Projector Reviews

Measurements were taken in a variety of conditions, with most in the Cinema preset in Normal LED mode. The gamma correction preset was selected as 2.2. All viewing and measurements were done on 120-inch-diagonal (16:9 viewing) and 140-inch-diagonal (2.35:1 viewing) Stewart Filmscreen StudioTek 100 screens (1.0 gain).

The full-on/full-off contrast was measured with a Minolta T-10 meter at 4 inches away from the lens face. I tested the projector in all LED levels. The highest native contrast ratio was obtained with the projector in Smart ECO LED mode. This produced a contrast ratio of around 4000:1. For most of my viewing, I used the projector in Economic LED mode. This produced about 25 ft-L on my screen for 16:9 viewing and about 18 ft-L for widescreen 2.35:1 viewing. (New firmware that enabled the Smart ECO mode's dynamic contrast feature was not provided until the bulk of this review was done, but content evaluation was performed and the review updated accordingly, including contrast measurements.)

The RGB tables were captured from a calibration workflow in CalMAN 2017. RGB and grayscale tracking out of the box was blue deficient across the board, with a peak Delta E of around 6 (anything under 3 is considered reference and imperceptible to the human eye). Using the grayscale adjustment tools in the user menus allowed for a maximum Delta E of about 2.1. Gamma averaged 2.2 with the projector set to 2.2 and with 2.2 as my target gamma in CalMAN.

The color gamut in the Cinema preset was oversaturated with errors as high as a Delta E of 10.5 in green. Once again, using the color management system in the user menus allowed for fantastic results, with all Delta Es less than 3 and a peak Delta E of 2.1 in red. Luminance and saturation values throughout the inner gamut were also very accurate.—KRD

As shown below, the HT9050 pass all of our video tests.