STATE OF THE ART
Bring FIFA gold home with a big-screen home cinema projector that shines for sports action
Bring that FIFA gold home and enjoy the beautiful game on the big-screen with a projector primed for sports viewing
Big tellies are all well and good, but if you really want to supersize your sports, then a home entertainment projector is the way to go. Recent increases in brightness mean buyers are no longer restricted to peering in pitch-black rooms, and going high-res or even adding cinema-style laser projection is on the right side of affordable.
For this larger-than-life showdown, we’ve assembled a trio of beamers that range from under £600 to a lofty £2,600. All deliver 1080p resolution and require only a clear white wall to strut their stuff (though if you’re feeling flush, you can always spring for a dedicated screen, too). Generally, you can expect to cast a 100-inch image in the average living room if you have a projection distance of 3m or more. When space is limited, an Ultra Short Throw (UST) model (represented here by Epson), will do the same from just a few centimetres.
Given that projectors are fundamentally different from televisions, we think the best viewing experience comes from a combination of brightness and colour vibrancy, which is what we’re looking for in this month’s State of the Art.
While all of these projectors boast built-in sound systems, these are little more than functional. We don’t recommend anyone listen to tinny speakers for the duration of the World Cup, so it’s perhaps best to plan for an external sound system too. If you already have a sound soundbar or AV system for your TV, that should do the job nicely.