Why You Should Upgrade Your Full HD 1080p Projector to 4K HDR

The 4K Revolution

The goal of display technology has always been to deliver image quality that’s as close to both reality and the content producer’s intention as possible. One of the primary ways of attaining this goal is resolution, and just as we moved from standard definition to high definition and then to full high definition, we’re now firmly in the era of ultra high definition, or 4K.

The native resolution of content has been upped to 4K from full HD. Regular Blu-ray discs have given way to ultra HD Blu-ray, gaming consoles are shifting quickly to 4K, and all major streaming services deliver original content with 4K as the default resolution. So by sticking with full HD you’re missing out on a lot of detail, and are no longer enjoying content as intended.

The Age of 4K

4K revolution has a lot more to it than just four times the pixel count of full HD. Color and dynamic range may be even bigger game changers. In the full HD 1080p days, projectors and TVs aimed for a color range (or gamut) known as Rec. 709. But as display technology improved, home cinemas drew ever-closer to commercial theaters and have begun using a color space known as DCI-P3 (DCI comes from Digital Cinema Initiative), which was previously reserved for big movie theater screens. With 4K projectors, this much richer color space comes to your home, offering a marked improvement in color performance, especially for reds and greens.

While the BenQ W1070 offers 100% coverage of Rec. 709, it doesn’t support DCI-P3 and therefore can’t display modern material in its native form, as most content now and going forward is formatted in 4K, DCI-P3, and with HDR. With few exceptions, even the best technology gets improved upon. That’s good, as it means progress. And if you’re serious about your viewing enjoyment, you want to have a true 4K HDR projector in your movie room.

Benefits of 4K Projectors

We didn’t just talk about moving from full HD to 4K without having a perfect solution in mind, and it’s our HT4550i projector, which will be immediately familiar to anyone who’s used the W1070. The HT4550i is a hero product for the 4K projector era and a direct successor to the popular W1070. With the HT4550i you get our true 4K DLP technology, or 8.3 million distinct pixels per frame. You also get excellent HDR and 95% coverage of the DCI-P3 color space. With those features, you’re ready to go with regards to enjoying all content, from Blu-rays to streaming to, in the latest mastering standards.

If you’re one of the many people around the world with a W1070 you should know that we’ve made the HT4550i as a slip-in replacement for the W1070. It uses the same throw distance so you don’t need to change screens and can put the newer projector in the same location as your current W1070. Mounts and attachment points are all 100% cross-generation compatible. So if you have a W1070 mounted from your ceiling in a living room, it’s a simple matter of taking it out and placing the HT4550i in its place. A HT4550i will fit anywhere a W1070 did.

If you do need to make adjustments, the HT4550i’s lens shifts vertically by up to 10% and has a 1.3X zoom for extra flexibility in choosing and tweaking an installation. The key here is that with the exact same throw distance and mounting you don’t need to go over the troublesome process of calculating the right location for your new projector again. The HT4550i replaces the W1070 hassle-free, bringing you up to speed with 4K HDR projection without expecting you to redesign your home.

Why You Should Upgrade Your Full HD 1080p Projector to 4K HDR Home Projectors

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