What Hi Fi Sound and Vision 14 MAY 2008

InFocus IN83

£ 3500 5

* * * * *

InFocus had to raise the bar, and it has – superbly

For
Sleek styling; simple to set up and use; superb, colourful image; great detail, three-dimensionality and realism
Against
Perhaps just out of reach, pricewise, for some

Infocus’s assault on the projector market has been unforgiving – the company seized two of our four projector Awards in 2007. But it isn’t resting on its laurels: it's trimmed the price of the IN82, and released the IN83.

The smooth curves remain instantly recognisable, as do the tidy little remote control and intuitive menus. But there are a few tweaks internally: chief among these is that the IN83 houses the latest 1080p DLP chipset from Texas Instruments, the DarkChip4. Elsewhere on the spec panel, there’s increased brightness, with a maximum ANSI lumen output of 1600, against 1500 in the IN82.

Deep Blacks, impressive insight
The end result is simply stunning. Watching Ratatouille on Blu-ray, sending the 1080p/24fps signal directly, the level of detail and three-dimensionality is staggering – you can pick out individual strands of hair. With Cars this subtlety again helps to deliver brilliantly involving images that instantly impress.

Switch to real-life action and it’s just as pleasing. Letters from Iwo Jima shows fine contrast levels with truly deep, dark blacks underpinning bold but natural brighter shades, while the level of insight still impresses. Motion is smooth too, making this InFocus a desirable piece of projection tech that fully justifies the outlay.