Epson Home Cinema 3200 4K PRO-UHD 3-Chip Projector with HDR

Came with Epson Certified Refurbished sticker on the top. Sadly, focus uniformity was poor and it wasnt any brighter than my 2200-lumens HT1075 with 3K hours on the bulb. I will say it was very quiet.

I should have read up more on this model but there are no internal speakers. I planned to use external AV anyway, but just surprised it didn’t come with it. I am impressed with the picture quality and brightness though.

I have been using this projector for a quite few weeks, screen becomes blank for few seconds quite often, also when it is running its really making noise.

PROS: + At 2,900 Lumens, this projector is bright + Pixel Shifting 4K Projector looks great; in particular with HDR content + Accepts full 10-bit HDR source input signal + Supports 4k @ 60fps resolution via HDMI 2.0 (18 Gbps) + Excellent vertical & horizontal optical lens adjustments (manual) + Latest Bluetooth tech for external audio source + Little to no fan noise in Eco modes + 3LCD tech avoids rainbows, for those sensitive to it + 3D glasses support, for those who aren’t happy with a mere 2 dimensions + Low input lag and latency for gaming + Relatively compact design for a 4k projector + Lots of advanced picture controls and adjustments + Full-featured remote control + 2.0A USB Power Port CONS: - Poor black levels - No built-in speakers - Fan can get noisy at higher brightness levels - Some may find on the pricey side BACKGROUND First I should note that I have an existing home theater/office that I’m using to test out this projector. I currently have an Optoma UHD65 DLP 4k projector. This would be at a different price point but I’ll make a few notable comparisons. I’m also using a Silver Ticket 120” 16:9 Gray Material screen and about 12’ away. The room has blackout curtains but I did tests in complete darkness and with various levels of ambient light. UNBOXING & SETUP Out of the box you’ve got the projector, a remote, batteries, documentation, and a power cable. No HDMI cable is included. The project itself is compact for a 4k projector. It’s smaller than the Optoma UHD65. The lens is off-set, which is normal for smaller projectors. That’s just something to note for installation. Although it’s easy to adjust for that. Speaking of setup, it’s fairly straight forward as just about any modern-day projector. There are adjustable feet for table use as well as ceiling mount points on the bottom. Thanks to the manual lens adjustments for horizontal and vertical positions, installation is very easy. Some projectors don’t have this, such as the current Optoma projectors, meaning you have to mount dead center and at just the right height. Otherwise, you’ll have to deal with digital keystone correction which limits resolution since it’s basically cropping the image. Avoid digital this if at all possible. The physical optical lens shift is the way to go. REMOTE CONTROL The non-universal remote is surprisingly useful for the projector. It’s a standard candy-bar design with quick-access buttons for just about every feature you could want. There are still menus that you’ll need to dig through for some advanced functions. But the basic stuff is all there with a single button. The remote is also backlit and very intuitive to use. The IR signal and receiver are strong enough so that I can just point at the screen and the project at the back of the room picks up on the signal. I’ve used some projector remotes that fail at this. CONTROLS & SETTINGS I won’t go through every setting as the manual would do a better job. But Epson projectors are well known for having just about every advanced feature and setting you could possibly want. In addition to several common features in the form of physical buttons on the projector. But the on-screen menu itself is laid out in an intuitive manner. In other words, if you just want to make some basic adjustments to brightness or pick a preset picture mode, you can do that. Or if you want to adjust the gamma or hue and color saturation, it’s all there for you. For example, the primary color mode presets of Dynamic, Bright Cinema, Natural, and Cinema will be all that your average user needs to touch in order to get the picture they are comfortable with. PICTURE QUALITY I did most testing in Natural, ECO power mode, and High-Speed Auto Iris. I haven’t spent much time doing extensive calibration yet as it’s surprisingly good with a few minor changes. After the bulb has some more hours on it I’ll go through that process and update here as needed. Basically, the picture looks great. The bright 2,900-lumen output with HDR enabled really makes colors pop. And with 4k pixel shifting, you do notice those fine details. At least with 4k content, which is most of what I watch these days. It’s worth noting this isn’t a “true 4K” projector, but with said pixel-shifting, it technically meets the industry definition for use of 4k branding due to the number of pixels hitting the screen. Compared to the Optoma, I do find it’s DLP chipset to produce a smoother picture which lends itself to a more crisp image. There’s more vibrant color saturation with Optoma’s RGBRGB color wheel versus the RGBCYW of the Epson. The latter is meant to allow more light output. But that’s something you really do have to compare back-to-back to appreciate. On its own, the 3200 is really impressive with 4k content; more so with HDR as it has the added benefit of being quite bright. The biggest negative is absolutely the 40:000:1 contrast ratio. Whereas the pricier models can easily push 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio, it’s very noticeable with any content where there is a decent amount of black content and when viewing in a dark room. The best you get is a medium gray color. This is most apparent in the dark home theater environment. With curtains opens or a little ambient light, it’s essentially a non-issue for virtually any projector. GAMING I threw a few 4k games at the projector via my Xbox One X and it absolutely met all expectations. After some more back-to-back comparisons with the DLP projector, there is a noticeable improvement with lower input lag. I had pretty much gotten used to it and had simply adjusted to the lag by dying more frequently. But if you are playing a game that benefits from fast responses you’ll appreciate the quick responsiveness via low input lag. AUDIO There are no speakers on this model, which is unfortunate as I know some would like that for outdoor use. The remote is used for other projectors, so there are volume controls, but they won’t do anything with the 3200. There is an aux jack for audio output as well as Bluetooth audio streaming. Bluetooth is using a relatively new “aptX” Bluetooth standard that compresses and decompresses audio streams for fast low latency audio transmission to your wireless receiver (i.e. headphones, speakers, etc). Older Bluetooth receivers may not support this new standard. Regardless, you’ll get much better audio quality if you provide your own HDMI AV receiver and speaker system. Just make sure it supports HDCP 2.2 and HDMI 2.0 standards for 4k passthrough. CONCLUSION There are projectors for just about every use case you can think of. Which is what I’m going to focus my review and rating. This projector is ideal for a living room home theater. In other words, a dual-purpose room. Where you may have some ambient light coming into the room because you have a near-by kitchen, game room, window, etc. In which case the bright output of the projector can still produce a nice crisp and detailed 4k image. Just note that as with any projector, black levels and overall image visibility will suffer due to external light sources other than the projector itself. This is why in those situations, a lower contrast ratio isn’t as big of a deal. And you still need to have some control of light as there are physical limitations here. Also, a gray material screen will help with black levels and reflections from said lighting. If you’re going to primarily use this in a dedicated home theater where you can control all light sources, the 3200 is still perfectly acceptable. But if you’re particular about those black levels, I’d suggest moving to an alternate and possibly more expensive model with a better contrast ratio. As long as you make the right choice for your needs, you won’t regret the decision. The Epson 3200’s bright lumen output, 4k HDR picture quality, and flexible installation make this an easy recommendation from me.

