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

This works really well. Easy to setup and use. Excellent picture. Brightness is really good. Kind of pricey but for the quality it’s worth it.

Back in the 1990s and 2000s I had several Epson projectors and generally they were refurbished units. They all performed very well and I could see no difference in quality from a new unit. This year I have tried two Epson products, the LS300 ultra short throw and this unit the Home Cinema 3800 and both were refurbished and both had issues and were defective. The 3800 has bad and crackling speakers and when they did so, it would cause the image to flicker. Also the video playback would randomly shut off by itself and the unit would power down. Also the remote would not power down the unit. In order to turn it off, you had to turn it off at the unit. Also the 4k image quality has not as expected. The black levels were not good. There were no blacks just light greys. Black levels were far better on SD but still not great. 4k playback looked very good in bright scenes and dismal in dark scenes. This was actually the same with the LS300 which had an alleged contrast ratio or 1000,000:1 but it looked more like 5000:1. Maybe this was due to the units being refurbished but possible Epson is simply not what it used to be.

This thing is amazing!!! The picture is bright, the colors are incredible, and the blacks are as black as I’ve seen in a projector! All that and I only use it outdoors where there’s plenty of ambient light. The projection is so bright I was able to watch a movie before sunset. Great product! Thank you!

Excellent color, contrast and brightness. Input lag is good enough for console gamers. The ECO mode is quite. I like 3LCD projector more than DLP projector. They have better color and contrast. If you are like me, looking for a 3LCD projector, for movies and gaming, and 4K, Epson product line is definitely what you can’t miss. And this one, HC3800, is the best at $1000-$2000. I love it! (This is a late review. I bought the projector one year ago. I’ve been enjoying it for the past whole year. I am so glad that I did a right decision a year ago)

I love this projector. It was easy to setup and is quiet. It’s a projector so you can hear the fan, but one of my couches is right below it, and I can only really hear it during the real quiet scenes. I replaced an older Epson projector with this one and am happy.

4K picture is great

I mostly watch movies, youtube. I had a optoma hd28darbee that was great for games and pretty good for movies and then it failed. I tried one of the optoma laser projectors hz39hdr and the color was horrible way washed out. I looked out of the box and noticed just how good the picture was on the Epson 3800…. WOW incredible color, and detail. In fact it has the best image I have ever seen period!! Only drawbacks when switching inputs it can be slow and buggy so make sure if using a receiver with 4k hdmi switching, you have all the firmware updates done. Also games did look a bit better (sharper) with optoma however with some adjustments and just how good it looks with uhd4k movies I will except that. I mean it looks so good I stayed up to 2am just watching uhd4k content on youtube etc, amazing !!! Buy it you will love it!!!

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 was hesitant to purchase based on some reviews complaining of inconsistent sharpness across the image. Here I am to tell you this is absolutely true. When I perfect focus the center to see the pixels, the edges are blurred. I can focus the edges, but then lose the center. Cannot focus entire screen. I have laser leveled the projector dead center to the screen and am within its range (17.5ft for 120”). I just got a replacement unit, exact same problem. Specifically bad in bottom right corner. Oh and lo and behold other reviewers complaining of the same bottom right corner. These things are a pot shoot. Maybe you’ll get a good one, I got two bad ones. I’m done. NOT a quality device, just has expensive components. Doesn’t matter what the windows look like if the foundation is trash. That’s this. Don’t fall for it. Plastic junk.

Just got this projector replacing my Panasonic 720p projector which worked nicely for 15 years but now with 4K content available I thought I would get this to start with watching the Super Bowl. First impression is it’s amazing upgrading from the 720p. Colors are rich and crisp. Lots of keystone adjustments available to fix the alignment since my previous projector was not aligned center of the room and I used the same ceiling frame to hang this projector. Couldn’t step away watching a movie or HD/4K content. I am still using a very old HDMI cable and yet getting very good picture - not sure if I have to upgrade it. Overall, after two days of using it, just impressed how good the experience is. Will know more after tomorrow’s super bowl game. Definitely recommend over buying a large OLED TV.