Sanyo PLV-Z2000

The Sanyo PLV-Z2000 has it all! 1080p resolution, great contrast, smooth filmlike images, virtually silent fan noise at 19db, and no pixelation or chickenwire effects.

The PLV-Z2000 features an InOrganic LCD panel - most of you are saying right now 'what is an inorganic LCD panel?!' Well simply put, the current range of LCD panels are constucted from sand particles and can therefore termed as organic. The Sanyo PLV-Z2000's LCD panel is man made - therefore it's inorganic. It's not affected by UV light that degrades traditional organic panels and hence the Z2000's lifespan is significantly increased.

Sanyo have produced what they are terming as the 'Topaz Real HD technology system'. This is a 3D color management system that addresses changes in color phase and color level to obtain accurate color reproduction. For the boffins amongst you the Sanyo PLV- Z2000's color management system provides 1110 times more color combinations than the SANYO PLV-Z5, a total of approximately 216 billion possible color combinations. This new color management system was designed to optimize the potential of Deep Color via the projectors two HDMI 1.3 inputs.

It doesn't stop there! long 2.0x wide angle zoom lens, a huge vertical lens shift of 3 full picture heights and a casing smaller than its rivals. Oh and the casing is matte white so it will blend unobtrusively into your ceiling as well!!

So thats the science and facts over with now onto the fun....

Having received a pre-release PLV-Z2000 we were eager to check it out in our demo room. We connected it to a Playstation 3 and first test was to watch the PS3's pre-installed HD trailer for the latest installment of Gran Turismo. The depth of detail was staggering right down to the loose bits of gravel at the side of the tracks! Rendering on the cars themselves leaves nothing out and the background scenery is fantastic.

Next up we watched (purely for resarch and testing) the Blu Ray Casino Royale. From the opening credits the demo room was silent! As with previous models in the Z series, the color accuracy on the Sanyo PLV-Z2000 is its forte.We had the 'Creative Cinema' mode on which we found to be a bit heavy on Red hue (for us) so a minor adjustment to the image settings and the picture quality was a resounding 'faultless' with us all. We paused the disc at various stages to check out the depth of detail - not once could we find any pixelation. For example, explosions were staggering, no pixelation and the full colour spectrum of reds ,oranges, yellows and blacks were clearly defined.

Finally we fired up Ridge Racer - Although not a true 1080 optimised game - it was still detailed, not as detailed as the Gran Turismo trailer but we were not expecting it to be. Roaring round the track the tarmac really looks and feels like tarmac.When overtaking rivals the level of detail on their cars such as the sponsors etc is immense. Hit the Nitrous button and the car screams off down the track trailing a blur creating a true sense of speed!

As ever reviews are subjective, for us we are very impressed with the PLV-Z2000 and believe this is the best best projector in it's price range by miles, this was until the new Mitsubishi HC5500, 1080p LCD projector came into the market.  Both projectors are in a simiar price bracket and on our side by side tests we were very impressed with the performance of the HC5500 excellent video processing and although both projectors are rated as 1200 lumens the HC5500 looked brighter and certainly has better black levels plus the addition of motorised zoom, focus and lens shift.

UPDATE : 10th December 2008
The Sanyo PLV-Z2000 is now discontinued. Its direct replacement is the Sanyo PLV-Z3000