I need to begin by noting that for the last couple of years I have been spoiled by mostly watching on a 55” OLED I purchased for my bedroom and I have to note that it is unfair in my mind to base a projector against an OLED screen. Although to black levels on the projector are as good or better than any I have used it could not possibly compare to the OLED screen I had become so accustomed to. Otherwise I am impressed by this units performance given its price level. I also cannot compare it to the new laser projectors which are far above the price of this projector. I own a large number of projectors or er the last 15 years and although some of the HD/3D units are very close to the picture quality of this one they all fall a bit short. What they do not have is bluetooth, which I was happy to see is included in this one. After spending several days watching about thirty movies and barring myself from watching my OLED screen I can say this far exceeds my expectations. I have enjoyed it so much that I began to use my home theater more and have begun to upgrade my sound system. If you are considering a first time projector at this price point then I do recommend this projector. If you are looking to upgrade to 4K but are not able to shell out at least two or three times as much money for a laser projector then I also recommend this unit. Update: After using for a few months it started making a loud buzzing noise whenever an image is projected. When it goes to no image it stops so its not the fan. Very annoying. Update 2: After using this wonderful 4K projector for over a year I have experienced just one problem, that until just recently I had no idea what was causing it. The problem was a very loud and annoying sound from the unit, especially when projecting bright scenes. The sound is difficult to describe in words and the best I can do is that of n electronic buzzing. If you are experiencing the same thing you will know what I mean. The other day I just got so fed up with it I decided to try again to see if I can do anything to stop it short of opening the unit up and playing around with something I am no way qualified to do. I decided to just change settings to see if anything made a difference. After about half an hour of switching settings off and on I finally hit pay-dirt. I have always preferred the “Dynamic Mode” setting for color mode. I changed it to Cinema Mode and played a movie that I had just experienced the annoying sound and to my surprise it was gone. It turns out that the sound is evident only when in the Dynamic color mode. Although I prefer that color mode the trade off in eliminating the noise is worth it. I hope no one else has experienced this problem but if so I suggest this as a fix.

Pros: Bright and performs well in a room with ambient light, has a sharp picture and great HDR controls Cons: Contrast is not optimal, lens adjustment and focus is manual and makes it extremely tedious to adjust a ceiling mounted projector, fan noise is a bit loud.

We received this item....which we have been soooo excited about! And the power wont turn on. We tried all of their tips in the user manual and still nothing. It is soooo disappointing to pay so much for a product & wait so long for it to arrive defective. We are quite frustrated. I mean, thank goodness this wasnt for a business meeting or something so very important. Id say this is not reliable.

This projector is excellent for what I needed for a basement home theater. It’s a quality piece of equipment.

Have already made plans to have a drive-in night when the weather warms up. Was able to get a 70 plus inch picture from 10 feet away. Great picture clarity, color and contrast, easily viewed in a sunlit room and no deterioration of quality at larger sizes. The picture is very adjustable and and the controls are full-featured and duplicated on the unit and remote. The picture orientation is slightly down, the unit is designed to be hung overhead. The unit is huge and heavy you will want to make sure it is well secured hung overhead, maybe have it sit high on top of some furniture at the back of the room. The power cord appears to be about 10 feet long great for reaching that power socket lower down the wall. The Bluetooth is practically an afterthought and clearly not the preferred way they want you to hear the sound, it is only A2DP compliant. It really is designed to be installed and left in one place with wire connected speakers. If that is what you are looking for it is highly recommended for you.

Heavy (compare with Optoma UHD-50X), I dont feel very comfortable sitting under it. Kind of noisy (compare with Optoma UHD-50X) Picture is sharp in the middle but blurry on the sides. The BIGGEST problem is, it doesnt work with the 50ft HDMI 2.0 cable I laid behind the wall and ceiling! I tried many different computers and a SONY Blu-ray disk player, NO SIGNAL! It only worked with a Acer Laptop computer. VERY FRUSTRATED! Finally, I got the Optoma UHD-50X, it worked right the way! And the Optoma is so much lighter, quieter, image is sharp everywhere! I can finally relaxed and enjoyed the big screen. Compare with the UHD-50X, This projector looks better, and the quick corner function is so much easier to adjust the screen.