The
Hitachi CP-X251 is a compact, entry level business class LCD video
projector with a lot
of useful features. Hitachi has made a very good projector,
demonstrating how competitive the under $1000 market can be.
Upon opening the box, you’ll notice that the
projector comes nicely packaged in it’s own soft case carry bag. Set
up was a breeze, courtesy of the easily adjustable dual post front
legs and an auto keystone function. Connectivity is very good for it’s
class, featuring multiple VGA ports. The lens is actually quite short,
so we were able to hit a 100” image from about nine feet.
Out of the box, image quality was nothing to get
excited about. The colors looked fine, but blacks were very grey. A
little tweaking of the Gamma levels went a long way. The CP-X251 has a
very powerful Gamma adjustment feature, allowing for the standard
presets (although they aren’t numbered, which is annoying), as well as
a function that allowed you to set your own Gamma value. We used this
feature, available using the Advanced Menu, to set all parameters at
–16. A pleasant surprise were the built in charts that appeared when
custom setting the Gamma level. This settled the projector in at an
acceptable black level, and provided for good over-all picture
quality.
It is a noisy little beast, although the low lamp
mode helped that. There’s no mistaking this for a HT projector, but
with the good analog jack pack, it makes for a very versatile
projector. There were no digital video inputs. Surprising was a useful
Freeze and Magnify function that worked easily off the remote control.
Hitachi has a problem doing a good remote, and
this one was no exception. It’s small, dark colored, and easily lost
in a dark room. The controls were well laid out, but on a smaller
remote without an illuminated keypad, pressing the right buttons can
be a real challenge.
We established the following settings
Brightness –1
Contrast 0
Gamma – Custom (-16 to all)
Summary: Excellent choice for business due
to light weight and high brightness. Not recommended for home theater
use.
