JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

[Javs]

On the other forum, there has been a lot of talk about the new models being a step backwards.

The lamp, lens and basic light engine is the same between last year and this year. So brightness and contrast are unchanged. Anybody finding large differences have one or more of the following:

1.  Have a setting mismatched between the two.
2.  Have a measurement error, due to procedure or meter.
3.  Have a defective projector.
4.  Have a defective lamp.

I have checked with a trusted person that has compared brightness between a 620 and a 640. The 640 was brighter, but the 620 did have some hours on it, but not many.

Cool, so one sample?

I would like to see measurements.

I know of now a bunch of units stacked in a room that are all dimmer than the last year models, and some of those have pretty high hours on the last year models.

I am open to a massive bad batch of bulbs being the cause, and have said so.

But excuse me when I say if I took measurements, they were done in an identical manner between the two units I have here.

Also, the center of my lens is pretty great actually, I find the outer 3rd of the whole lens to be unacceptable.

Here is a repost of a portion of a recent post I made on AVS, there is good news in here somewhere..

Here is the center quadrant on my lens, I think I posted my bad lens shots earlier in this thread, which are only the sides... but anyway, i have no issue at all with the center portion.

9900 on the LEFT / 9500 on the RIGHT.

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Pretty  close.  My 9900 would be widely accepted by most  people on this forum if they had no idea what a golden 9500 looked like.

Also regarding my brightness, which was one  of the other major issues I had with my unit, Woofer who has a 9900 right now stacked in his room, also has brightness issues and light meter readings to show it, along with ARROW-AV, Kaoticr1 on AVS, So, actually, it looks  like something is going on here, that's four units we now know of which are dimmer than the 9500 counterparts in a stacked scenario. ODD.

Moving on, I took a couple more pictures this  morning. Namely CMD definitely has an ongoing bug, which also affects  CMD OFF and Low Latency OFF when the projector is first turned on and  probably with some resolution switching, and CMD needs to be Cycled  ON/OFF to remove the bug.

Look just to the right of all the  lettering when CMD is on, there is ghosting, it looks like a green convergence error, but it cannot be, because on the left side of my  9900, is literally the best convergence I have ever seen from a JVC. My  bad convergence is all the way on the other side

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

CMD  on the new units introduces artefacts when enabled, and also makes the  image softer. Nigel, I would love if you could look at the very same  image I am looking at, photograph like I have, and we can corroborate  data?

9900 Low Latency OFF / CMD Off / MPC and Clear Black OFF.

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

9900 Low Latency ON / CMD Off / MPC and Clear Black OFF.

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

9900 Low Latency OFF / CMD ON / MPC and Clear Black OFF.

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Screenshot Roll-Over

Low Latency OFF / CMD ON

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123359

Low Latency OFF / Low Latency ON

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123360

If you look at the above rollover with LL ON, you actually have more complete and rounded letters, and the vertical lines have better  delineation in the spacing between the lines vs OFF. Also the other  annoying thing here is, the CMD bug will manifest every time you use the  projector if you decide to leave LL OFF, the only way to be sure it  never manifests, is if LL is left ON, pick your poison here. If you  forget to cycle CMD and the bug persists your image is going to be far  worse.

9500 Low Latency OFF / CMD Off / MPC and Clear Black OFF.

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

9500  Low Latency ON / CMD Off / MPC and Clear Black OFF. - DONT ever use  this mode in 24p on the 9500. Resolution and detail is completely  killed.

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

9500  Low Latency OFF / CMD ON / MPC and Clear Black OFF.  - Notice the colour  shift since I never Autocal'd CMD ON - But also notice similar  softening as the 9900 with CMD ON

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Screenshot Roll-Over

9500 Low Latency OFF / CMD ON

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123365

9500 Low Latency OFF / Low Latency ON (Horrible performance from the 9500 here)

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123364

Screenshot Roll-Over 9900 vs 9500

LOW LATENCY OFF vs LOW LATENCY OFF

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123368

CMD ON vs CMD ON

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123367

Next  I looked at an up close portion of this image, its from the newest  version of the Masciola Suite, however I looked at this image in normal  SDR Gamma mode to reveal all the detail in the picture and take away any  HDR Gamma differences there may be between the two units:

