You just described something that costs thousands of dollars to set up and thousands of dollars of added rent. Or we could just go to the movie theatre every couple weeks.
Basic 4K projectors are down to 1,000$, you can add a screen and surround sound for another 500$. Assuming you would watch any other video like Sports, Netflix, or YouTube it’s a significant upgrade for both.
As to space, you can put your collapsible screen in front of bookshelves, windows, doors etc So they take up less useful space than a large TV.
RE Space, you do need quite a lot of open area to give the projector space to fill a decent area too though (less so if you've permission to mount it on the ceiling).
I'd be surprised if a good short throw 4K projector is $1k (but if you've got recs within that range I'm very interested)
That’s an ultra short throw which is different as it’s aiming for around 2 inches from the projector to the screen. Short throw is more in the 4 foot range while producing an image several times that size. https://youtu.be/Fu_U0HS7axk
A normal projector is 11+ feet from the screen. The diagonal being approximately the same as the distance from the projector to the screen.
I have seen short throw 4K projectors from around 1,500$ but IMO they are a poor fit for home theater as the screen ends up as a bright object in people’s view.
> You just described something that costs thousands of dollars to set up and thousands of dollars of added rent
The cost of projectors and surround-sound speakers has dropped so significantly in the last decade (and you can use a Raspberry Pi as your media center) that I suspect it is within a lot of people’s means here and that this audience has splurged on other high-end electronics from time to time. I mean, I live in Eastern Europe on a local middle-class salary, and my setup was still achievable after a few months’ saving up.
Definitely, the real limitation to this setup is whether one can rent or own a standalone home. As the other person mentions, this is not an easy option for that portion of the HN readership who has moved to NY or SF. But for cinephiles elsewhere, they ought to think about such a setup and see whether they could make it happen.
Yes, I have a decent home theatre, and my partner and I enjoy watching shows and movies on it most nights we're home.
But going to a beautiful old cinema to watch a classic movie on a huge screen, is a whole different experience, and one that most movie enthusiasts relish from time to time, regardless of what setup they have at home.
No matter how affordable/practical it is to build a home theatre for many of us here, it still won't be for many people, and we can still find it sad that the ability to experience old movies in the kinds of theatres where they were originally shown is being wound back by changing corporate interests.
How much is a HD projector nowadays? A few hundreds bucks maybe? You will be spending more than that over 1-2 years going to the theater every few weeks.
Also, when going with girlfriend or children, the cinema is twice or triple as expensive.
Hmm