I drove up to see Allan at IdealAV on Wednesday and to collect my 9200. Anyone who has ever dealt with Allan will know that he cannot do enough for his customers and he was very willing to set up 'my' 9200 in his 'dark room' so that I could see it before committing myself to buy it (although it was never really in doubt that I would be taking one home - LOL).
Before demoing the 9200, Allan put the latest Sony 500 through its paces - and the result was as awesome as one would expect for a £9k PK. I wondered out loud if this was going to make me disappointed in the 9200.
So, we plugged it in, turned it on and played a Bluray through it. We adjusted the brightness down by 4 'notches' - and then we both sat there amazed. I have set up a lot of displays over the years and I can genuinely say that I have never seen such amazing out-of-the-box performance (this with the unit in 'natural' mode). Considering we had made NO adjustments to ANYTHING at all, other than the small adjustment to brightness (and turning off all the usual 'enhancement cr&p) the PQ was astonishing.
Allan gave his time as generously as ever and we played through various scenes from several of his demo BDs. I was impressed with the sharpness (coming from DLP this was something I was particularly interested in) and also with the black levels which were deeply satisfying.
Next morning I installed my Peerless mount and set up the 9200 in my own HT (quick and easy thanks to the Epson's vertical and horizontal shift adjustments and the 'peerless' micro-adjustment capability of the mount) and within a few minutes I had a stunning picture on my ReactII screen. The very good black levels give the image a solid foundation and noticeable 'depth' while the excellent sharpness brings out all the detail from the image. Tonight I will adjust the settings using my S&M setup disc and, once the lamp has settled down with a couple of hundred hours on it, I will dig out my colorimeter and Calman 5 and do a full calibration. It is already superb and it can only get better!
So, once again, thank you, Allan - you have a thoroughly satisfied customer!