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Projector Torture Test: LCD versus DLP
[Today's post is heavy on the hardware and light on pharma/medicine/biotech content.]
I'm guessing that at least some of the people who visit this weblog are just as responsible for projecting presentations as they are for producing the content in them. If you are involved in specifying or obtaining projectors, you might want to check out this ExtremeTech article.
"TI admitted that the results were not statistically representative of a large population of LCD and DLP projectors, but rather limited in nature. Still, the results are eye-popping, even accounting for the limited nature, and TI funding.
After 4000 hours of testing, you can see that the colors shifted enough to warrant a failure in all five LCD units. Even changing the bulbs couldn't improve the color quality; the organic materials in the panels themselves were damaged due to the long exposure to high-intensity light and high heat. The DLPs, on the other hand, remained consistent.'
The first projector to fail only lasted 1368 hours. (BTW, did you know that LCD technology is manufactured using organic material.)
Please note the caveats mentioned in the article: the sample size was very small (N=7) and was in no way representative; the operating conditions these projectors were subjected to really don't reflect the way a vast majority of projectors are used in the real world; oh, and the study was sponsored by the creators of the DLP technology -- Texas Instruments.
Even given these limitations, I still think the results of the study are worth taking into consideration when planning a projector purchase. Especially if budget considerations require that the projector be in service over an extended length of time and that it will be in use for several hours a week.