Projector Reviews

Sony VPL-VW915ES 4K LCOS Projector Review Specs

Specs
Dimensions (WxHxD, Inches): 22.06 x 8.78 x 19.53
Weight (Pounds): 44
Video Inputs: HDMI (2), RS-232, IR, Ethernet, USB
Price: $20,000

Company Info
Sony
(877) 865-SONY
sony.com
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COMPANY INFO
Sony
(877) 865-SONY
sony.com
ARTICLE CONTENTS

COMMENTS
drny's picture
Submitted by drny on October 7, 2020 - 1:52pm

Unfortunately, Sony's propensity to overcharge for their projectors (compared to the competition) continues. This is specially offensive in their Native 4k models. A Laser light engine is fantastic, but only if the overall performance of the 915ES was comparable to JVC's NX9 (which is not). Thank you Kris for a thorough examination of the 915ES, and your astute expert observations.

Surge74's picture
Submitted by Surge74 on November 30, 2020 - 1:39pm

Kris never said the NX9 is better. That's completely false. First of all, the NX9 is lamp-based. Totally inferior to laser based in every way. I compared the Sony laser against the JVC laser and the Sony came out on top. First of all, the latency is about 2X faster on the Sony, so if you're a gamer, forget about the JVC. Second, the ARC-F lens is a little sharper than JVC's all glass sense, which makes sense given Sony's photographic experience. Third, the chassis is smaller - JVC's laser units simply wouldn't fit in my current AV cabinet.

mjg100's picture
Submitted by mjg100 on December 23, 2020 - 8:46am

The VW915ES was reviewed. It does not use the ARC-F lens. The $35,000 VW995ES is the one that uses the ARC-F lens. As for lag, I am seeing 36ms for 1080P and 31ms for 4K. Yes that is lower lag than the JVC, but just barely lower, not close to half. JVC has been measured at 39ms for 4k in its gaming mode.

FireFly1's picture
Submitted by FireFly1 on October 4, 2021 - 7:53pm

Been looking at upgrading my VPL-VW295 but just don't see a huge enough difference to justify the 15K cost difference. I might wait another generation and I am with you, JVC just are too big and fan noise was too loud compared to the Sony and my listening position. I might play the waiting game, as I don't have a ton of life on my lamp yet.

str8uprubbish's picture
Submitted by str8uprubbish on October 8, 2020 - 6:25am

Can you compare this to the latest JVC projector from the point of view of black level and shadow detail? I have a 9 year old 1080p JVC projector with a 120 inch screen and despite auditioning multiple 4k projectors including the prior Sony laser projector I haven't seen enough of a performance difference to justify upgrading. Are we at the point where there are obvious differences now?

Kris Deering's picture
Submitted by Kris Deering on October 8, 2020 - 1:47pm

The JVCs still have the upper hand in overall contrast capabilities and shadow detail performance. Their native contrast is still much higher and only get better if you engage their dynamic solutions. The Sony laser designs don't do dynamic contrast as well as their lamp based designs, so you are really relying on their native contrast. While this is still higher than most projectors on the market today, it is still only about half the contrast capability of the newer JVCs.

Surge74's picture
Submitted by Surge74 on November 30, 2020 - 1:41pm

Wrong, and wrong again.
The JVC has a tiny, repeat TINY, benefit to contrast; but for that you have almost double the latency. So if you're a gamer, you're not going to love the lag of the JVCs. Second, the JVC laser units are louder, larger, and slower to HDMI handshake when you switch inputs. Third, the glass lens of the Sony (ARC-F) is sharper (marginally) than the JVC. That makes sense, when you consider Sony's photographic experience.

Swordoflevi's picture
Submitted by Swordoflevi on October 14, 2020 - 7:49pm

Kris, I loved the review. Being an ISF calibrator during the hard times (3 tube projectors with faroudja line scalers and D6500 light boxes LOL), I would like to know why so many high end barco projectors are not reviewed and unfortunately there are no places to view them on demonstration.

Since 85% of movie theater projectors are Barcos in the Commerical world, can you fill in the gaps of understanding for me on the quality of these projectors if you have seen them. For example, the Bragi Cinemascope projector I have been trying to read about and would love to know more about. It has a native 2.37:1 ratio chips so that no anamorphic lens is a required. It has 2100 lumens but they claim it appears so much brighter because of the technology. They have partnered with DT Screens but I can't hardly find great in depth reviews about them compared to the Stewart screens. The Bragi is around 30-35k so it is more than the Sony and the JVC but I would love to know what I am getting (if anything) when you go higher in price. Any detailed information would be tremendous or an AWESOME review of a Bragi would be beneficial to many of your readers.

Looking forward to your response and more in depth articles.

Kris Deering's picture
Submitted by Kris Deering on October 20, 2020 - 2:27pm

Thanks for the feedback! I have seen two Bragi projectors recently, the "widescreen" version and the 16x9 version. These are really not anything like their DCi counterparts you see in cinema installations and rely on the XPR based DLP chips to achieve their resolution. So they are a pixel shifting solution as opposed to the native 4K imaging chips used in Sony and JVC models. They also suffer from the limitations of the dynamic range potential of the more recent DLP DMD chips, which is only a fraction of the contrast potential of the SXRD and D-ILA brands mentioned before. And at these price points it makes any type of comparison almost not fair given the vast differences in performance between what the Barco's you mentioned can achieve in direct comparison with the Sony/JVC models at half the cost but far higher performance metrics. Maybe at some point we will do some reviews of the upper DLP offerings from folks like Barco, but that is not my call!

Swordoflevi's picture
Submitted by Swordoflevi on October 20, 2020 - 6:37pm

Kris,

Thank you for the reply. I have two more questions.

From what the rep told me, the Bragi has a single chip DLP .9" I believe and its native resolution is 5120 x 2160. From my understanding to be considered a true 4k resolution it has to be 3860 x 2160. Since the Bragi Cinemascope is native 2.37:1 ratio I didn't believe any pixel shifting was occurring. Do I have my understanding screwed up on this?

Here is the spec on the one I am referring to.
https://www.barco.com/en/product/bragi%20cinemascope#specs

2.) Have you seen DT screens at all? I am so interested in their Dynamic screens because of their auto detection side masking.

Again, I REALLY appreciate your comments here.

geickmei's picture
Submitted by geickmei on December 9, 2020 - 11:20pm

Why have you not listed the lumens of brightness for this projector? How do you measure it? How might you convert that to nits?

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