $3,500, and the PL2 is 2,800 bucks on sale on the website as of yesterday over 25, exactly so that.

21:31 - Phil Jones (Guest)
So we had those two. Both had smart features built in, sound, a lot of similar technologies built in, except for one of them just has a much, much, much nicer laser light source in it and is to and is brighter. Right, okay.

21:45 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Okay, then we had two from 4Movie, which is a surprisingly highly regarded company that makes these products that I hadn't heard about more than a couple of years ago.

21:58 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Well, 4movie is a kind of a newer brand for the US. You um in in asia, um pretty popular. The four movie theater actually won the one to shoot out um the year before last year, yeah, last year. So the the new theater premium is they've made some serious, they made some advances when it comes to brightness and some other things to make that projector stand out, just Just like the Hisense. That was their flagship model and then they also have one called the 4Movie. Was it Cinema Edge? Cinema Edge, yeah, and that's their single laser value unit. So both Hisense and 4Movie both had those models in the shootout.

22:47 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Okay, then we had a stalwart in the projector business Epson with their LS800.

22:53 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, the LS800 actually came in second place during the last showdown Incredibly bright and it has the because of its, it's pretty much the only non-dlp project um ultra short throw projector available. Most ultra short throw projectors utilize a dlp um, a dlp chip, and this uses epson's proven 3 lcd that results in um higher. They call it color lumens the ability to not only do bright whites but also generate the same amount of brightness just showing red or green or blue. So it so it's a. So, when it comes to brightness, it is, it's, it's, it's awesome and and and, like I said, I like it, it's pretty act. It's very accurate, out of the box, it's a good piece. It's a good piece. I think I came here with that piece retails for 3,500 bucks 3,500 bucks.

23:46 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
But I like that, I like that unit on the expensive side for a single laser anyway, but but really high quality yeah, it actually won an award on projected reviews is one of our recommended pieces, so it's a nice cool okay okay, then we have another company I had not heard of before, nexi go yeah, it's funny.

24:04 - Phil Jones (Guest)
I just learned about these gentlemen a few like about a year and a half ago. So they were in the shootout that was conducted the year prior but which I did not participate in. But they made some adjustments and some advancements to their software. So that happened right after the last showdown. So you decided this, we decided to include it, and this year's after the last showdown, so we decided to include it in this year's showdown. It's a TriLaser RGB laser device, has some really cool dynamic contrast technologies built in and we actually just did a review. Our review on this unit actually just popped up on Project Reviews a couple of days after the showdown.

24:44
And good piece um quite affordable as well 2,700 bucks retail, 2,700 bucks. So so and um, and it actually had some, um some very good strengths um to that unit that we were impressed with great, uh.

24:59 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Next to last is uh x, jimmy, I think is XGimi, I think that's how you pronounce it XGimi, yeah, xgimi, x-g-i-m-i, the Aura 2.

25:08 - Phil Jones (Guest)
So the XGimi is. They have made a name for themselves in what are called lifestyle projectors, those ones that look like little cubes that have built-in sound systems. More of the, instead of mounting it to the back of the ceiling, it's more of put it on the counter in front of me or like on a table in front of me and move it around.

25:26 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Well, all of these are put it on something in front of you, right up next to the wall, exactly.

25:31 - Phil Jones (Guest)
But those are yeah. So they made their name on kind of a more traditional throw in a more compact form factor. I see, and this, the little Aura 2, is their second generation, so they decided to enter it. The style and design is beautiful, it's very compact. It had some advantages which we'll talk about, but it goes back to that reference versus preference thing and we'll see how. Sometimes, like you said, reference doesn't always mean winner, but that piece, I think, retails for under $3,000.

26:07 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
$2,700.

26:08 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, around $2,000. So, as you can see, almost everything is under $3,000.

26:12 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Except the last one, the Samsung Premier 9, otherwise known as the LPU9D.

26:20 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, the Samsung Premier 9 is one of the most, one of the most expensive ultra short throw projectors on the market. It's built like a tank, so fit and finish wise, build quality wise it's. You talk about user interface. If you're a Samsung person, that user interface has been perfected over millions of televisions. If you want to calibrate it, you can calibrate it like a Samsung TV interface has been perfected over millions of televisions it has. If you want to calibrate it, you can calibrate it like us, like a Samsung TV. So fit and finish, very, very, very, very, very, very good, which makes it very, very, very expensive. Thousand dollars, six thousand dollars. I'm actually much as most of the, or more than most, exactly that.

