Optoma Technology HD143X 1080P Home Theater Projector

I've had mixed emotions about this projector. When it arrived the Amazon box looked fine but the projector box itself was pretty damaged. There was enough padding inside the box that I don't think it made any difference. When I connected the projector it displayed a much smaller image than I was expecting based on the throw ratio listed. While using the zoom feature I noted that it was good at shrinking the image however it wouldn't enlarge the size of the projection but rather just zoom in on one part of the image. The projector does not create an image that is centered at the height of the projector. The bottom of the projection is at the same height as the projector. This resulted in half the image on the wall and half on the ceiling. In order to get the correct image and size I had to completely rearrange my basement and ceiling mount the projector. Once I got through all that things got better. Originally it was convinient to have the projector off center, however there is no horizontal keystone correction. So I had to rearrange the basement again. The projector does have a useful zoom provided you are trying to shrink the image. It also has a vertical and horizontal image shift which was very useful. The up and downside to that is each source has its own setting so you end up setting it up once for the blu ray player and once for the roku, and once for the Xbox. The good is it will have different settings for each input. The other downside is anytime you change the input or change from the previews on a blu ray to the main menu you have to wait while the projector detects what the source is and reloads the settings. Very annoying and unnecessary. It does have built in test patterns for screen calibration, which us nice. The remote lights up well. The strange thing is the on and off buttons are not the same button. I also can't seem to find a remote code for the projector so I cant use a universal remote. Additionally the remote has keys which don't do anything. My unit also seems very picky about the remote angle relative to the unit. The image itself is nice and sharp. At night it looks great but it suffers a lot in a room with light. This is a problem with all projectors I know. I expected it to be a bit brighter. The brightness difference between vivid and eco mode isnt very noticable, however the difference in fan noise is very noticeable. Speaking of noise, when the projector starts up it emits a high pitch squeek for several minutes. Not real loud, but annoying until your show starts playing sound. The biggest issue was that after about 1 month of use the projector lamp died. Called optoma and they said to try Amazon first and if that didnt work they would step in. Hooray to Amazon. Even though I was a few days outside the 30 day return window they processed a very fast replacement. Not sure if this was related to the damaged box or not. I love the big screen but it has come with waaaayyyy more baggage than I was expecting. Fortunately I was able to rearrange my basement othwmerwise I would have been really unhappy. If I had to do it all over again I don't know if I would do it again honestly. Maybe my opinion will change after years or reliable use.