Leica Cine Play 1 review: A good projector with the Leica badge and price

Leica is known as a maker of high-end cameras and lenses. We recommend one of their smaller models in our catalog Best point and shoot camera guide. And what is it Projector Other than the camera in reverse? Well, to be fair, there are a lot, but I can see why Leica entered the space.

The Cine Play 1 is a compact projector with some great specs, including a 3,000 lumen light output. Interestingly, it doesn’t use the Google TV interface like the majority of modern projectors and instead uses Hisense’s own VIDAA operating system.

Overall performance is good, but the list price of $3,795 indicates a “Leica tax” that also results in its cameras being more expensive than other models with similar performance. Even at $3,000, which you can regularly find, the Cine Play 1 struggles to compete with similarly priced projectors.

Specifications and so on

• Resolution: 4K
• Lumen Specifications: 3,000 (claimed)
• Zoom: Yes (0.9-1.5)
• Lens Shift: Gimbal (vertical adjustment only)
• Light source type: RGB laser

Almost every projector I review has a body made of plastic. Some feel cheap, others feel less cheap, but very few people use metal. The Cine Play 1 has an aluminum casing, which looks noticeably more luxurious than other projectors. Great when the lights are on, I guess.

The Cine Play 1 has most, but not all, of the features you’d expect in a projector in this price range. This includes a gimbal mount, motorized zoom and an RGB laser light source that Leica claims produces 3,000 lumens. Most gimbal projectors I’ve reviewed also have some sort of “lazy Susan” at their base for easy horizontal rotation. The Cine Play 1 doesn’t do that, but then again, how hard can it be to actually rotate the projector?

In its most precise position (theater day does not, interestingly enough, Film maker), I measured it The projector has a power of 2100 lumens. With the Brightness Enhancer feature set to Ultra, I measured 2647. Given differences in measurement techniques and unit-to-unit variation, this is reasonably close to spec. However, in this mode, the picture is noticeably green and the fan noise is much louder, which is especially noticeable given that the Cine Play 1 is usually very quiet. It’s worth noting that with the Brightness Enhancer set to High, the image becomes much less green, although still somewhat blue/cold, and slightly less bright at around 2,541 lumens. Fan noise is still noticeable.

I’ll talk more about this in the conclusion, but one of the things I was hoping for with the Cine Play 1 was a great contrast ratio. I measured an average across multiple brightness modes of 1,386:1. This is definitely decent. It’s about 40% higher than the average of all the projectors I reviewed for CNET, and nearly 2.5 times the average. It’s also in the same range as other projectors around the price. the Exgeme Horizon 20 Max It was 1,367:1 for example, and the JMGO N3 Ultimate was 1,859:1, although that had some increased brightness in the black levels, so the ratio was probably a bit lower. Epson home cinema 5050although much larger and designed for more permanent mode, is about the same price, and has a much higher contrast ratio of 5,203:1. However, it’s a little dim at around 1,731 lumens in the brightest (i.e. not green) normal mode.

The Cine Play 1’s brightness and contrast are good, but I would have liked more given the price and name. I would also have liked to see more lens shift options, such as what JMGO N3 Ultimate It has, but these features aren’t very common so their absence here is (mostly) forgivable. There is an option to shift the lens in the menu, but it only works if you are in the digital (not optical) zoom range, but you shouldn’t use digital zoom as that reduces image quality.

communication

• HDMI inputs: 2
• USB port: 2
• Audio output: optical, 3.5mm headphone
• Internet: Wi-Fi, Ethernet
• Broadcast interface: VIDAA
• Remote control: Not backlit

Almost every projector I’ve reviewed in the past few years has had Google TV OS. That’s… well, I guess. It would likely be very cheap to implement. If it’s similar to the TV side, Google might pay companies to include it. Early versions of the operating system lacked the adjustments that other non-Google projectors had, limiting image quality adjustments. However, this problem has generally been resolved now.

I bring this up because the Cine Play 1 is the first projector I’ve reviewed that uses Hisense’s VIDAA operating system instead. Coincidentally, I have the next Hisense projector in my review queue. Overall, using VIDAA feels fairly smooth, with less clutter than Google TV. The apps are laid out in a row, and there’s a small window showing what the latest source is showing. Since it’s not Google, you may not be able to find every app you want. All the major apps are here, but if you have a favorite but less popular app, It’s best to check if it’s available first. Or just connect a Flow devicewhich you can do via one of the HDMI inputs and if necessary, power it via the adjacent USB.

Operations-wise, Cine Play has a nice “cinematic” touch. When turned off, instead of issuing a power-off warning or turning off the image immediately, black bars come from the sides to simulate closing the curtains. elegant.

The projector has two 10-watt speakers that play decently loud, and the overall sound is very good. The bass is a bit boomy, but there’s a surprising amount of it. Like all projectors, it’s best to connect to a device Speakers or receiver And speakers.

