After a long time of deliberation and checking many reviews/videos, I decided to purchase this screen after seeing just how many sources around the internet claim that a CLR screen really helps out your picture quality on a UST projector. I came from a short throw projector (BenQ W1080ST) that was being projected onto a 106" white Silver Ticket fixed frame. This screen served me well for 5 years and worked well with the Formovie Theater which I also purchased from this site (another product that I feel has been a bit overhyped for marketing purposes). Deciding I would like to combat ambient light in my living room for when I would like to not have my room completely dark, I looked into many ALR/CLR screens, and this screen was the dream, but took a long time for me to honestly consider because the price felt ridiculous to me. I eventually settled on this screen when I noticed it had the nicest construction quality (velvet frame, mounting hardware, etc.) that most others lacked, and was widely regarded as the best.
So down to my thoughts on the screen:
Pro's:
- The frame is beautifully constructed with thin, velvet covered bezels that result in a screen that mimics the look of a TV.
- Mounting hardware is heavy duty and allows the screen to be lowered/heightened to achieve a level surface, or to make up for a height difference from the throw of your projector.
- Screen material offers a higher contrast and deeper blacks in a light-controlled environment, as well as offering some help against typical room lighting, such as floor lamps.
Con's:
- Price $$$$. I do not believe the screen material/nor ability to reject ambient light is anywhere near the premium being asked on this screen over similar screens. It is not a night and day difference between this and a white screen when it comes to purely ambient light. I cannot speak on the ability for ceiling light rejection though.
- Light rejection. Again, I can only speak on ambient light from windows/floor lamps, but I was not completely wow'ed. It doesn't reject to an extent that makes me feel this was thousands of dollars better than my old white screen. Projectors just can't overcome ambient beyond a certain point.
Overview:
Assembly: The assembly was very straight-forward. The box is nicely packaged with everything labeled for the frames. The screen comes with a nice full-color instruction book that details everything out step-by-step, or you can follow the assembly video on YouTube. All in all, tensioning the screen takes the longest if you want to do it correctly, and if you're doing it by yourself. Outer frame snaps on to the inner frame and before you know it, you have a fully assembled screen. Mounting the screen on the wall is fairly straight-forward as well. It is detailed in the instruction booklet on how to do so. Make sure you level out your projector completely beforehand, and without any kind of keystone to ensure the best results. Mounting hardware is installed either into studs, or with drywall anchors. You will be hard pressed to fit all of the screws into a stud since the mounting holes are spaced farther than your typical stud, which is kind of a bummer.
Surface Material: I honestly do not feel that this screen makes a huge difference in comparison to a standard white screen when there is enough ambient light. It mostly appears slightly darker thanks to the gray surface adding contrast to the image, but if you're looking for a screen that is going to help with ambient light coming from windows (mind you, I have two standard size windows with blinds up that are mostly closed in this room), this screen really isn't going to help to an exponential amount which is the reality since we're working with projectors here. As far as rejecting ceiling light, I don't use ceiling lights, so that feature of the screen is a bit lost on me which I expect is more relevant to most others buying this screen, but you will struggle to find people telling you how well these screens work against just straight up ambient light in the room. Floor lamps/table lamps affect this screen a bit less than they did with my white screen, but outside daylight really still requires light control for anything that isn't a bright, colorful image.
The screen looks great with light control at nighttime, with a bit more contrast than your standard white screen, but is it worth the thousands more? Debatable.
Another reason you might buy this screen over a white screen is to combat light reflecting off the screen and onto your ceiling. Does this help with that? Yes, to an extent. There is still minimal light bleed/spillage. However, something that I wasn't expecting was how much light bleed there would be off to the sides of the screen, which wasn't an issue with my white screen, due to its thicker velvet bezels catching light. The thin bezels which was a reason for me wanting a different screen, is actually a bit of a detriment to the screen, because they're too thin to catch light spillage EVEN WHEN your image is filled to the screen properly without keystoning, which was a surprise to me. I don't know if this an issue with the screen or the Formovie Theater, but I do not have another UST projector to test this with.
