If you only had a budget of around $1500-2000 for a projector what would be some brands you might consider. Screen size is 106" diagonal.

Wait, buy a real projector.

What are the lighting conditions?

What kind of screen? The right kind of screen for the installation could blow your whole $2000.00 budget. If you plan on shooting it on the wall, the projector choice is really irrevelant since you'll lose a lot of the detail anyway.

There are a lot more factors in designing a system than you have given information...

One of the big ones beign that lots of 5-10 thousand dollar DLPs and LCDs start to look crappy once pushed of 100" . YOu have to consider light and screen and all that fun stuff. The real cheap projector probably is not going to hold up well under that sort of load. I can say I have seen the cheap infocus driven into the 100" plus and its pretty bad.

A film projector off of ebay...you might have a tough time getting the media though.

Both of these low cost projectors will amaze you for the price. the LCD is hi def, the DLP is not but native 16:9 and will display hi def sources, and both are very bright. This technology has come a long way in many respects in just the last couple of years including the cost.

[Link: knollsystems.com]

[Link: knollsystems.com]

[Link: infocushome.com]

This puppy should do the trick.

It is for my brother in law. And yes he is cheap. He has a 106" pull down da-lite screen he bought off of Dell website. I just wanted some opinions on what would be a decent, take that with a grain of salt, for him. He is probably going to go with a LCD because of price, but he could care less about the most expensive. I install projectors and home theaters daily, just not many in our opinion un-worthy projectors. Thanks for the input especially JBL and teknobeam. Now that we got him being cheap out of the way, what is the best he can get. AND NO WAITING FOR HIM IS NOT AN OPTION. His room is not going to have any natural light it will be totally dark when watching movies, etc. His screen is 16:9, 1.0 gain, white, and a pull down. Any more suggestions would be appreciated.

Infocus SP5000 at 2k and SP4805 at 1.3k.

Mike

I recently had the opportunity to work with an Optoma H31. My initial impression was "wow, that's one awful looking projector".

After taking some time away from the project and coming back later, I changed my impression to "wow, that's REALLY one awful looking projector."

Screenplay 5000? Not too shabby for $2K and easily worth the price jump over the 4805 and Opt H31.

The Knoll projectors are rebadged Infocus. Try the SP4805 for DLP. Really good for the money. The SP5000 is LCD and the price just recently dropped to I think 1800. I prefer the DLP personally, but the LCD is 1280x720. I've seen the Optoma H31 as well, and no it isn't on par with a 10k projector, but it is adequate for the price.

The Infocus SP4805 is a real cheap PJ with some real good images, it isnt an HDTV panel but for the money, it does a very good job. You may want to downsize the screen a weee bit for that price range that you are in, not alot of PJs can handle that size of screen and still perform well.

Just tonight my Dreamweaver rep showed me the 3 chip PJ. Awesome. But equally impressive was the $2k Dreamie. Best budget PJ I have ever seen. Period. Check it out.

[Link: audioplusservices.com]

Having a good source is also key, Even with a 1300 dollar projector, a 50 dollar DVD player is going to hurt the final image.