Original Screen grab frame:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

9500 Projected Image Close Up:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Here goes...

9900 vs 9500 MPC ENHANCE OFF / CLEAR BLACK OFF

LOW LATENCY OFF vs LOW LATENCY OFF

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123369

LOW LATENCY ON vs LOW LATENCY ON

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123371

CMD ON vs CMD ON

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123370


9900 vs 9500 MPC ENHANCE 2 / CLEAR BLACK LOW


LOW LATENCY OFF vs LOW LATENCY OFF

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123372

LOW LATENCY ON vs LOW LATENCY ON

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123373

CMD ON vs CMD ON

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/123374

It  looks like when CMD is ON with both units, the 9900 is sharper for  sure. But personally I prefer the 9500 in Low Latency OFF / Vanilla  modes in all the above images of the Indian woman's hand, it actually  appears a little more natural to me. Enhance and Clear Black actually  pretty quickly begin to 'cook' the image in all cases on both projectors  here, I think the image is more filmic and natural with Enhance either  off or on 1, and actually Clear Black off too. The 9900 image definitely  does also appear more natural and filmic, but I had a feeling it was  because they reduced the effectiveness and severity of the MPC controls,  I find with both projectors all enhancements off, both images from both  projectors appear quite natural to look at. Click here to see what I mean.

I  have 30 hours on this 9900 now... I think I have hit the wall in terms  of comparisons, definitely until I get a new sample, but I don't  honestly expect much to change. Let it be known I am EXTREMELY fussy! It  doesn't help I have a golden sample 9500 here to compare to, what I  call a bad lens is excellently sharp according to others.

[Javs]

Here is a repost of my initial findings anway verbatim. You can see the edge of my lens here... But the center as I say is find for comparisons on the new eshift. There sure is slightly more detail in the man on the scooter shot with the box in the background... May as well post all this stuff here too:

Grats!

I hope to have my X9900 in a couple weeks and will be doing an in depth shootout between it and my X9500.

EDIT - I have my unit now, so here are my thoughts all collated... My unit is not a good sample, I will be replacing it and will update my thoughts on that unit, most of this was shot from the center of the screen though so for the most part its still going to be a very relevanty comparison, since both my lenses are sharp in the very center. Its the outer edges I have issues with with regards to this lens.

----

I am disappointed overall, and its mainly a gut feeling though, a few things stand out, but it seems to gain a couple steps in one area we give up one or two steps in another area.. I am torn on weather I will keep this projector.

There, got that out of the way.

Here is what my shelf looks like right now...

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Eshift buzz is definitely reduced since when I first turned it on, it sounded dead set like an electric razor at first, by the end of the night, 4 hours later it was about the same volume as my old unit, unless you put your ear right up to the 9900 and then the frequency was a bit different. No big deal here.

The 5 seconds improve sync time in Low Lag mode is very nice. 11.8s in low lag mode ON, 16.8s Low Lag mode off for a 4k Desktop to appear.

Turns out this lens is not as sharp as my 9500, once I studied all the corners of the lens it was clear it wasn't quite as sharp. My 9500 lens is pretty much pin sharp in all the corners, this 9900 lens appeared to be, but when I had both projectors stacked, they were both super sharp in the center, but the 9900 slightly less so, and was a couple clicks less sharp on the corners and this could not exactly be brought in line with the sharpness of the center. Both of these lenses though are still far out sharper than my X7000 lens ever was, so I would still say both these lenses are excellent and would quality for hand selection for the 9XXX series projectors, its just that my old one is better than the other.

However because the left side has perfect convergence, the pixel delineation appears to be stronger, however the focus grid is sharper on the X9500 in person, no doubt about it..

X9900

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

X9500

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

The chromatic aberration on the right side of the lens I have come to decide is unacceptable. I think this will be the basis of at least exchanging this unit to try another sample. While the 2/3rds of the left hand side are perfect, I would actually prefer if the panel alignment was out, that it be out by a consistent amount across the whole screen, my last two JVC's were both exactly 1 pixel blur out vertically, which is easy fix, this would require zone alignment and I am not doing that with an MSRP $10k projector.

EShift 5 with text is better than EShift 4, but in real data in video, I am not sure it can be seen at all.

My X9900 is DIMMER than my X9500 is right now at 700 hours. I'll let that sink in for a moment.

I have to run the X9900 on iris -9 and contrast -2 to brightness match the X9500 currently at iris -10 contrast -1. This is a shame, because my X9500 was at least 10% brighter than this when it was new and has dimmed itself since new. So the 9900 starting out where it is, its not looking good here.

There is some ugly super warm colour temp cast over just the menu screen, the X9500 menu screen looks like a correct calibrated almost 18% grey menu, I don't know how else to say that. I did calibrate both grey-scales on the projectors, there still seems to be a slight colour difference on screen however despite very quick cal, the menu doesn't seem to be affected by calibration at all, so that ugly red bias grey menu seems there to stay...

