Optoma HD66, HD (720p), 2500 ANSI Lumens, Home Theater Projector

I am huge fan of 3D and after seeing demos at besy buy, decided Plasma is the best way to go to avoid the 3d-killer ghosting.I chose largest 65" Panasonic 65ST30 over Samsung because i already own a Samsung 52" LCD TV and wanted to try a different brand this time and also i like the Avatar kit more than the megamind kit.After i received the TV, i watched several 3D movies and my excitement of owning a 3D TV was shattered the moment i noticed dreaded ghosting in almost every movie. i tried to get some inputs from other buyers here and some Plasma fan boys lectured me about how i dont know what i am doing with the TV settings...trust me i tried all available 3D settings and couldn't eliminate the cross talk.i would like to thank Amazon for their out of the world return policies which allowed me to return this lemon. I am sure if i tried a replacement i may have succeeded in keeping it based on other 5* reviews here on this model.anyway, i was back on the market and i realized that if you are a 3D fan you got to go for the biggest screen...so was looking at Mitsubishi 82' TV till i saw a demo at frys and it was so washed out and horrible that i realized my folly of not looking at 3D projectors as they are not only fraction of cost but also are most portable unlike these behemoths. After a lot of research i bought the Optima HD66 and 3DXL and a 120 inch Favi screen...all for under 1k...1/2 the cost of 65 inch TV.For anyone wanting to go for the best 3D experience, all i can say is this is the best route. The image is HUGE beautiful and totally immersive. ABSOLUTELY ZERO cross talk with the Optoma 3D DLP Link glasses which not only were a lot more comfortable than Panasonic's but are also big and give you complete immersion, nothing short of the theater 3D experience in the privacy of your home ! You realized that this is how thing should work in the first place ! Watching some scenes in Open season and Tangled i almost jumped into the other world (people often say 3D TV's give them a window into another world but a 120 inch screens opens a "wall" through which you can walk into the other !). On the 65 inch TV the 3D effects would only stop at the TV surface...with the 120 inch screen they truly pop out of the screen. Well i am not a big fan of cheap pop out effects, but i prefer 3D for the depth it gives and the bigger screen literally opens another world for example....the roller coaster ride in Despicable Me put a big smile on my face and many butterflies in my stomach as it gives the feeling of literally sitting in that car !! (why dont they make a 3D bluray just for roller coasters ? whoever reads this and makes one...dont forget to send me some royalty please ! )Ofcourse i understand that projector is not the most convenient setup for many and they dont compare with black levels of Plasma...but the technology has evolved so much that there is no equivalent in the TV world for the size you need for 3D. While it i ideal to have a Home Theater Room to setup the projector, you can pull off a very satisfactory portable setup even in small apartments. While panasnoic give 1080p 3D on 65 inch TV compared to 720 3D of the Optoma, there is no comparison as far as cross talk and size is concerned.By no means i want to put down this brand (i own many electronics from Panasonic and i love them and hence i even purchased the TV in the first place)...but for anyone who is purely looking for the best 3D experience i urge you to consider projector route.i am blown away with the quality and brightness of this tiny projector ! i found the Optoma DLP Link glasses to be very well made, big and comfortable for my prescription glasses. 3D is awesome and i cant get enough of it ! No ghosting whatsoever which is a big deal for me. i dont know much about what this does to the blacks as i felt that scenes were not as dark as they should be....may be its my 120 inch 1.0 white screen ?Should i order the Monster RF glasses to see if this gets better (they are too darn expensive ) ?The remote if very annoying where they dont use the top half of the directional buttons but use some puny ones below where everything is crowded. Why cant they use the "L" and "R" buttons to allow you to switch the DLP sync (yeah i am victim of this issue too, not annoyed by this yet as much as the stupid remote).I really need and appreciate the experts here to share thier 2D and 3D settings as i feel something is lacking in my image (as much as i love it). 2D is too bright and appreciate ways to get the best watchable 2D image that would alow me to give up my awesome Samsung 52inch LCD TV.

Its going to be almost 2 weeks since I purchased this projector. Watching movies is great on this projector. I am using my wall for the projection which has got grainy surface. Picture quality and details are awesome. I was shocked to see such clarity even on a grainy surface.I tried to run this during daytime and didn't found it doing very good in the light even when blinds are closed. I have to close curtains for it. This can be ignored as optimum use of this projector is only when you are watching movies, and movies give feel on such big screens only after room is perfectly dark. I will not reduce any star because of this.The only heart breaker with this projector and I believe with all the 3D ready projectors sold today is the extra hardware for viewing 3D contents. It really makes no sense to purchase a 3D ready projector for 600 even $ & then purchase a converter kind of device of almost same amount of the projector in order to watch 3D movie on a 3D ready projector. I am giving 3 stars just because of this additional hardware 3D-XL. If I ignore this then definitely this projector is 5 star.And why the 3D-XL device is more costly than compared to UK and even does not comes with the pair of glasses while the UK one comes.I am not a very techy person for audio and visuals but I understand that this 3D XL box will do some sequencing of frames in order to show right and left frames sequentially. This is more a firmware upgrade. Since most of us has recently bought this device hence in my opinion Optoma should do this firmware update free of cost as most the mobile companies do these days.The only real issue seems to me currently most 3D players has output of HDMI v1.4 while the HD 66 supports input of HDMI v 1.3. It's really feels cheated that Optoma is asking to purchase a full box instead of a small HDMI v1.4 to v1.3 converter and asking for a whopping 500$. For me is seems like I am asked to purchase one HD 66 on discounted price. It will feel like OPTOMA is cheating us.##update on 21 Dec 2010##In amazon UK site this product is sold just 249euro which is equal to 327.5$. UK version ships following below given item in the box.[...]Box Contains# 3D projector adapter# Power Plug# Power Adapter# User Guide (CD)# Quick Start Card# Warranty Card# WEEE card# 3D Glasses# CR2032 battery# Large/small interchangeable nosepiecesupdated on 9/19/2011Updated to 4 stars as picture quality is awesome. It makes my weekend.