GCN LAB REVIEW
Toshiba TLP-X150U
GCN LAB REVIEW: The TLP-X150U is a good value at $899. It won’t blow you away with its performance but won’t disappoint you either.
The Toshiba TLP-X150U is a good projector that does well in most areas, but it has a few flaws. It didn't run the table in any test but performed well overall.
The TLP-X150U is 3 pounds, 14 ounces, and it's 11 inches wide and 8 inches deep. It should fit easily into most laptop bags, though it also comes with its own carrying case. It has VGA and S-video inputs, plus a special port that can act as a second input or a computer-out port. A tiny switch lets you move between the two modes.
It has auto-keystone, which is nice if you don’t control the room and have to set the projector at a less than perfect angle. However, the TLP-X150U’s menu is one of the most confusing we have seen. When you hit Menu, you get a nice nondescript list of features. However, when you arrow down to select an option, such as brightness, the entire menu redraws itself in a completely different, more cartoon-like style, even in a different part of the screen. The first couple times we did this, we thought we had navigated away from the configuration menu into a new set of screens, until we realized that the text matched. It just looked completely different. Toshiba needs to pick one style or the other and leave it at that, and it should keep the menu in the same place.
The TLP-X150U could put 720 lumens in the middle of the test screen at 10 feet, and the drop-off was only down to 700 along the edges. However, that is somewhat dim to be used in all lighting conditions. At the least, you will need to dim the lights or shut the shades to ensure good image quality.
It has good text display down to 9 points and a perfect gray field. A gray field might sound like no big deal, but that's the hardest single color for projectors to produce. Any pixel tracking or phase lock errors are apparent on a gray field, especially when using an analog connection. None were found with the TLP-X150U.
The colors were mostly accurate with the exception of green, which was slightly yellowish. And its color registration was very good, though much more accurate along the horizontal axis than the vertical.
The TLP-X150U is a good value at $899. It won’t blow you away with its performance but won’t disappoint you either.
Toshiba America Information Systems, Inc., 800-346-6672, www.explore.toshiba.com