JVC - DLA-NZ900

That's a big screen in a big room it sounds like. There is no question that the NZ900 is a premium model. It is just better across the board in what it delivers. Bigger and better lens quality is the real key feature so you are paying for that quality for sure, but it also delivers on that. Is it worth it? Yes, if it is within your budget, I think it is a projector which will be fully capable for the next ten years. There will be small improvements made over those years, but nothing earth shattering. This is also a good question and topic of conversation over at AVS Forum in their $3,000+ projectors section.

Is the screen 16:9 or 2.35:1? Either way that’s a massive screen and you’d likely be better off going with the NZ900 and leveraging the internal tone mapping to get a punchy HDR image. Remember you’ll lose some brightness when you calibrate the projector, was that taken into account with the nit values provided above? Both projectors also have color filters to get you close to 100% P3 color coverage, but if you use them you lose roughly 30 percent light output. If you don’t use them you get somewhere in the range of 85-89% P3 color coverage, which may or may not be a big deal to you. If you go with a 2.35 screen you could also add an anamorphic lens down the road for more brightness.

The latest top jvc projector is finally offering on/off contrast performance of the previous king the rs640 and 20LTD, but at a considerable 2-4× cost increase. A calibrated nz900 is going to offer the best image a projection enthusiast has ever seen in the price range. You have to move up to a Christie to get to the next level. I'd also say you'll need to help the nz900 with a Lumagen or madVR to gain the very best tone mapping, which projection needs. A calibrated lg 97" G3 is simply operating on a different level, while you only sacrifice on potential maximum screen size. While a $15k 97" lg G3 is a relative bargain compared to a top end projection solution, there is another alternative to consider. We are on the doorstep of emerging big tv tech with rgb mini-led, and tandem layer oled. So, an intermediate step might be grabbing something like $3-5000 98" miniLED and building out the rest of your HT, with a plan to upgrade in 2-3 years. This has been my plan, having bought and calibrated a tcl 2024 98" qm851g miniLED. This gives me time for rgb miniLED and tandem layer oled to evolve a generation before spending 2-4× on a 100"+ panel. My peak projection experience was a jvc rs640 with tone mapping support from Lumagen DTM and HdFury LLDV Dolby Vision. In our 25x16 HT I ran a screen innovations 10' wide 2.35:1 ar scope screen. This was roughly a $10k all in value proposition. You have many options to consider, and it sounds like you have a great HT canvas to work with. Congrats.

People pay professionals good money to help them with answers to your questions. Equipment choice alone is barely half the equation. Good design and good integration are critical to achieving high performance. This isn’t something you should just freestyle, as there are many tradeoffs to manage based on your subjective preferences. Design informs equipment choice. It’s an iterative process as you converge on design and equipment choice simultaneously. Long throw projectors generally offer better image quality than UST at the same price point. UST are nice if you’re worried about people casting shadows or if this is a general entertainment space hosting karaoke night and dance parties. If it’s just for watching motion pictures while seated then get a long throw projector. For $5k I’d try to score a deal on a B-stock Sony VPL-XW5000ES or a lightly used JVC D-ILA projector, preferably with laser light source but if you’d rather spend less then a bulb is fine. You can find some screaming deals if you don’t mind bulbs and fake 4K pixel-shifting. If your viewing distance is >10ft then it shouldn’t matter. https://www.avsforum.com/forums/front-projector.252/ Fixed screens are cheaper than motorized screens. Acoustically transparent screens are nice because you can place the LCR speakers behind the screen, which not only looks better but sounds better. But this is also where you need to be careful as there is interaction between viewing angles/ screen size and speaker positions and seating distance. All have to be in harmony. Woven screens usually look and sound better than perforated screens, but this depends on the exact screen material, budget, viewing distance and preference. Like I said, there’s lots of tradeoffs to manage. I’d recommend minimum 7.1.4 speaker configuration, even if you have to built it in stages as funds allow. My preference in that size room is 9.1.6 but that’s going to break your budget in terms of AV processor capability, speaker count and amplification requirements. You’ll want a minimum of two subwoofers. What exactly do you mean by “sound conditioning is already taken care of?”

Black level champ, it's lcos jvc.

Finished my home theater rebuild. Went from a Sony XRD 1080p to a DLA NZ800 8K projector, 150” 16:9; Marantz Cinema 30, JBL Synthesis 7.2.4 speaker set up with two HSU VTN TF1 600W subwoofers. It is amazing. Total spent $50,000 on equipment, custom carpentry, paint, new carpet, and new chairs (September). Still missing a couple speakers due to JBL Backorder.

JVC and Sony are the only native 4K options under $100K. Sony is by far the best for gaming with a sub 12ms input lag and excellent all round performance. The JVC can be better for Blu-ray, especially if you’re hiring a 1st class calibrator. However, I find most prefer the well rounded performance of the Sony. The new Bravia 7 (XW5100) has become my favorite bang for the buck projector.

I am in a similar situation. I’m renovating my home theater and upgrading projectors. My room is 23wx25d with a sloped ceiling that’s 8 to 17ft. So along that 25ft depth the screen side is 25ft wide and 17ft tall. My screen is 180 inches I have been struggling with what projector to get and while there are some in the 10k price range that can work it’s going to be difficult to get that many lumens in a solid projector. Ultimately you have (and I have) a lumens problem. I’ve been working with Audio Advice to try to determine a projector and I am already looking at 20-30k projectors. One I found that would easily meet your lumen needs is the Epson QL-3000. That’s a $16k projector without the lenses and close to 19 depending on the lens’s. When I brought it up to Audio Advice they were not huge fans of the projector. I haven’t seen it in person but images I’ve seen of the video look good. But it’s doing 4k upscaling - so it really comes down to what you need lumen wise compared to image quality. I want cinema level amazing so I’m looking at the JVC-NZ900 now (30k! :(…)

https://preview.redd.it/1ul7a5snstvf1.jpeg?width=4032&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=06073ce5d1601bc998177230231e2b68713a8010 Just for assistance. I put a separate post up talking about my new NZ900 (outside of your price range but as an example). This is a 25ft throw onto my wall, the screen size here is about 220 inches. The NZ900 is 3200 lumens. Your issue will be lumens as you need the brightness for your HDR pop. If native 4k isn’t a hard and fast requirement the QL-3000 is 6,000 lumens and is 18k-20k for the lens you’d need. I just wanted you to get a visual of what you’re looking for. This was taken directly out of the box, with zero config, image is 1080p. There’s no screen (hasn’t been installed yet, and it’s projecting onto a peopercorn gray wall). I know when I was looking I wanted to see what things looked like and know the variables to help me decide. One big item that could matter is your throw distance. The closer in the better (but there are zoom considerations). For example my pic is at a 25ft throw but I’m considering mounting at 20ft AND I’ll shrink the image down to a 180 screen. So my setup will actually get a bit brighter.

Sweet! Wish I could have swung a NZ800, settled on a NZ500 (RS1200) with a 147” 1.90:1 screen. Also a Cinema 30 like you! Running 7.2.6.

JVC DLA-NZ900 And a matching screen.