Panasonic AE900u vs. Epson Cinema 550 - some ambient light

That's a mighty big screen, especially in the presence of ambient light as your subject line implies. At that size, an LCD projector's image is going to be pretty dim, though the black level will be better than on a smaller screen.

I haven't seen the Epson, so I can't comment on it. In his review of the Panasonic, Kevin Miller concluded, "The PT-AE900U is one of the least-expensive high-resolution projectors on the market, but as I said earlier, you get what you pay for. Given that fact, you have to expect some performance shortcomings, like the slightly soft picture due to the quality of the lens. Still, I do think it’s a reasonably good projector for the price. If you can afford about $1,000 more, you can do a lot better in terms of picture quality and performance in a single-chip DLP projector. However, if you are on a really tight budget, the PT-AE900U is capable of a reasonably good home-theater experience, particularly if you go to the trouble and expense of having it professionally calibrated." To read the full review, download it from here: www.avguide.com/product?id=3507.

In terms of LCD projectors, Kevin liked the Hitachi HDPJ52 much better than the Panasonic, but it's also close to $1000 more. In any event, if you're going to spend the dough on such a large screen, I would pony up the extra scratch for a projector that can properly light it up.

Scott Wilkinson
Video Editor
The Perfect Vision

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