Over the past couple of years, we've seen quite a lot of projectors aiming to actually take the place of LCDs or plasma displays, as the center of a home entertainment system. Nevertheless, there are relatively few people who can actually afford to build a whole entertainment system around a very expensive projector, and that might also be the case with the device you're about to see as follows, namely Planar's Viper model, announced back in the second half of 2008.



According to the manufacturer, this is the company's first 3-Chip DLP high-definition projector that has been designed especially for home cinema integrated solutions. Despite being marketed as a top of the line product, the projector has some curious specs, namely just 1280 x 720 pixels native resolution, 10,000:1 contrast ratio and a brightness level of solely 2,000 lumens.



Furthermore, the device can also deliver rich, accurate colors, as well as proprietary advanced video processing with 10-bit independent dual image and motion adaptive processing. Additionally, it seems that Viper's true 1080i interlacing is touted as capable of providing increased detail enhancement, while in the same time being able to reproduce with no artifacts all native film and native video formats (1080p, 1080p-24, 1080i, 720p, 576p and 480p).



Planar's high-definition projector does deliver a high level of installation flexibility, with five lens options, power zoom and focus, and horizontal and vertical lens shift that prohibits lens shift outside the image area to eliminate shadowing or clipping the image.



Also included are an RS-232 automation interface with discrete on/off, input selection and aspect ratio control, as well as two HDMI 1.3 with Deep Color inputs. Nevertheless, the device offers a much wider range of connectivity options, including here Component video, Composite video, S-Video and 2 x 3.5-mm mini-jacks (for controlling purposes).



The Planar Viper projector has an estimated retail price of around 15,495 US dollars, which is indeed a huge price point, but one to be expected from Planar, which, after all, is not exactly known for manufacturing very affordable products.