Labs

Optoma's HD73 is easy on the eye, with a smooth white case and brushed silver sides. Hot air is expelled from a vent on the right-hand side, so it's not ideal for positioning in areas of limited ventilation, such as a bookshelf. We'd recommend keeping space around this projector, as it became hotter than the other home cinema models. It is quieter in operation than the office projectors, but slightly noisier than the other home projectors.

The HD73 uses the same-sized

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DLP as Acer's PH730, and outputs the same 1,280x768 native resolution. When connected to a PC it can match a resolution of 1,024x768 without compression, although a thin border is present when watching widescreen movies. This isn't very noticeable.

In the past, DLP projectors suffered from over-saturated colours and brownish reds, but the HD73's colours were rich and vibrant. Its seven-segment colour wheel meant there was very little rainbow effect.

The HD73 picked out detail even in the darkest parts of our HD clips. Like BenQ's W500, it excelled at handling interlaced standard-definition material too. The HD73 displayed a perfectly crisp Windows desktop over both analogue and digital connections. We had to use an adaptor to connect our PC with VGA as the HD73 has only a DVI connector. For home cinema equipment it provides S-video, composite and HDMI inputs.

Optoma has done an excellent job with the HD73. Its superb picture quality won't disappoint, but it's expensive. BenQ's W500 is just as good and is £298 cheaper.