HDMI SYNC TIMES:

When Low Latency mode is on, my projector was syncing in 11.8 seconds for a 4k desktop image to appear, and 16.8 seconds when Low Latency mode is off. Thats also a repeatable 5 seconds quicker than the 9500 was generally. All modes seem to be between 2-3 seconds quicker syncing vs the 9500 when low latency mode is off.


LOW LATENCY MODE: This seems like it needs to be left ON at all times, at least on my unit, its sharper with it, there is some effed up blur ghosting artefact with Low Latency off, yes you read that right, Low Latency needs to be on for sharpest image. Its totally odd but the pics don't lie.


Perhaps my unit is misbehaving? It did come at default switched to On OOTB. EDIT - This has actually be corroborated by other owners, this may be a bug, but for best quality Low Latency must be off, oddly, cycling CMD on then off again removed the ghosting... but how long does that stick for? Perhaps on next power up the ghosting will be back, best to leave it ON.


LOW LATENCY ON:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

LOW LATENCY OFF:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Low Latency Roll over comparisons On / Off


http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121488

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121489

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121490

ESHIFT 5 DOES NOT HAVE LESS MOSQUITO NOISE THAN ESHIFT 4. It just doesn't. The fine buzzing noise with your face to the screen is identical on both models. Sorry to see this, it was one of the things I was hoping to see improved, for a calmer image, but no.

Windows Desktop at 4k/ Still not native on either machine but no doubt the 9900 is getting closer to where it should be.

X9500

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

X9900

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Rollover

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121495


Now for this, lets look at Eshift 5 vs 4. At first your eyes may be drawn to the vertical lines being far sharper with actual gaps between then on eshift 4 and you would be right, but look at the letters and words... eshift 5 kills it with high density 4k text. But it seems to give up something all the same while doing it... which is a lesser evil? I really don't know, I am truly torn here...


CHROMA TEST


X9500

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

X9900

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121753

Chroma Rollovers:


http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121496

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121497

---

I have begun the process of RMAing the projector, hopefully the next sample is better, if its lackluster again, I will either try get a refund or sell it on, if the lens is excellent and convergence is at least consistent, meaning if it required adjustment I can do the whole screen at once, not only one side, then I will keep it.

I did spend a lot of time calibrating, and Autocaling the new unit today and kind of general trouble shooting, I didn't touch the calibration on the old unit, there was a tiny bit of colour shift, but I have slightly kicked the colour in Lightroom around a tiny bit to make these comparisons closer.

Good news is Autocal works great! Arve tool works too, just need to hit ignore a couple times on some errors but works.

Oh the Low Latency shadow wierdness bug for me seems to have gone away, as far as I can see now both Low Latency on and off look the same.

OK pics...

Here is one you can definitely see more fine detail in, again this is text only, but hey its real content as it were!

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121588

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121589

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121581

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121583

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121582

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121590

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121584

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121586

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/121587

---

BT2020 Mode. This is covering pretty much the entire P3 gamut. HDR mode without the filter for added brightness at the cost of coverage...

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

----

OK here are pics of my lackluster lens and convergence! Yay!!

I literally dont even have to tell you guys which is which!

Left side of screen:

X9500

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

X9900

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Right side of screen:

X9500

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

X9900

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Left side of screen, both projectors at the same time.

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Convergence, X9900:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

What happens when I correct the convergence with zone alignment... This is a single 1080p pixel horizontal line pattern, gee this artefact looks SUPER familiar.

X9900

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

X9500 with normal panel alignment:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Obviously the 9900 can show that screen as clear grey too, but if I want panel alignment to be correct, I get artefacts, yay!

Oh and here is real content, top corner of screen:

X9500

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

X9900

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

[AVSCraig]

When is JVC AU going to replace your projector ( I'm assuming they are ) ?

[Javs]

There is no question which one of these has proper font kerning and spacing. More complete lettering etc...

Ground truth, original photo:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Original photo enlarged to same scale in Photoshop:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Which is which?

Projectors:

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

JVC RS440 / 540 / 640 projectors

Full Image 9500 vs 9900

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122001


Blow up 1:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122002

Blow up 2

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122003

[Javs]

When is JVC AU going to replace your projector ( I'm assuming they are ) ?

I just got off the phone to them, they are going to have it picked up on Monday finally and sent to a service agent to generate a report...

But now I worry they are even going to notice the lens issues since they don't have a known good lens to compare it to. Regardless, its the process I must follow.

