Epson Brightlink 1485Fi Business/Education Projector Review-Performance

Epson Brightlink 1485Fi Business/Education Projector Review - Performance: Color Modes, Image Quality, Text and Presentation, Audio Quality, Brightness, Contrast and Audible Noise

One of the huge advantages of the 1485Fi is how bright it is. During my lab testing, I was able to test it in almost-complete darkness, and, of course, the image looked great. The real surprise was when I began letting light into my space. Even at an amount of uncontrolled ambient light that would kill an average projector, the 1485Fi displayed content incredibly well. Keep in mind my lab is in Southern California, so it’s sunny outside.

Outside of text and presentation image quality (see the images above), consider how this projector is going to be used in both the classroom and meeting room. Most of us are much more familiar with writing on a whiteboard than .... Personally, in my previous life in corporate management, the whiteboard was the most effective way I could collaborate with my team. There is a good reason for that. Many of us are very comfortable creating or writing in an analogue fashion. With the 1485Fi this means creating with a marker on a digital whiteboard. One of the key benefits of this type of system is that I would be writing at the same speed or pace that my students or co-workers are writing, so they would be able to keep up with me. Like many of you, I still make extensive use of tools like PowerPoint. PowerPoint is an amazing tool, but think about what your students go through when, with one click, multiple sentences can appear on the screen. Apply that to a whole presentation, and you’ll quickly see how your audience might struggle to keep up with your pace when you are all trying to collaborate.

The 1485Fi offers an 8-Watt x 2 built-in stereo speaker system. I know this is not a home theater but I would have liked a little more dynamic range, for the corporate user, from this system. All the sound is in the mids and highs, which should be perfect for the classroom. The projector is more than loud enough to let students hear content clearly from the back of the room.

Epson claims a brightness of 5000 lumens for the Brightlink 1485Fi. I measured its brightest mode, Dynamic, at full wide-angle. Since the 1485Fi does not offer an adjustable analog zoom for these tests EVERYTHING is considered wide open, allowing the most amount of light to get through to the screen. I took this measurement three times as I changed the batteries in my light meter. The 1485Fi beat its own claim by over 1000 lumens, coming in at a whopping 6,153 lumens. In my experience, Epson tends to be a bit conservative on business PJ’s and on business/education projectors’ brightness claims, so I was not surprised when it came in higher. I was just surprised by how much higher it came in. Below is the lumens data for all the other modes on the 1485Fi.

The Epson Brightlink 1485Fi has a contrast claim of 2,500,000:1. Contrast refers to black level performance, or “how black” the blacks look. Business and education projectors don’t require great black level performance in the same way home entertainment or home theater projectors do, so business and education projectors tend to hang out in the medium-grey to medium-dark grey spectrum. We don’t expect them to have true black.

That said, the 1485Fi has good black level performance. Check out the photos above.

The Epson Brightlink 1485Fi has a rated fan noise of 36db at full power, 27db in ECO Mode. That’s pretty standard for Epson projectors, and business/education projectors in general. At full power, the audible noise wasn’t all that audible.

This projector is meant to be ceiling mounted, so it will be well above the heads of students and teachers. Even those closest to the projector aren’t likely to get distracted.