mustud52

Discovered last night that to display an old 4:3 format movie in correct ratio when using an HDMI connection that it must not be upscaled by the player. Otherwise it does a variable stretch, stretching more at the sides than in the centre, to fit the widescreen screen. Fortunately a button press on the HDMI format button on the 2930 player remote. Took me ages to work out that was the only way to do it as the PJ aspect ratio is locked when receiving 1080.

Okay. The double glazed windows are now installed on the west half of the house. What a job. Now for lots of painting. And found out that the roof is leaking. And that I have some dry rot that has to be dealt with ASAP. Stuff all that. This evening installed the Epson on the ceiling and got the movie room back into shape. Just in time for tonight's GP. One heck of a projector. Its always interesting to see how they perform in a display room, but the real test is when you install in your own environment. I am delighted. I think I will get it professionally calibrated once I have a few hours up.

Projector arrived today. Temporarily set it up on the Little Jumbo as the ceiling mount has not yet arrived. Also need to get a DVI-D to HDMI adaptor to connect to the cabling in the ceiling. In the mean time, and to try out the projector, shifted the dvd player onto the next step of the Little Jumbo so I could hook it up with a spare HDMI cable. Ooh, it is nice, isn't it! Tried out the opening sequences in Gladiator and Lawrence of Arabia, which I knew gave stutters with the old Infocus 5700. Very smooth and sweet. Lovely colours and, all in all, very happy with the picture. Would have been even better if I had the sound hooked up as well... Who needs Blu Ray? Not on my 92 inch screen, anyway. Mustud is a happy boy. Fitting new double glazed windows on the west side of the house next week, so that will most probably occupy me for some time. The projector will most probably stay on the Little Jumbo unused for a couple of weeks, but I am really looking forward to some cinema magic.

What a voyage for the Mustud family. Well, Mr Mustud, anyway, as Mrs Mustud thinks this is all a little silly. The first pj I tried to buy was an Epson 8700. That fell through (after I paid) because the eBay seller had no stock and tried to upsell me. I got a refund and then an eBay no pay claim. Had to call eBay to get that redirected back to the seller for being naughty. Next attempted purchase was a Panasonic 4000. Cancelled that (and in hindsight, perhaps a bad decision) because I thought 3D might be a good option. That was for $1950 from the Good Guys following a suggestion by Glen 1. Next purchase and payment was to Simply Electronics for a Panny 7000. Many emails later, and after 12 days, I had to contact Paypal to explain that Simply Electronics are a pack of shysters. I should have checked up on them before paying... It looks like they either supply immediately or, as in my case, never. The Paypal refund came back within 4 hours. Tick to Paypal and confirmation that Simply Electronics were just stringing me along. Last night bought an Epson 5010. The tracking info tells me it is already well on the way. I reckon that $2,790 is pretty good (I remember paying $6,000 for my old Infocus 5800 all those years ago). After looking at some posts here I have also ordered a Peerless geery thing mount from Amazon. Excellent price and it is also despatched. I might end up looking at movies one day...

Interesting, Mark. I have done a lot more reading since my earlier posts, and I am sure I will get a BD player at some stage. Your post is another piece of evidence pointing me that way. However I have no BD discs, have about 3,000 classic movies on dvd, have 3 Denon 2930 players and a 3900 player feeding various Samsung 720 plasmas and, in the HT room, the soon to be replaced Screenplay 576 pj. At least I will keep the Denon AVR and speaker setup. Yes Glen, I got a Panasonic 7000. It has not arrived yet. I have developed a feverish anticipation.

Maybe.

Some very helpful stuff here. Great news Al, about the capability of the Denon as a deinterlacer/scaler. I never really used it that way because when I got it I already had the VP30. Happy, its great think that there may be someone here who knows even less than I do about this stuff - except you are most probably fooling. Another twist in my saga on a replacement pj happened today. I will wait to see how it all pans out before I tell, but there's a chance that Glen 1 will have a laugh. It would have been so much easier if I had never started looking into this...

