The rapid shift to affordable Full HD projectors, typified by a battalion (other collective nouns which might be appropriate include horde, mob, cineplex... sugestions on a postcard) of affordable LCD models, has clearly put pressure on the traditional mid-range PJ market, which is the accepted stomping ground for upscaling DLP models.

After all, why pay more when you can get so much for less? DLP-inventor Texas Instruments, however, clearly believes that its technology still offers plenty of advantages over the competition, which justifies a modest price premium. And in the shape of the InFocus IN82, typically priced around £3,000, its argument does indeed appear to be compelling.

Little black number

Despite being markedly bigger than the HD Ready InFocus IN78 that impressed so much before, this slick new PJ is still a looker. It employs a dramatic gloss black, prettily-curved chassis, that will definitely turn heads. Inventively, the main body of the projector sits on a ball-jointed foot, which allows you to manually rotate and tilt it to your heart's content. This makes it perhaps a tad easier to install in potentially awkward-shaped viewing rooms than 'normal' projectors.

The only slight niggle about this innovative design is that it's rather difficult to make small and precise movements with the ball joint. But this seems a relatively small price to pay for the flexibility it offers.

The IN82's connections include two 1080p/24-capable digital video inputs (one HDMI, one M1-DA multipurpose job) both specified to the v1.3 standard, permitting compatibility with DeepColor sources such as PS3 games and AVCHD home-made HD movies.

Also noteworthy on the connections panel are 12V triggers for driving a motorised screen and triggering aspect ratio adjustments, and an RS232 port, making the InFocus custom-install friendly.

The darkness

The chipset at the IN82's heart is a 1920 x 1080 DarkChip3, which combines with the projector's optical system to deliver a phenomenal claimed maximum brightness of 1,500 ANSI Lumens, and an even more remarkable potential contrast ratio of 12,000:1.

As you might expect, though, there's more to this 12,000:1 contrast figure than meets the eye, only made possible via a variable iris control.

You can manually adjust the amount of light emitted through the lens in 12 selectable steps. The idea is that, in a suitably darkened room, you can sacrifice some of the lamp's brightness in return for deeper, more natural black levels. This is a useful tool that other projector makers would do well to support.

Another key element in the IN82's picture make-up is its PixelWorks' 10bit DNX video processing engine - the same silicon that worked so well on the IN78, and which will hopefully adapt itself equally efficiently to the demands of Full HD resolution.

Other features well worth a mention include colour gamut adjustment; the facility to have the projector professionally calibrated by an Imaging Science Foundation (ISF) engineer; flesh tone calibration, black level calibration, and the software element of TI's BrilliantColor system for richer, more natural colours.

InFocus also claims that the IN82 sports D65 (video-optimised) colour calibration out-of-the-box. However, our Tech Labs actually measured it at 6,158K, not 6,500K - although it was quickly tweaked to an almost spot-on 6631K. So, there's no shortage of picture enhancing technology onboard. But how does the PJ shape up in actual operation?