27:03
The last unit won an award. The previous model won an award on our website, so we definitely wanted to bring it in there because it was one of the newer models and people wanted to know how does the new one stack up? So we actually brought that, we actually included it. I will say, as I mentioned, most of the manufacturers opted to come to the shootout. We met with Samsung, we explained the process and they opted not to share the information or they opted to say you guys just do whatever you need to do, wow.

27:37
So what I did and it was my call because, remember, we talked about that reference versus preference so what I did was, most of the time, when you look at these high-end projectors, the best-looking picture modes is either their movie modes or their filmmaker modes or something like that. So the filmmaker mode tends to be the most accurate bright mode. Yep on the unit. So that's the unit. That's what I chose. Now, after the review, after the thing, we went in and started messing with it and said, ok, well, maybe if you put it into its vibrant mode and make adjustments, it probably would have been a better solution. But that was not my call to make. So we just said, if you're not going to come, we're going to pick the best mode out of the box. That's going to be filmmaker mode, the filmmaker mode. But because of that it was challenged in some of the categories that we were actually Shall we say Well, let's take a look at those categories.

28:43 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Let's show the scorecard that all the judges got to fill in.

28:49 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, so if we want to go through the scorecard, I've been to these things where they have like dark room mode and light room mode. People don't do that.

29:00 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Well, except that you did do some evaluations with the lights on and some with the lights off.

29:04 - Phil Jones (Guest)
We did but most people aren't going to adjust to one mode and do all the adjustments and then make a mode number two, because I've seen, like on the big guys they do that. But I see the average consumer is probably going to pick one SDR mode and whether the lights are on and off, they're just gonna choose that mode so. So that's what we did one mode, right, and then we check things such as you know, because SDR color reproduction, contrast, black level I can't really see all the different things because it's itty bitty.

29:35 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Well, yeah, there's color accuracy, skin tone, contrast, black level, shadow detail, detail and sharpness, 24p motion for movies and overall score for brightness and daytime viewing. So there was a category with the lights on.

29:49 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, how does it react in the daytime? Yeah, how does it react in in the daytime. What does it look like in the daytime? So those are the ways. So those are the categories that we did for sdr, for hdr, the categories that you still care about color reproduction. You still care about your black, your contrast and your black levels. Motion is motion, so if it works well in sdr, it's going to be the same results in in HDR.

30:11
And then we also added some other things. I actually add highlight, detail and visual artifacts. Visual artifacts apply to both SDR and HDR, and that could be things such as laser speckle, chromatic aberrations, which is like if you look at a white line, it looks like there's a red line or green line to the left and right of it or something like that, right right. You know those types of things are visual artifacts.

30:39
The one thing you'll see on here is I really wanted to separate the term tone mapping into multiple things. A projector cannot accurately reproduce consumer HDR content. I will repeat that A projector, due to its limited brightness, cannot on-screen brightness, cannot accurately reproduce HDR content. Hdr content is mastered for flat panels which can deliver, say we'll use a term here nits. So nits, a thousand nits or 4,000 nits is based on what the mastering is, those contents of Mastodon, a projector. You're lucky to get 200 nits out of it, so there's no way that it could accurately produce it. So they utilize tone mapping, which is almost like think of it as contrast curve compression, in order to fit that brightness onto the screen and that impacts. If you do it wrong, it does not look good. So we wanted to divide it into can it deliver inky blacks and good shadow detail? Can it still deliver good on-screen overall brightness? And can it do all of that without blowing out the highlight information um at in the brighter scene? So that's how we kind of broke it down.

31:56 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Those three things define tone mapping yeah, yeah, very good, but in in um, realistic terms and sort of more everyday terms, rather than tone mapping, which many people wouldn't even understand what that is.

32:10 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Exactly, exactly. Can I see stuff in the shadows? Is the shadow?

32:14 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
black. Can I see details in the highlights?