[DavidHir]

Hey Javs,

When I stare for a few moments at the "normal" grey pattern shot you posted of your X9500, it looks very good but I see small hints of pink in it?  I also see small hints of pink in the tan-brown paper screen shot comparison.  My RS440 looks like that too (non-calibrated right now).  This appears to be just normal for D-ILA/LCoS although certainly better than Epson and Sony.

[Javs]

Hey Javs,

When I stare for a few moments at the "normal" grey pattern shot you posted of your X9500, it looks very good but I see small hints of pink in it?  I also see small hints of pink in the tan-brown paper screen shot comparison.  My RS440 looks like that too (non-calibrated right now).  This appears to be just normal for D-ILA/LCoS although certainly better than Epson and Sony.

Thats actually a single pixel line pattern in 1080p, its a torture test. Its the reason there is blotching since panel alignment directly affects it, and highlights how much of a bad idea it is to use Zone correction.

Grey fields on both projectors look absolutely excellent as epected with no perceivable colour shift at all.

[TWISM]

Javs,

I will have another 640 to test sometime next week and will report back. This is kaotikr1 from the other forum, and I along with you have what appears to be a low performing 640 in regards to brightness.

Mike,

When you talk about a projector being defective in regards to low light output what would you contribute that to? What would cause that?

[Javs]

Javs,

I will have another 640 to test sometime next week and will report back. This is kaotikr1 from the other forum, and I along with you have what appears to be a low performing 640 in regards to brightness.

Mike,

When you talk about a projector being defective in regards to low light output what would you contribute that to? What would cause that?

Personally I am still hopeful its a batch of bulbs...

[AVSMike]

Javs,

I will have another 640 to test sometime next week and will report back. This is kaotikr1 from the other forum, and I along with you have what appears to be a low performing 640 in regards to brightness.

Mike,

When you talk about a projector being defective in regards to low light output what would you contribute that to? What would cause that?

Any number of reasons, but I don't think it is the projector design. Because if it was, then all of them would be low and that does not look to be the case.

[TWISM]

Any number of reasons, but I don't think it is the projector design. Because if it was, then all of them would be low and that does not look to be the case.

Someone posted they swapped a bulb from another model over and it still measured lower, which I would think took the bulb out of the equation.

Have you spoken to Chris at JVC about this yet?

[AVSCraig]

Someone posted they swapped a bulb from another model over and it still measured lower, which I would think took the bulb out of the equation.

Have you spoken to Chris at JVC about this yet?

We can neither confirm nor deny who we speak to at JVC, but we've been told there should be zero difference lumen wise from last years models. Really, since the basic chip and light engine design hasn't changed since the RS400 / 500 / 600  ( they just measured higher than spec'd so they changed the specs for the RS_20 series ) there should be no difference - other than unit to unit variation.

[TWISM]

We can neither confirm nor deny who we speak to at JVC, but we've been told there should be zero difference lumen wise from last years models. Really, since the basic chip and light engine design hasn't changed since the RS400 / 500 / 600  ( they just measured higher than spec'd so they changed the specs for the RS_20 series ) there should be no difference - other than unit to unit variation.

I get it, just like with "CMD" early on there was "no issue" and people had to push and post screenshots and data, then all of a sudden there was an issue, and one that requires a fix.

I get that some of us are a bit different as we actual might take the time to validate manufactures claims, measure them, compare notes, etc... It just seems like something is off, or the handful of us that have measured are just unlucky as all are coming across units that measure quite poor to the previous year models.

I can live with less than spec, what is hard for me to swallow is when people post they are getting 1200 lumens calibrated on low lamp, and I can't hit 1100 on high. Hopefully as a fellow enthusiast you can understand the concern.

[woofer]

Someone posted they swapped a bulb from another model over and it still measured lower, which I would think took the bulb out of the equation.

Have you spoken to Chris at JVC about this yet?

That would be me..     Bulb was from an X7500 with zero hours on it.. this was swapped to the X9900. The bulb read very close ( slightly higher and i mean slightly) to the original from the X9900 .

[AVSCraig]

I get it, just like with "CMD" early on there was "no issue" and people had to push and post screenshots and data, then all of a sudden there was an issue, and one that requires a fix.

I get that some of us are a bit different as we actual might take the time to validate manufactures claims, measure them, compare notes, etc... It just seems like something is off, or the handful of us that have measured are just unlucky as all are coming across units that measure quite poor to the previous year models.

I can live with less than spec, what is hard for me to swallow is when people post they are getting 1200 lumens calibrated on low lamp, and I can't hit 1100 on high. Hopefully as a fellow enthusiast you can understand the concern.

That I do. It's perplexing.