Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Vivitek D530 projector: Priced right enough for a basic projector

Vivitek D530 projector

Even though the world is looking forward to the High Definition (HD) television and movie viewing experiences, there are lot's of projectors available in the market which are not HD capable. And still, they are selling well. Why? Probably the price.

At a price of Rs 38,000 for the projectors, people are enticed by the ability to blow up the videos to anywhere between 40 inches and 120 inches on the wall.

The Vivitek D530 projector is one such projector. Is it good enough?


Package and Contents

The D530 comes with the VGA cable, remote control, carry case and some warranty and usage information.

First Impression

Dressed in white color, the D530 looks really classy. the control buttons are on the top panel. There are the vents and the speakers taking up the two sides, while all input controls are on the rear panel.

The remote is the card type one, with clearly marked buttons. The setup too was simple. Let's see how it performs.


Performance

I plugged in the WD TV Live, via the HDMI, to the projector, and immediately realized there was a problem. The audio was playing from the speaker built into the projector. In simple terms- Not Nice!

I did some fiddling around, and ultimately had to connect my home theater system to the audio-out on the WD Live media player. Now, this is a major drawback, since the D530 does not have a dedicated 3.5mm Audio Out to which I could directly connect the speaker setup.

Well, let's focus on the positives now! The image size I got was about 46 inches, with the projector placed about 3 feet from the wall. And the image reproduced was in the the 800x600 resolution. Not a lot by any stretch of the imagination, but still decent enough to enjoy a movie. Even if you connect an HD video source, like I did, the projector will scale down everything to fit the 800x600 display resolution it is capable of.

The reproduced image was quite good, with good color depth and sharpness.

The projector menu has a host of image management options- which is good considering that people are not always happy with the default settings. These come in handy for different uses- presentations, movie viewing etc.

Another thing with a resolution, which is on the lower side of the resolution tree, is that you sit as far away from the wall as possible. The close you get, the grainy the image becomes.

The remote responds well to button presses, even when it is not directly aimed at the projector.

Another thing with the D530 is that it can heat up quickly and then the fan becomes quite noisy. Better to use it in an air-conditioned environment, to keep it cool.


Verdict

At a price of Rs 38000, I really can't hold anything against the projector, except probably the lack of audio out. The resolution capabilities may not be the best out there, but then again, the price point makes it a good buy for someone who doesn't want HD but just a big screen movie experience.


Price: Rs 38000


Specs:

Multimedia and Office projector
800x600 native resolution
3200 lumens
3000:1 contrast ratio
3000 hours lamp life
Image projection size 40" to 300"
16:9 video resolution type
Built-in speakers
HDMI in
VGA and Composite video input



Pros:
Price

Cons:
3.5mm Audio out option missing

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