My goal is to build an entertainment system that can deliver from 2 channels listening to day time movie/HDTV using plasma, day/night time movie/HDTV for 16:9 content and night time 2.35 content movie environments in a single room. In addition, I want to use the maximum real estate in my wall, left to right and top to bottom, THE widest and biggest screen for both 16:9 and 2.35 image I can get.

Beside the widest width and biggest image for both 16:9 and 2.35 viewing area I want, day time viewing and cost are also important factors for me. With different gain materials in 2 different screens, I can have a 2.8 gain high power material screen for the day time viewing even when all my blinds are open and a lot of ambient lights inside the room. In the evening, I can have the matte white, 1.0 gain screen to enhance the black color for the 2.35 movies. Also, with 2 individual screens, the cost will be substantial less than any single masking similar size screen, not to mention I will be sacrificing narrower image for the 16:9 content (masking back from 2.35 format for CIW set up). As you see in one of the below pictures, I make a custom enclosure, then texture & color it the same interior color in order to hide these 2 screens inside there.

My plasma is hanging on the wall and providing the HDTV from cable box, VMC, DVD and BD contents from HTPC anytime I want. If need, I can pull down the back screen, 110 16:9 screen, for the same content anytime. During the evening pop corn time, I can pull down my front 104” 2.35 screen and I’ll be able watch all the 2.35 format movies I want. The set up is so versatile and I can be able to adapt everything we want in one room that the whole family can enjoy around the clock; from morning news to late night blockbuster movies; plasma and different big screen when we want all we want.

I have been thinking to get a projector that can do the 2 screens set up I want this year. Panasonic 3000, JVC RS10/350 and RS20/750 are top of my list in terms of performance. From my research, picture to picture, I believe RS10/350 will be able to deliver a better black and overall better picture than Panasonic 3000 and RS20/750 will be a significant better than Panasonic 3000. Unfortunately, both JVC models does not offer lens shift and zoom features that Panasonic 3000 offers in order for me to do what I want. Why? Since this is NOT a CIH set up instead of a CIW set up, it does require the projector to resize and lens shift to different image sizes; from 16:9 image back and forth to 2.35 image.

With Panasonic 3000, I can easily switch between 2 format images, 16:9 and 2.35. When I need to view 16:9 content, all I need to do is press a “16.9” preset button from my remote and Panasonic 3000 will resize the 16:9 image I saved before – that’s it!

When 2.35 movie time, all I need to do are:

(1) Press a “2.35” preset button in my remote then Panasonic 3000 will resize the 2.35 image I saved before.

(2) Press the “V-fit” button, vertical stress the image for the anamorphic lens.

(3) Slide the anamorphic lens in front of the projector then I will have the widest width my wall allows 2.35 image in my 2.35 screen in front of me. No black top and bottom bar, brighter than 2.35 without lens image and using all the pixels Panasonic 3000 provided.

There are plenty of debates regarding using zoom instead of anamorphic lens in the 2.35 section. I tried it with my Panasonic 3000 and perhaps from my viewing distance and other factors such as TR 2, I prefer the anamorphic lens over using the zoom for the 2.35 image. Perhaps, it is just me. Please don’t take my words and I strongly encourage you to A/B yourself, maybe you like it and you will be able to save the money of the anamorphic lens at the minimum and also no need to manually slide in and out the a-lens.

With a 16TB movie server combine a HTPC as my player, streaming a 2 channels MP3 from Foobar2000 or playing back a Blu-ray ISO from Arcsoft TMT3 with SimHD bit streaming DTS MA or TrueHD to Onkyo Pro 885 (replacing Theta Casablanca III HDMI edition preamp available end of summer) then powered by a 7 channels Theta Dreadnaught II amplifier to 7 Martin Logan speakers via MIT Shotgun interconnect and speaker cables between them, the outcome is a powerful but yet multipurpose movie theater system that we have been looking for a long time!

Specifications

Room size: 17’ X 20’

Ceiling height: 9’

Projector to screen: 16’

Projector drop from ceiling: 14”

16:9 with 2.8 gain screen: 110” 96” X 54” with 14” black drop from top.

2.35 with 1.0 gain screen: 104” 96” X 41” with 20” black drop from top & 7” black drop from bottom up.

Throw ratio: 2

Video

Panasonic AE3000 Projector

Panamorph UV200 Anamorphic Lens

Chief projector and anamorphic lens mount

Da-Lite 16:9 110” High Power screen

Da-Lite 2.35 104” Matte White screen

NEC 1080i 50” Commercial Plasma

Audio

Onkyo Pro 885 Pre-Amp (On order Theta Casablanca III HDMI edition upgrade)

Theta Digital Dreadnaught II

Martin Logan speakers and subwoofer

MIT Shotgun S1 interconnect and speaker cables

PS Audio Power Premier Plant

HTPC

Hardware: 60G SSD, ASUS Xonar HDAV Slim, ATI 4670 Fanless, LG H20L Blu-ray Drive, Core2Duo, 4G RAM, 2X Fusion + 2X Hauppage

Software: W7 WTM Ultimate, AnyDVD HD, VCD, TMT3 with SimHD, MM3 PR3, HomeSeer, Foorball 2000, CopyWipe

I don’t have a nice camera.

All below pictures are about 2 feet back from my sitting position and using same color setting.

All the blinds were opened when day time pictures taken and all the blinds were closed when the night time pictures taken.

In order to see the same image, I took all the pictures from the same frame. But when 16:9 you will see my HTPC player in full screen mode and when playing a 16:9 content, it will fill the entire 16:9 screen. When playing a 2.35 movie, it will ONLY displaying the 2.35 image, nothing else, no borders at all.