A funny thing happened on the way to the forum. Yesterday I made a decision and purchased and paid for a new Epson 8700 from a vendor on eBay. Lots of legitimate feedback, all seemed good. Then I bought a ceiling mount as well. This morning I received an email from a very helpful dtv member letting me know of a clearance sale of the Panny 4000 at the Good Guys Brighton. Hmmm...perhaps I should have bought that. Even have saved $300! Oh well, couldn't go wrong with either of them, thinks Mustud. Next email is from the ebay vendor apologising that he was out of stock, and would I like a newer model? Cancel that, request a refund and this morning ring up the Good Guys. I pick it up on Thursday. $1,985, seems a good price to me. I understand they had 4 more in stock this morning. I will have a play with the VP30 but do not expect much. Anyone need one for spare parts? I expect to use the Denon 2930 to do the deinterlacing and scaling after confirming that the Panny does not do a better job once it is installed. Oh yeah, looks like the ceiling mount can fit the Panny. Hope so, anyway.

Have done some updating of the Mustud memory by reading a whole swag of reviews and articles today. As I am really not interested in 3D, a projector like the recently superceeded Epson 8700 or the equivalent Panny would have been about ideal for me. I may be looking a little to late for these, though. It seems all these pjs have the Reon, as indeed does the Denon 2930 I will be feeding from. Guess I will use the new pj I get to do the deinterlacing/upscaling. My VP30 is showing "serious error 1". I have done a few hard resets, and that seems to work for about 5 minutes. But then back comes the error message, just when I think I have fixed it... Any thoughts on whether the VP30 is still an asset in the system given the Reon chips are in both the new pj I will end up getting (when I can decide which one to get!) and the older Denon?

Hi all. I am pretty out of date in keeping up with progress on projectors. I have an old Screenplay 5700 that really needs to find a hole in the ground after much honorable service. Most of what I watch are old SD movies played on a Denon 2930 player. I was very happy with a DVDO VP30 scaler that did a pretty good job with the output of the Denon before feeding it to the Screenplay. My problem. The VP30 has developed a fault, and I am wondering if it is worth repairing. The Screenplay needs to be replaced with a new projector. I have read a few reviews and thought that something like the Epson 5010 seems pretty good. I do not really expect to watch very many HD movies, as we already have about 3,000 SD movies that need to be watched. What projector do people here recommend given that the quality of upscaler built into the unit is most probably very important to me. I expect to feed it with 576 from the Denon. The denon does upscale, of course, however if the upscaler in the projector is better than the one in the Denon, then... Is the quality of a VP30 (with ABT) still worth keeping or is it a bit old hat given what is fitted to projectors these days? Advice very much appreciated.

I'm pretty sure that mustud, alebonau and are all the same person.

Good to see that this thread appears to have now died. R.I.P.

And a very happy buyer am I

I noticed the same thing over the last two Saturdays. Made me feel good when I found the ones with lower prices! On the other hand I remember when I first started buying cds in the early 1980s - they were $25 each back then. I guess that is now the equivalent of...I don't think I want to know.

I have been struggling with this very question myself. My main consideration is that I have a 1600 strong SD DVD collection and want the very best capability SD player. The Denon 3930 is most probably the last generation uber SD machine, but is the real benefit in the VP rather than elsewhere? But will my next projector have a VP equal to the 3930? I'm currently using a 3910 in my HT but am thinking of moving this to another room where the player is getting a bit long in the tooth. Ah, decisions...

Similarly, I have had no problems with my 3910 for about 15 months now with pretty much all the recordable formats. Having said that, I use burnt discs pretty much only for preview and replace them with retail versions within a few weeks. If they are not worth replacing then they are not worth collecting IMO. Given the current price of retail dvds, why would anyone build up a big library of burnt discs? In any case, both single and dual recordables seem fine on the 3910.

Nope, all good (although...). Just checking your sig. This is a bit different to car audio, hey? Cheers, Alex

JohnA, Excuse me for the inquiry, however are you the JohnA who fitted up my WRX with speakers and amp?

Does anyone know anything about TAG (The Audio Group) speakers, particularly the 3.5 model? Apparently they are made in Melbourne with only a small distribution. They are fitted with Focal drivers so should be quite high end. Any reviews or opinions? Thanks.