Newbie needs help Panny PTAE100 vs CTX PS-5100 !!

Okay sorry to mention the Panny again, but its my first post ;p so i hope its okay . I want a low price projector to run my video/DvD etc and i have approx £1300 to spend. i am not rich, but this is my all time luxury ehhe - so i want to ask these questions to make sure i get an at least average performer for my money. I woudl be very grateful for any advice.

I will use in my bedroom which has only a 9 foot gap to the wall, and also in the front room has either 12 foot, or 18 foot gap. I will only be using for tv, movies and PSII etc. Not presentations. I will be moving the projector from room to room now and again too.

Question 1 - Is 9 foot going to be enough space to get a fair sized picture and what size can i expect?

Question 2 - I am not that fussy, main points are the space, and also that it wont always have to be totally dark to see a picture, although i am aware that the darker the better, it woudl be nice for the screen to be watchable with some daylight perhaps. Can this be done? the quality is important of course, but i am happy with average piccie and low price.


OK and my choices are :-

(1) The panny PTAE100 you all seem to be buying *grins*. Cheap lamp, long lamp life, and it says extra short throw lens for low space rooms. Sound great, my only concern being the 700 lumins and not 1000 - will this make a difference? Cost is £1300 incl VAT.

(2) CTX PS-5100 - again great write ups. They brought their first out a while ago. Seems to haev good reveiws too. Has 100 lumin, says its quiet but i read it has 42db, i feel thats not that good . Its about £1175 incl VAT, bit cheaper than the panny. This was my first choice to be honest, until i read this forum and how many of you have gone for my second choice - the panny. What do you feel about this projector?

(3) I was told to buy the NEC IT150 - i was just told this was a great cinema projector. But i dont know - i wonder if any of you guys/girls have an opinion on this.

(4) Other baragin projectors form sahara and infocus i have looked into and they seem not good for cinema experiences. If anyone has any other options better than those i haev mentioned - i woudl be happy to listen.


Sorry for being a newbie hehe. I know peopel haev different opinions, but i think most of yours will be better than my own so i want to see them

Oh last thing, if any of you have a reputable company to buy one of these projectors from which i can get delivered in maybe 10 days or less i woudl be grateful. And if my prices i quoted can be beaten that woudl be good too


Many thanks
Kind regards

[pack man]

I am a bit of a newbie myself but I think given £1300 to spend on a PJ most people in here would buy the panny AE100. But it does have its drawbacks, you should read the posts in the forum to find out more.

............"Question 1 - Is 9 foot going to be enough space to get a fair sized picture and what size can i expect? "............

http://www.projectorcentral.com/projection_calc.cfm will give you screen size for many projectors all you have to do is put in how from the screen the PJ is. (I don’t know how accurate this site is)

Also if you do buy the AE100 I don’t think you be able to get it in ten days, more like four weeks+. Some people on this forum have been waiting for over a month because of low stock.

[RichardH]

How are you going to feed the projector? This may be a problem (more cost!), as a PC will give you the best image for DVD, but at the expense of much tinkering. If you have a PC available, then fair play, but as an alternative, it may be worth thinking of the ProV gizmo - £150. You could then feed DVD player and PS2 through it, plus it has a TV tuner built in.

OK thanks so far. I have already decided upon the panny.
I know there seems to be issues with it, but it seems so far the most popular and i dont think the majority can be wrong. (i hope hehe)

And yes i just found out the waiting lists seems to be 4 weeks + lol - and I sorted out the distance vs screen size - thanks for that info.

The feed that you mentioned .. it looks interesting. I only have a stand alone multi region DvD player. So this 'gizmo' i checked it out, loocks interesting. Do i NEED to have this by the way, or can i plug PS2, DvD player, TV etc directly through the projector if i wish to? (yes i dont even know this yet). I am trying to saev money at teh moment, i may buy this gizmo later - thats only if i dont 'need' to have it straght away - what do you think?

[RichardH]

Have a look here for a list of inputs on the AE100 - in summary, you have VGA, SVideo, component, and composite, so you should be OK plugging straight in from your various sources. However, you won't have TV input, although a feed from a VCR would do that job, as they have tuners built in.

How are you handling sound, by the way - I assume you have an amp & speakers?

Re watching in some daylight - if you have curtains drawn, then you might be OK, but I doubt you'd see much in full daylight.

HTH

Thanks Richard.

My room is normally fairly dark - i never really have full daylight and keep curtains closed anyway often, and besides i shut curtains most of the way when i watch TV anyway so should be okay.

For sound i have a 5.1 surround sound system with built in amp. It was a bargain one for i think approx £100, videologic if i remember rightly (a special deal). Very cheap but i am EXTREMELY happy with it and the sound for the price - infact i sold my £350 hifi and use my DvD player to play CD's through those speakers now gives me more space.
I am not making a home cinema, i just want was a cheap option with some of the home cinema advantages and i think the panny along with my surround sound will be cheap and cheerful. Just got that 4 to 6 week wait now ahh well


BTW i live in North London Richard - well just into Herts actually (East Barnet). Just wondered if you have heard of Homechoice? Richard i have this and i actually like it. Its run on the net and gives you a massive hard drive accessable at your home for movies, and series etc etc. Hard to explain, but its great - even better on a projector I bet -

[RichardH]

Homechoice: > I have a friend who has HomeChoice (Wembley). Unfortunately, I live in a small village in the sticks, and we can't even get ADSL, let alone cable, so no go for me!

R

[pack man]

in my last post i said there is low stock of the panny but i bought one today from http://www.av-sales.co.uk/ for £1372.40
i think they still have more in stock