2. Sanyo PLV-Z5

The PLV-Z4 had already made a strong impression when it debuted last year. The looks of the Z5 are absolutely identical to the Z4, but, what about the new projector's onboard technology and performance? Do they live up to those of the Z4?

The Z5 uses a 0.7" HD Ready tri-LCD matrix illuminated by a lamp delivering 1,100 ANSI lumens. The contrast ratio is 10,000:1 (full on/off). There are two HDMI connectors that are most welcome, since more and more sources now use this interface. There are also VGA, two YUV, and S-Video inputs.

Installation

The Z5 has a gray outer shell and an automatic dust cover to protect the lens. The feet are easily adjustable and positioning is very simple thanks to the projector's horizontal (+/- 50%) and vertical (+/- 150 %) lens shift. The lens' short focal length lets you get a big picture at a fairly short distance from the screen and the powerful zoom adds additional flexibility. Do try not to set the lens too far off center, though, or you'll lose a lot of brightness. The Z5 uses a dual-iris system that helps optimize the contrast ratio and brightness to suit a Home Theater setup in a dark room or for family multimedia use in a more brightly lighted space.

The menu holds no surprises - it's complete and simple. But fans of detailed adjustments will be satisfied with the range of advanced possibilities, and will be able to save their adjustments in four memories, while neophytes have seven presets to choose from to suit the projection environment. To access all these adjustments, the backlit remote control works very well. It is easy to handle the buttons are fairly small but well placed, and you find them fairly quickly after a short period of use.

Performance

The PLV-Z5 adjusts well to different viewing environments. The lamp's power gives it excellent brightness in lighted rooms in "Dynamic" mode. But the colors lose some of their accuracy. In "Living" mode, it's less bright, but bright enough for a semi-lit room. The colors are more natural and the contrast ratio is very satisfactory. For dark rooms, the "Pure Cinema" mode lets you reduce the brightness significantly, but provides optimum contrast and warm, faithful colors. In addition to these adjustments, you can tweak the opening or closing of the iris. You can let the projector make the adjustments automatically or choose the amount of opening yourself. After a few not-too-difficult adjustments, you'll have contrast very close to that of DLP projectors, provided that you're in a dark room. But color accuracy is where the PLV-Z5 really shines, and does even better than its ancestor, the Z4. The factory adjustment is faultless in this area, and the projected images look astonishingly natural.

During our tests, the films we screened showed no problems. The deinterlacing of the signal was of excellent quality. The Z5 delivered a picture with good sharpness and definition. We even had to reduce the sharpness value to get a softer, cinema-style image. That was even truer with an HD source. Overall the image showed very little noise - probably the best performance in this price range in that department.

Conclusions

The PLV-Z5 is a very good video projector. I couldn't find much to criticize about it. This model delivers the best the tri-LCD technology has to offer in this price range. It's suitable for all types of uses, while still performing well in all situations. With a high-definition source, it delivered a well-defined image that had to be softened a little for more naturalness.