Finally, the long, thin remote is made mostly of metal and has a sophisticated heft, befitting a high-end product. However, it is not backlit, which makes navigating in the dark more difficult.

Image quality comparisons

JMGO N3 Ultimate

The JMGO N3 Ultimate is a close competitor to the Leica Cine Play 1. Both are gimbaled projectors, although the N3 is also motorized. It’s a few hundred dollars cheaper than the Leica, and although it’s rated as much brighter, it produces fairly close measurements. I connected each of them to a distribution amplifier and displayed them side by side on a 102-inch monitor with a gain of 1.0.

The first: goodness. Like most projectors in this price range, the Leica is very bright. While the JMGO is brighter, by about 350 lumens in my testing, that doesn’t make much sense in the real world. Side by side, the N3 looks a little brighter, but that 15% difference isn’t that big of a deal. Or to put it another way, the difference between a 350 lumen projector and a 700 lumen projector is very noticeable. The difference between 2100 and 2450 is not big.

The contrast also looks fairly similar. I had some difficulty measuring the N3 Ultimate’s contrast ratio because it would turn off the lasers when given 0 IRE (black screen) regardless of the settings. So the 1,859:1 ratio I measured was less accurate than I normally prefer, but it’s in the ballpark. This is higher than the Leica’s figure of 1,386:1, but again, these are solid numbers and side by side they look very similar. There might have been a little better depth to the image on the JMGO, but barely.

The biggest and most surprising difference to me with the Leica was the color. Leica cameras are known for their color accuracy, and the Cine Play 1 was noticeably less accurate than the N3 Ultra. First, none of the color temperature modes I tested were accurate. The most natural lacks red, giving the skin tone a slight pallor. The other colors themselves were a little off as well. None of them looked bad per se, but the projector was definitely less accurate than the N3 Ultimate. This was true regardless of picture mode, including director. So the result looks a bit less realistic. It didn’t feel artificial, and it wasn’t that bad, but I’ve reviewed a series of microprojectors recently, so the performance here was surprising.

There are wide picture settings, so if you want to have your own monitor Professionally calibrated You can improve colors and color temperature, but I have a hard time recommending spending more on calibration when the projector is so expensive to operate. There are other projectors that are cheaper and much more accurate. Again, that’s not bad, but the projector gets a B in the less expensive category.

A word or a few words about RGB laser light sources. The Cine Play 1, like all RGB laser projectors, has an issue if you wear glasses. Depending on your prescription and lens materials, you may see… Chromatic aberration, or color fringingaround bright objects. This is especially noticeable when against a dark background such as white credits on a black screen, street lights at night, etc. It will appear as if the image is “split” with a monochromatic “ghost” on either side. This is especially noticeable if you’re sitting fairly close, since you’re naturally looking at the corners of the screen through the corners of your glasses, exacerbating the visual problem. This is separate from the DLP rainbows that some people see with certain DLP projectors. This won’t affect everyone who wears glasses, and it certainly won’t affect those who don’t wear glasses. For what it’s worth, I notice this and find it annoying enough that I personally wouldn’t buy an RGB laser projector. verify BenQ W4100i Instead because it uses LEDs it doesn’t have this problem.

Although I didn’t compare them head to head, the performance of the Leica is fairly similar to the Leica’s Valerion Vision Master Pro2. This projector is a little brighter, at 2,301 lumens in its normal modes, but again, that’s not enough of a difference to matter in the real world. Neither projector has particularly accurate colours, though the Pro2 is slightly worse. They both have an attractive exterior in my opinion. The Leica is available for a few hundred more, which is probably worth it if you want a gimbal. However, I would still choose JMGO over either of them.

Determine the range

Unless you’re researching and testing dozens of models released every year, the projector market is interesting in ways you might not expect. For example, I’ve found that the vast majority of projectors share many of the same parts. Other than Epson and high-end brands like Sony and JVC, almost all projectors use one of the DLP chipsets made by Texas Instruments. They also tend to use many other off-the-shelf parts that are identical across brands.

What each company does with these parts is key, which is why there are often huge differences in performance between projectors. The lens can be a big factor in this, so I was interested to see if Leica would use its long history of great optics to do something special with the lens. The results were disappointing given the naturally high expectations associated with the name. To be clear, the performance itself isn’t disappointing, but with the name at the top, I think it’s fair to expect more. It should show performance at least on par with brands with a small part of Leica’s history, for example.

Rant aside, the Cine Play 1 is a good projector; It’s not a great idea and for the price that’s a fair expectation. You’re definitely paying for that little red circle at the top. For many people, this is a reasonable tax to pay and that is completely fair. The chassis alone looks very luxurious in a sea of ​​plastic boxes. If you’re just judging on performance, that’s fine, and there are better options for less money.