Finally done

Overall, I'm pleased with how it looks and the performance I'm getting for using such a pittance to build (around $50.00)

So with that, lets look at this project...



Finished with dvd player mounted on the side. I used some zbar to mount it and double-sided tape to keep it from moving.



I used 4ply matboard (commonly used in picture framing) and essentially matted the lcd display. I used glue to put them together and staples for added security





Here a top view showing how I used telephone wire to lengthen the connections between the board controller of the lcd and the dvd player itself

Here's a comparison to the Ask 970, the projector that started this whole retrofitting craze on LL



A final of the projector opened up. I did not remove the circuit board at the bottom for fear it might control the lighting and fans. I was right



Well, lets start watching. the first thing I notice is the that the infocus pts out a lot of heat. And is somewhat noisy, actually slightly noisier than the ASK. But once you see an image, you'll see it was all worth it. Note that its viewable even with the lights on

off


on

The following images were done at the last minute, so I didn't use a tripod to completely steady the shots. Even then, the shots are pretty indicative of the performace you'll get from the infocus. I must say that whites are more off-white, slightly yellow (no doubt due to the color temp of the bulb- however, since so few times one will actually see white -other than animation- I doubt it will be a problem.

With the lights off, note the eveness of the display. Also, note that glowies are almost absent. If you have the Ask with the unsplit setup, you'll see glowies there. This pretty much confirms for me that any design to get the best possible image, start with a split freshnel setup.




The screen is a light gray painted wall with black painted around and the rest of the screen wall.



Some measurements. The distance from lens cap to screen is about 7ft. The resulting image is 16:9 58" diagonal.

Leeloo with lights on at an angle

Lets continue...

One note:

The resolution of the insignia is not the best. text is pretty unreadable. There is noticable SDE. That said, it still performs great. One could only wonder once the higher res 7-8" lcds installed in these units how it would look...

Halo 3


Gamecube Clone Wars

More dvd images. The nice thing about the insignia is that I have full control for brightness, contract, hue, and saturation. I can really fine tune the image to look as best it can.

Black background


In real life, this scene is actually quite viewable


White background. Again, its not white, its off-white but not yellow. If you find a higher temp bulb, you'll get whiter whites


This image is more pixellated that it shows. but again, still watchable


I watched the image from abot 10ft back. I think to better enjoy this you'll have to sit about 2.5x screen width to not notice the pixellation, Defocusing could also help.

Animation is pretty fluid on this lcd. I'll be trying some gaming on this projector soon so I'll see if it can handle fast scenes

The Incredibles


Monsters, inc


Victor

some gaming images as promised. I used my son's gamecube and played Rogue Squadron and Clone Wars to check for ghosting or slowness in fast action sequences. I'm happy to report no such issues. Once your eyes get used to the pixellation, the games are quite enjoyable.




The black mark is a dirt blob I haven't remove yet. Otherwise, from up close this is the pixellation I described, the only limitation of the 7" lcd


But during gameplay, you don't even notice it


Good corner to corner focus and even lighting throughout.

I love love love it I have been trying to find one of those projectors but everybody wants an arm and a leg for them maybe they know what we want to do oh well I guess I am building an enclosure i have the fres and lcd but the lcd i stripped the polar so i just stuck it back on oh well hopefully my images will look as good as yours or close to.

A curious thing about placement of the 7" lcd. Since I mounted it way off center (and getting the images as you see), the bottom of the screen image is practically almost at the top of the lens, so I can place this on the coffee table and still get the entire image, just like a commercial projector

You can see with this image from Stomp/Dolby digital



Once again, the great thing about this projector is the eveness of the lighting and the absence of glowies due to the use of a split freshnel setup


Victor

victor-eyd, is it just me or are the pictures not coming up?

imagestation is offline today for server maintenance

more testing. This time I used my Imoviemate for outdoor use. I tested it with my 165" outdoor diy screen and the image was surprisingly good. I'll have to head-to-head this with my ASK, my other ohp diy, and finally my NEC for true comparison in the near future.

While it didn't reach the full 165", probably 150" or so, the image was still surprisingly clear (albeit pixellated if you sit too close) and the speed of the lcd was great. I detected no ghosting or delay when watching any scenes with fast action. Some pictures to come (when imagestation is back online)

Okay, some images for those who wonder about relative brightness of diy projectors.

This image is using my ohp design, which is simply a stripped panel sitting on top of an overhead. Plenty of light loss to be sure, but here's the picture. The camera is not showing the true brightness (it is brighter in real life) of the images so simply refer them for comparison's sake and not indicative of the actual brightness. Camera is a Kodak Z740 5.0mp taken in night mode with 2sec delay on a tripod


And the same image using my infocus


As you can see, the infocus appears brighter than the ohp. Come to think it, I think the flash is on also. I'll have put them against each other so really see if there is a notceable difference in light output

Here's another outdoor image, projected at about 150" or so 16:9. Once you get used to the pixellation, the image is actually quite nice (and sharp might I add)

sweet..this paired with the 7.2" 720p projector would be about the sweetest thing on the planet..what would you say the throw ratio is for this projector with the 7" panel?

like how far back did you have to get to get a 150" screen?

man..and the added benefit of the lens shifting makes this even more appealing...

if the sharpness is as even as the brightness then I'd be a happy camper.

It was almost 7ft to get a 60" throw, so its a long throw pj to be sure. For a 150", I think I was almost 25ft away. And it was sharp at that distance, too.

Yes, this thing is just waiting for a 720p 7.2" to really perform. Edge to edge sharpness and even brightness is almost guaranteed. The color is off, simply because of the lamp temp, but perhaps using a 80a filter may just do the trick. So if you find one, grab it. It'll save you the hassles of building a box, measuring distances, etc. etc.

