Hi all

Im seriously tempted by the price of the X1 to grab a flight to the US and pick one up. I havent booked a hol yet this year and the wife seems ok with this (yay!). However, I havent managed to demo anything other than LCD projectors, so have no experience of the rainbow effect and how affected I might be.


So what Im wondering is what type of people are likely to be able to see them? Is there a correlation between those that are sensitive to rainbows and those that are sensitive to flickery monitors/TVs?

I am fully aware the only way to really see how Im affected is to go try one out, but if I want to get one on holiday I dont really want to bother a poor sales person who cant offer the same great price with a holiday thrown in!

[LV426]

The trouble with asking a question like this is that you'll elicit responses from people like me who ARE highly sensitive to anything refresh-rate related (who are likely to say, oh, it's terrible) and those who have little or no idea what refresh rates and flickers are 'cos they can't see it (who are likely to say no it ain't a problem)

My own experience is that
a) if a CRT PC monitor is running at anything less than about 80hz I'll see it flickering to such an extent that it will tire my eyes.
b) I have never seen a DLP device that did not exhibit nauseating rainbows.

As a rule of thumb, then ,yes, if you are one who would prefer the digital smearing and so on of a 100hz TV over the flicker of a 50hz one, you will probably find rainbows (even very fast ones) annoying and/or nauseating.

Really, you can only tell by getting a demo, in a darkened room for at least an hour.

[Mr Bump]

Yeah, the best advice is that both you and your wife need to spend at least an hour with with either that projector or a very similar one. Case in point - I demoed a Optoma H50 DLP projector, which has a 4 segment (Red, Green, Blue and clear) 120Hz colour wheel and I could clearly see rainbows on bright objects on black backgrounds. I then demoed the more expensive H56 which has a 6 segement (RGB twice) 120Hz colour wheel (effectively it is the same as having twice the speed of the H50's wheel, as the clear panel is just to increase the Lumens slightly) and I could see no rainbow effects at all. Needless to say, I bought the 56. My wife, however, could not see the effect on either projector, so it really is down to the person.

Thanks folks... I wont be jumping in to DLP without a decent demo now thats for sure. Ill be putting up with my flickery 50Hz TV for a while longer and hopefully demoing both DLP and LCD pjs some time soon!

[LV426]

If you can, try to take a good look at the Sony VW12HT. Evidently (from what others have said) its overall performance comes very close to more expensive DLPs - but without any risk of rainbow or other refresh artefacts. In most respects, this is (I gather) not a typical LCD device.

[Messiah]

or the new Epson TW100 which according to ProjectorCentral is better than the VW12 and can be found much cheaper (£22xx)