Mitsubishi HC3800

Mitsubishi's latest entry-level Home Cinema projector, the HC3800, marks the manufacturer's return to DLP technology.  A direct competitor to its cousin the HC5500, which uses LCD technology, it's an interesting alternative if you're a fan of the Texas Instruments technology. 

Handling: no lens-shift, but a powerful zoom

Things don't start well for the HC3800.  Without lens-shift, just one HDMI input and a glossy black case, the outside doesn't really speak to top quality.  Another problem is the noise produced by the fan: at 27 dB it's reasonably quiet, but because it's so high-pitched, it quickly becomes irritating.

The projector's strengths are its small footprint, low energy consumption on standby (0.3 W) and the well-equipped backlit remote which has plenty of useful shortcuts.  Unusually for a DLP projector, the built-in zoom is powerful and gives you a lot of choice over the size of the projected image.

Image Quality: Full HD is on the table--but nothing else

Whether you opt for LCD or DLP technology, we can't stress enough how important it is to set your projector up properly, as they never perform as well as they could do using their default settings.  Make sure you take the time to tweak the settings--we always give our recommendations in the inset--or, if you can take your own readings using some specialist equipment and set the values that way.


We measured black levels of 0.44 cd/m² with brightness at 330 m².  Such deep blacks are one of the hallmarks of DLP projectors, and allow the Mitsubishi HC3800 to stand up to competition from LCD projectors like the Epson EH-TW5500, Panasonic PT-AE4000 or Sony VPL-HW15, all of which struggle to contain black levels.  To do any better, you need to go for the Sanyo PLV-Z3000, where blacks are only 0.28 cd/m², but overall brightness is lower.

There aren't any particular settings to reduce the level of electronic noise.  You'll have to make do with the default post-processing treatment, which is less powerful than what's on offer on more advanced projectors.

Bright areas are well-handled, and there are no problems with over-exposed areas like with the HC6800 when its iris is activated.

Upscaling and 1080p: playing a DVD (576p SD) on a projector means that the DLP chip has to do the upscaling to reach 1080 lines.  The HC3800 does a pretty reasonable job of this task.  Still, the level of detail is much lower than with a PS3, which is much better at it.  In particular, diagonal lines become pixellated when the projector is doing the upscaling, but look fine when the PS3 is in charge.  With 1080p video, there's plenty of detail, and is even better than the Sony VPL-HW15, with, however, a more visible matrix.

Rainbow effect: this visual artefact is unavoidable with single-chip DLP projectors, and is most obvious on black-and-white scenes.  The most obvious way to spot is with a vertical white line on a black background.  Move your eyes around the frame, and you can't help but notice the bars of red, blue and green.  It's much less obvious with colour video, but the most sensitive viewers will still be able to spot it.

100 Hz and 3D modes: there's no 3D or any system to improve the fluidity of moving images in video.