Victor

wow..yeah if the brightness really is that good the hit it will take from the 80a filter shouldn't be too bad. You could probably retrofit it with the 150w MH bulb as well..

can you tell me what kind of bulb is used in these as i think they are comparitive to an OHP bulb thanks.

evd bulbs

one more thing:

this is the 7" lcd from the insignia mounted in the opening that once house the original lcd. The width of the opening can easily accomodate a larger lcd -8" wide perhaps- should a unit exist in the future.

yessssssssss. I just scored one for $50! Now I need to wait patiently for the controllers for the 7.2" hd panel to get programmed....

Is the projector pretty roomy on the inside? I'm thinking of perhaps in the future retrofitting an MH bulb and perhaps even a mini-itx computer to have a portable media center projector.

until I do any bulb mods..do you know where to buy the bulbs for this thing?

thanks

The projector is roomy for components to add, but you may have to leave the circuit board on the bottom in place.

So you're the one who won. Did you beat out sdubb for the pj?

ebay for evd bulbs

Well somebody did I kinda gave up once it went over 80 with shipping I think thats my stopping point before I say ok no more

nope i was the only one bidding on this. it wasn't on e-bay but some other more obscure auction site where I actually had a chance of winning..the bidding started at 49.99 and thats what I bid. It just so happens the guy lives about an hour away from where i work!

Hey man here's another filter you might want to try. This I think is more of a thin plastic sheet..it may help the brightness a bit.
From my research the bulbs in these projectors are approx 3200K..this filter will convert it to 5700K.

http://www.studiodepot.com/store/index.cgi...149&id=6285

Also..just to be certain...when you had your image at 150" (projector at 25' away) it was still plenty bright?

bright enough to watch a movie

that is so awesome..

Well, I found out what this blue transparency is



Its a color correction filter for the infocus. Possibly the original lcd lacked enough blue so they added this film to boost it and get better whites. Fine if I used the old lcd. So I put it back in and it does slightly improve the color but it removes the pop that I liked when watching what displayed. Idid slightly dim the image as well. So if you want to keep it there, its up to you. To me, it wasn't worth the tradeoff so I took it off.

Victor

Well, I found a use for my projector







Happy halloween!

you have a LARGE house, that is a dream for Chinese :-(

we have flats only. expensive ! now the price is diploid of last year

More screen shots- now with the xbox 360 connected via composite. As expected, the 234i resolution definitely keeps you wanting more.
Screen size is 58-59" diagonal

But it is playable.

I would guess my wii would be a more forgiving (and better suited) game system rather than a 360. But it's good to see what happens if you feed it high resolution graphics.

O.K. this might sound like a dumb question, but how do you know if a projector uses a LCD screen? Is there a way of looking at the thing to know? I ask, because sometimes you see units for sale that have lines, partial displays, or something wrong, but i don't if it's a bad panel or something else. I don't know, maybe they all use panels and it's just a matter of panel size.

start with the model number and google it for specs

and check this site for more info
www.projectorcentral.com

was it hard to strip the panel? my model is slightly newer but looks very similar.

very easy, but I had to extend the wires from the lcd board to the main board by using telephone wire.

dude sick house

just pray it doesnt rain with your pj outside lol

Victor: I recently bought a similar portable dvd player and I noticed something in yours that interests me. You said you used telephone wire to extend the connections between the screen controller and the player, correct? If so, would it be possible to wire a typical phone jack to the dvd player portion and another to the projector leading to the LCD, then just use an off-the-shelf phone cord to connect them?

Mainly I want to know because I was hoping to keep the DVD portion shelved with the rest of the inputs (Sattelite box, consoles, etc.) away from the projector itself. Since they would be on opposite ends of the room, I would need a length of cable to connect them and it seems like it would be unweildy if I directly copied you in that respect. (Hard wiring over a long distance.) Furthermore, would telephone cable be able to transmit power to the LCD, while sending the audio/video signals without causing distortion or interference? How about cat 5 cable?

Sorry for the ramble, this just seems like it might be an elegant solution to my problem. Unfortunately, I would still need to find a way to route the screen controls to a more accessible location. (Heck, I wouldn't mind having a way to route all projector related controls to the dvd box.)

Here is an image of the wires. I can't say whether adding longer phone wires will lessen the signal but you can try.

Wow. I'm having trouble counting the individual wires in the pictures. Do you know how many you used? It looks like roughly 8-10, (I think I'm seeing some shadows in there.) which I think would require more than one cable if I attempted my idea. Thank you for the input.

or use a network cable essentialy the same thing but 8 wires

Would that work? It wouldn't be a problem that they are 4 twisted pairs? I certainly wouldn't want to cross the power with a video signal, for instance. If they can be used as 8 seperate "channels", that would be great, though. I read a little bit about power over ethernet, so I do think it would be capable of sending sufficient power to the lcd, but I'm somewhat paranoid about shorting the lcd. Do you think I could get some good input if I posted a thread in Extreme Mods? (Sorry if I'm hi-jacking your thread here Victor.)

Even though the 7.2" panel fell through I still thought I'd try to crack my 550 open and see whats inside.. I lubed up the fans and cleaned the mirror/lenses,etc. I really wish I could get the same brightness/uniform lighting with my 15" (or hopefully in the future 12.1"!) pj as this thing gets. That tiny little bulb puts out crazy heat though and would have to be replaced before anything else happened. I'm wondering if I could just rip off the light box and replace the bulb with a 150w/250w mh and get more brightness/way less heat.... hmmmmmm.....

another member here tried retrofitting a litepro..do you remember who that was???

Crap imagestation finally blanked out my pictures so I'll have to transfer over to photobucket. Give me some time.

Victor