32:16 - Phil Jones (Guest)
too Exactly, and does the image look dim? Because a lot of times, in order to give you all the highlight details and all the shadow details, if you don't bend the curve properly, the overall scene just looks dark and dim compared to, and that's why a lot of times people choose to watch SDR instead of HD on a projector, because the tone mapping curve isn't correct. Right, right.

32:40 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
All right, so we have a few pictures during the process itself, as people were milling around and doing their evaluations. Well, first here's a picture of you and Brian giving a little intro, I'm sure.

32:52 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, we were just talking letting the judges know the expectation, and one of the things we told them was when you're doing this evaluation, you're grading on a curve, right? So? Because they had just went downstairs and saw two and we're messing around with two $30,000 home theater projectors, right? If you're trying to compare brightness, black level, color, detail, motion against that, these aren't, these are. It's a $3,000 unit, right? So the way I said it is the best, one gets the A plus and then you grade down from there, right so?

33:29
you have to that A plus is not going to be the same as the $30,000 plus Exactly, and that's one of the challenges I have on my website is I've been trying to put on kind of a a a rating system, right, but if I do a rating system, I have to do different rating systems based on things such as price point and and and other and and applications, because good black level on a ultra short throw projector DLP ultra short throw projector is not the same as good black level on an L-cost three chip, you know $20,000 home theater projector. So we wanted to make sure that they realized that they had to grade on a curve and they did a really good job of doing that.

34:08 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Great. So a couple more pictures we have of the uh, of the system or the the thing as it was going here. We saw this one before everyone's sitting around a table here, here, here they are in a dark room environment, kind of wandering.

34:21 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, that was one of those ones we were looking at um shadow detail. So one of the benefits of having a uh of screens is these screens are really good at rejecting ambient light, but they have a very wide viewing angle. So while they would walk and stand directly in front of each projector, it was nice to be able to back up and look at two or three of them at the same time to compare. So this is a scene from Star Wars, one of the Jedi movies, the last one, I can't remember, I should know it and it's a scene and you're looking at Kylo Ren and can you see all the detail in his helmet and his cape and stuff like that?

35:04 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Oh, it's the last Jedi, last.

35:05 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Jedi. Thank you I use this scene constantly. One of the nice things about the kaleidoscape is I could queue up and make these little short scenes so I can quickly jump um from one to the other. So we had like six or four or five actually five clips we looked at for dark scenes with contrast and five for bright and stuff like that. But this is just us checking out this scene, right.

35:32 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Okay, and moving on to, I think we have another picture, not 100% sure. Oh, this is cool. Tell us a little bit about this.

35:40 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Okay. So after we went through and did SDR, we talked about that. Sdr and HDR. There's common things color reproduction and all of that stuff.

35:49
When you get to HDR, sdr material is mastered at the same brightness level. Doesn't matter whether you're watching something on a VHS or you're watching something on a Blu-ray or you're watching broadcast. They're all mastered at the same brightness At 100 nits. At 100 nits, hdr is not. It can be mastered at a wide range of brightnesses. So Spears Munsell offers a test desk, an HDR test desk that runs that.

36:18
They took the same scenes and you can choose different brightness levels or mastering levels, from as low as 400 or 1,000 all the way up to 10,000, mastered at it with a max brightness of 10,000. And that really impacts how the projectors react to those scenes. What you're looking at here is the Panasonic Blu-ray player can also read the metadata is the Panasonic Blu-ray player can also read the metadata? There's basically metadata injected into HDR material that tells you what the max brightness, the brightest pixel in the scene is and the average frame level for the scene. And this right here is. And what I did was I picked this scene. It's like these horses, it's like a common torture test and then we worked our way up to see how well these projectors responded. As the brightness got higher and as the content was mastered at higher and higher and higher, it becomes more and more difficult for these projectors to reproduce and you start getting blown out highlight detail and stuff in the background just completely disappear.

37:36 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Right, right, I believe this isn't this seen on Spears and Munsell. Yeah, the Spears and Munsell HDR benchmark.

37:42 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, HDR benchmark Great disc if you're looking at trying to dial in your projector. It has motion tests. That's where we got our motion tests as well. It has contrast tests for both SDR and HDR. So if you're someone that wants to make adjustments, it even comes with a very, very good guide to explain to you how to use these test patterns. So I always encourage people that if you have a projector especially, you got to take into account your room and your screen and 30 bucks or whatever the price is for this screen yeah to to for this to fine-tune it yeah to fine-tune it um for this disc.