The screen surface itself has the sawtooth pattern as you know and is much more delicate than your standard screen material. Looking at the screen from extreme up-close angles shows what appears to be dirt on it, but this is unnoticeable when viewing at regular angles with or without an image projected. My screen seems to have a slight indentation in the very bottom right corner. I want to believe it is down to a tensioning issue but I have tried putting the stronger silver springs on the corner, as well as completely re-tensioning the whole screen, but the issue still prevails. Lastly, coming from a white screen, I was interested to see how the lower gain of this screen would affect the brightness of my image, but I can say that the image is still just as bright, thanks to the light being properly reflected back at the viewer.
Frame Quality: This is the reason I bought this screen over cheaper ALR/CLR screens. The outer frame has a nice velvet bezel that is fit over the inner frame that the screen is tensioned to. The frame looks great, and lends your screen the quality of looking like a giant TV, as opposed to your standard thick bezel fixed frame screen. The frame has supports that run down the middle which are also a nice feature that adds to its rigidity/sturdiness.
While I'm sure it is not an issue with many of the screens, either the inner frame, or outside frame of my screen is warped and bows outward towards the viewer. It is minimal, but as anyone with one of these projectors know, the slightest deviations in distance can make a difference. This difference allows the corners of my image to fit perfectly to the screen, while the center of the image dips down a bit (around a quarter of an inch or so). This lends a smile like curve to the top of my image which I've only been able to combat by overshooting the image to the screen, and keystoning the corners to maintain a straight image across the top. This overshooting also necessitated having to take the mounting hardware out of the wall and remount it higher since the bigger image required a further projector distance, which resulted in the bottom of the image being projected higher (gotta love these UST projectors). I have tried taking my screen off the wall and bending the frame with the utmost caution/care to not ruin or scratch the screen material, which only helped minimally, and isn't something you should have to do at this price point.
The mounting hardware is high quality and allows you to adjust the screen down or upwards to help level out your image if you didn't do the hottest leveling job while installing. The inner frame rests on this J-hook hardware and just feels all-around solid.
Final thoughts: This is a beautifully constructed screen that helps give you a higher contrast image with darker blacks than your standard white screen. I don't believe it is worth anywhere near the price tag it's being sold for. If you must have a screen to combat ceiling light, this will help you, but honestly, projectors really can't fight too well against ambient light, so I don't think these special ALR/CLR material screens (from any brand), are really worth it. I love projectors and the image size that comes with them, so I will deal with the cons, but not for a moment will you sit watching your projector during daytime and think "this is just as good as a TV!" when it comes to the clarity. Instead of your TV's daytime glare, you get a washed-out image that is fine AS LONG AS you're watching bright, colorful video without too many darks. I think there is a bit too much marketing hype around both these screens and UST projectors right now. I did alot of research before purchasing this screen, but you're really scouring to find information on these screens still, and you really can't be too certain if they're just being talked up for sales. Alot of the information you find is going to be from people directly involved with this site, actively steering you towards products they sell. This is not necessarily a bad thing because they're very knowledgeable on these subjects, but you can't help but feel some bias. I've seen talk about certain screens abilities to "resolve a pixel", but if this is truly an issue (and something you can easily notice), it is lost on me, because my basic white screen produced an image of the same clarity as this one. I think this screen is much more expensive than it has any right to be, but as an enthusiast and perfectionist with these things, I bit the bullet on it. I do not think that I would purchase the screen again had I been able to redo it over, but you can't really know with these things until you see it for yourself. My review might be overly harsh, but for the price you're paying on one of these screens, you expect to be wow'ed, which I was not. The issues I've had, along with the price, factor strongly into my review. It seems alot of reviewers do not come from a background with projectors, so they do not have a baseline comparison for this screen vs a much cheaper, typical white screen. Overall, this screen is NOT $2000 worth better than the screen I came from, but I will say it is certainly a nice-looking one that will not be an eyesore in my living room.