Viewsonic PJD5533w Color & Picture Quality
As is our standard procedure, my laptop was connected via HDMI and the PJD5533w was displaying at its native resolution (1280 x 800). With this input and using the PC mode, the PJD5533w provided a very nice, sharp image. As we noted with the recently reviewed Viewsonic PJD6383s, the PJD5533w did not suffer from the "Brightest mode" color issues as much as some other DLP projectors we’ve reviewed in this price range.
While colors are somewhat washed out when using the brightest picture mode (in this case, it’s called Brightest), red were darker than with other modes, but yellows were better than many DLP multimedia projectors, which often have yellows that tend to look like mustard. This may be due to Viewsonic’s use of a 6-segment color wheel (RGBCYW), as opposed to the three or four segment wheel (that has no yellow segment) you often see in this price range. The other picture modes improved color accuracy and balance substantially. PC, ViewMatch and Movie modes were all quite good (see photos), with well balanced color and depth. While many DLP projectors fall short of the color saturation produced by LCD projectors, with the PJD5533w, the differences are very small in modes other than Brightest.
For movie or video viewing, Movie mode gives you the best color balance, as well as noticeably improved contrast. Movie mode can also be used for photo presentations when deeper contrast is desired. This will result in the optimum color rendition and displayed accurate colors and great realism. As a result of the good color balance, skin tones look quite accurate with the PJD5533w. As mentioned in the Setup and Menu section of this review, the PJD5533w also has full color management for really fine tuning the color balance.
Switching to the PJD5533w’s VGA input, there was a very slight change in picture quality and depth of color, but that’s typical going from a digital to analog connection. It’s only noticeable when you switch back and forth, so it’s really a non-issue. A digital connection is preferred when available, so it’s nice to have that option with the PJD5533w.
Even with higher resolutions and aspect ratios than its default 1280 x 800, the PJD5533w was more than up for the task. Moving way up to 1080p resolution (1920x1080), the PJD5533w had no problems. As we’ve repeatedly noted in recent reviews, there’s been a lot of improvement in image scaling and compression techniques and so it’s now the norm for a multimedia projector to cleanly handle any resolution or aspect ratio in its specified range. As a result, there were virtually no issues with even the smallest text on the spreadsheet. Such text remained quite readable and there was no color separation or overlap as can be found on some LCD projectors (mainly due to slight convergence issues inherent in a three-chip projector vs. a single chip DLP). Similarly, dropping to a lower resolution and different aspect ratio (1024x768), resulted in no noticeable loss of sharpness.
Overall, with the text sizes and resolutions that would most likely be used in presentations, the Viewsonic PJD5533w will have no problem maintaining readability.
Connecting the PJD5533w to a Blu-ray player via HDMI, added greater depth to colors, as well as the increased sharpness you’d expect from the higher resolution source (see photo). As previously noted, for more critical viewing, a calibration using the color management feature of the PJD5533w would allow for even greater accuracy in skin tones. Contrary to many other DLP projectors in this class, there was almost none of the typical DLP “rainbow effect” during viewing.
Overall, the PJD5533w’s good color reproduction and decent (if not exceptional) contrast and black levels, makes it more than an acceptable choice for classroom video presentations. It should be noted that if you have a video presentation that includes audio, you’ll want to use external powered speakers, as the W600’s built-in 2-watt speaker is not up to the task of creating an acceptable volume level for all but the smallest rooms.
