What Hi Fi Sound and Vision
14 OCT 2009
Epson EH-TW2900
This newcomer from Epson is one of the most appealing budget projectors on the market right now
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The projector market is brutally competitive: witness the latest Epson, the EH-TW2900. At just £1100, complete with a three-year warranty on both projector and lamp, it's one of the most affordable 1080p projectors around, yet its spec shows no signs of cost-cutting.
It's very easy to install, and its chunky proportions ensure much space for a large cooling fan, meaning this projector is phenomenally quiet, rivalling the class-leaders for near-silent operation.
Technical promise would be for naught if the Epson didn't deliver a quality image, but it musters the requisite contrast, brightness and colour vibrancy with ease.
Benefits of iris mode
An automatic iris mode is fitted, helping to optimise contrast in real time, and unlike many similar systems on rival models it's not distracting in operation, either sonically or visually. As a result, the EH-TW2900 pulls out much low-light detail for a projector in its price class.
That said, you'll sometimes find too much murk in shadowy scenes, which can make a dark movie like The Dark Knight a little too gloomy. In this regard, Sanyo's same-priced PLV-Z700 edges the Epson, the Sanyo also appearing a little crisper in some scenes.
However, with brighter footage, and especially animation, the Epson's other strengths – its stability, natural motion-panning and vivid colour palette – come to the fore.
It all adds up an effective package that, if not quite a class-leader, certainly gets close to the best available.
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