38:20 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
It makes it worthwhile well, I I have to say with a point of pride I wrote that user guide. Oh, you did. Yeah, I did. Good job, scott, thank you, okay. So finally, we took a look at the results. After all that, it was a one-day thing, right.

38:40 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yeah, it was one day and that was one of the things People said why didn't you test this and why didn't you test that? Because we had one day yeah right, one day, and this was a full day starting at like 9 o'clock in the morning and going till about 6 at night, just to get through these categories.

38:57 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Sorry, here's one more picture. Yeah, so this is actually the motion one.

39:00 - Phil Jones (Guest)
I just love the color on this, isn't it amazing? So this it was funny. I would try to pick a scene for a particular test right. So we picked this test. This is the opening beginning of Baby Driver and we were using this for motion because he walks. There's a lot of panning and he's walking across, walking by poles and a lot of vertical objects, so it does a really good job helping you determine if you see any motion artifacts, but at the same time, it's shot incredibly well. So the colors and the skin tones. So it was hard. So judges would I told people when they were judging to write in pencil because you would say, oh, this one's great, and then halfway through you end up erasing it.

39:45 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
So I'm like, oh, this one's better.

39:47 - Phil Jones (Guest)
And then you go, wow, I think this is a little better than what I thought. So, as they were going along, we told them to kind of write and make notes in each category in pencil and then at the end of everything then go in and say, okay, based on the tests for color, and then what I saw after those tests, now which one would I pick? And that was an example of that, that it was a motion test, but it happens to also be a great test for color, skin tones and even sound. It's got a great soundtrack to that.

40:19 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Yeah, yeah okay, now let's take a look at the results and, interestingly, you, uh actually ranked these in two different ways yeah, so first thing was the points and then the next thing was judges pick right.

40:35 - Phil Jones (Guest)
That goes back to reference and preference right and so I can give you an example the um aura, the xgmi aura 2, was the most accurate when it came to sdr color reproduction, but no one picked it for their choice for SDR, because they wanted more brightness or they liked the pop of one of the other projectors. So what Brian did was each based on their placement first, second, third, they were assigned a point, a number of points, actually I think he had them rate them from. Actually, I'm sorry, he had the projectors rated from 10 being the A all the way down to one. Nobody got a one right. And then what he did was he compiled all of those numbers to get the score score for that particular category and you're talking about the judges pick and I'm talking about the, the placement.

41:38
So if you look at the bottom where it says str, you'll see those numbers seven, seven, what those are, with the averages right for that projector, for that category, right from all six, from from all six judges, from 10 to 1 right, and then, after that, um, that's what those point. He took those totals and then he added up all of the totals for sdr and the one that had the highest totals for sdr won. The um was placed number one when it came to the points total Right. Then after that he goes forget all of that Based on price, sound construction, user interface and all of the other factors. Which one would you pick Right?

42:28 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Which one would you buy to take home yourself?

42:30 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Exactly or recommend to someone else or it's a friend or your mom, your friend or family, and then that is where the judges pick came in, and you'll notice that the judges picks don't align with point scores. And then the and then the, the one.

42:42 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Um, yeah, so that's what we're saying about that reference versus preference thing is preference thing, right, although the judges pick and the point total pick, um did did align with uh. In the case of the first choice and the third choice and the second choice, yeah, the um, the, when it came to the px3 pro.

43:05 - Phil Jones (Guest)
The px3 pro did a really good job and just about it. It wasn't like everything that that projector did everything perfectly right, it did, did more things. Well, you know what I mean. Yeah, and, and I will say that the the hisense px3 pro, they've added some new things, like a newer light source, new video processing, so it's pretty much state of the art when it comes to these ultra short throw projectors. So, and um, and it delivered great picture quality and then you can go through here and you can see right there. We we looked at other notable features and stuff.

43:37 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
I like the fact that you put in these notable features. So, for example, some of them still do three. They still do 3D. Yes, yes, and that's quite amazing.

43:46 - Phil Jones (Guest)
I know it's and some of the bigger um, the only way if you want 3D by the it's ultra short throw or projection, because TVs don't do it. Tvs don't do it anymore.

43:55 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
And, amazingly, I found it astonishing that some of these projectors actually do Dolby vision.

44:01 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yes, so and I will tell you that that makes a that makes a difference. Like some projectors didn't make a huge difference On others, it does Because some of the projectors are now starting to do dynamic tone mapping, the ability to, instead of taking the metadata, which is often not enough or not there, the projectors will measure the content scene by scene, frame by frame, and make tone mapping decisions based on that split second decision. Right so? But a lot of times you're still trying. Hopefully it'll read that when you come to Dolby Vision. Dolby Vision, that frame by frame instruction is actually embedded into the metadata. Yeah, so I can give you an example.

44:46
The XGimi Aura looked great on SDR, but as you started to add higher and higher brightness sd um hdr content, it struggled with it, but then it supports dobi vision. So when you fed adobe vision, it looked great. So reason why we the way I want to tell people about this is there is no absolute winner, for it's what works best for you. So let me give you an example of that dxgme. So if you look at dxgme and you said, you know I watch a lot, a lot of sdr, have a huge blu-ray collection, I'm a stickler for colors and I'm watching blu-rays, dvds, classic movies, and I'm a stickler for cover for color.

45:31
The the aura 2 is great at that. But then you go and the only hdr watches on an apple tv and dobi vision. Then the fact that its tone mapping wasn't wasn't didn't match. Everything else isn't as much of a factor. So if you say I like this is so, you have to look at each category and say what matters most to you. I am a high brightness person that watches mostly HDR and I don't really care much about SDR, or I don't use the sound system or I'm not going to fiddle with the settings, and based on all of those things, the projector that works best may not be the one that won for you and you may pick something different based on your needs and your price point.

46:18 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Right, one more thing from the final scores. Let's put that back up At the top with the finals you have. Then, aside from the judges pick rank and the point total rank, you have the sdr point rank and the hdr point rank. Yes, for example, the hisense px3 pro uh, in total points got first place in hdr but second place in sdr. So that's an example of what you're talking about exactly, exactly.

46:47 - Phil Jones (Guest)
You have to. I want we brian is trying to work on kind of a think of it as a configurator. Will you pick it? Um, it asks you. You know, what do you care most about? Are you an HDR guy? You're an S. Are you an HDR person, sdr person? Do you care about sound? Do you care about W? Are you going to use Dobie vision? Do you care about motion? Are you a sports person? Is it going to be bright room? Is it going to be dark room? And based on that, that'll help you pick the right one for you, right.

47:19 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Well, this has been great and I really appreciate your time here with us. Both your website and projectorscreencom yours is projectoreviewscom both have recaps of this event with that final scorecard that people can go look at. We'll put the links in the show notes, Okay, and I want to thank you so much for being here and telling us all about this wonderful event. I assume you know this is the third one, right, A third annual.

47:48 - Phil Jones (Guest)
Yes, this was the third annual I've been trying to convince Brian to do, because there are other categories. So the next one would be like we talked about the little, small, compact lifestyle projectors and then maybe a shootout with the King Kongs. You know the big guys because everybody wants to know how do all the big guys stack up? But those are actually more challenging because now you're talking to really see the differences bigger screens, more interaction between the units. The projector is farther away from the screen.

48:17
Yeah, it's a lot easier to put eight ultra short throws in a room than it is to put eight $30,000 light cannons in a room.

48:24 - Scott Wilkinson (Host)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

48:26
But we want to do that as well, and when you do I'll have you back on the show to talk about it. Okay, thanks, scott. Thank you so much, phil Jones from projector reviewscom, Good friend of mine, longtime associate in the business, so glad to have you on. Thanks so much. Excellent, and I hopefully we'll talk again soon. I'm sure we will. So that's it for UST showdowns. For now, anyway, if you have a question for me, you can send it along to htg at twittv and I love to answer those questions right here on the show. And, as always, we thank you for your support of the TWiT Network with your membership in Club TWiT, which gives you access to all the Twitch shows in their video forms. You can see all these great graphics we provide for you and we thank you for considering that. Until next time, geek out.