Pros & Cons
-
- Bright, with a 4,000-lumen rating, and reasonably portable.
- 1.5x zoom lens.
- Scores well for data image quality.
-
- Rainbow artifacts limit usefulness for video.
- Sound suitable for only a small room or a little larger.
BenQ MX766 Specs
| Engine Type | DLP |
| Inputs and Interfaces | Analog VGA |
| Inputs and Interfaces | HDMI |
| Native Resolution | 1024 by 768 |
| Rated Brightness | 4000 |
| Warranty | 36 |
| Weight | 8.6 |
With its 4,000-lumen rating, the DLP-based BenQ MX766 ($2,199 list) is obviously designed to throw an image that's big enough for a mid- to large-size conference room or classroom and bright enough to stand up to ambient light. It also delivers reasonably high quality for data images. The combination is enough to make it a reasonable candidate if you need an XGA (1,024 by 768) projector.
A head-to-head competitor with the Editors' Choice Epson PowerLite 1880 MultiMedia Projector, which shares the same brightness rating and resolution, the MX766 is a little heavier but still in the same weight class, at 8 pounds 10 ounces.
The rule of thumb for projectors in this 7 to 9 pound range is that they're most likely to wind up either permanently installed or mounted on a cart for room-to-room portability. However they're also light enough to carry with you. With that in mind, BenQ even ships the MX766 with a soft carrying case. If you need an unusually bright portable projector, or need to store the projector when you're not using it, that counts as a small but welcome extra that Epson doesn't provide for the 1880.
Connections, Setup, and Brightness
Setting up the MX766 is standard fare, with a manual focus and manual 1.5x zoom. The back panel offers a reasonably full set of image inputs, including the usual HDMI, VGA, and composite video ports. Other choices include S-Video, a USB mini B for USB display, two USB A ports—one for reading files directly from a USB key and one for adding an optional Wi-Fi dongle ($49 list), and a LAN port both for sending images and audio over a network and for controlling the projector.As a point of reference, following SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers) recommendations, 4,000 lumens would be appropriate for roughly a 270-inch diagonal image at the projector's native aspect ratio, assuming a 1.0 gain screen and theater-dark lighting. In my tests, the 98-inch diagonal (78-inch wide) image I used was easily bright enough to stand up to the ambient light in a typical conference room or classroom.
Data and Video Image Quality
The MX766 scored reasonably well for data quality. On our standard suite of DisplayMate tests, color balance was excellent in all preset modes, with suitably neutral grays at all levels from black to white. Colors were nicely saturated in all modes as well, although red and blue were a little dark in the brightest mode and yellow was a little mustard-colored in some modes.More important for most data images is that the projector handled detail well. With text, for example, both black on white and white on black characters were crisp and fully readable at sizes as small as 6.8 points. With an analog (Read: VGA) connection, I saw some minor to moderate dynamic moiré on screens that are designed to bring out that issue. However, unless you use patterned fills in your images, you'll probably never see this problem. If you do see it, and it bothers you, note that it disappeared entirely when I switched to a digital (meaning HDMI) connection.
The XGA resolution necessarily puts some limits on video quality, particularly for showing widescreen video, which has to scale the image to fit in the pixels available on the chip. Within the limits of the resolution, however, the projector does well in most ways, although I saw some mild to moderate loss of shadow detail (details based on shading in dark areas) and some minimal noise on screen.
The real problem for video is rainbow artifacts, with light areas breaking up into red-green-blue flashes of light. These are always a potential problem for any single-chip DLP projector. With the MX766, as with most DLP models, the artifacts show rarely enough with data screens that it's unlikely that anyone will find them objectionable. With video they show far more often.
The good news is that the artifacts show less often than with most DLP projectors. So even though people who see the artifacts easily would likely find them annoying for long sessions, it's unlikely that they'll be an issue for clips of up to a few minutes. That doesn't put the MX766 in the same class for video as the LCD-based PowerLite 1880, which can't show rainbow artifacts at all. However, it's more than you can safely assume for most DLP data projectors, and it counts as minor plus.
The sound system also counts as more of a plus than a minus, despite some shortcomings. The volume isn't as high as you might expect from the 20-watt speaker, but it's enough to fill a small- to not-quite-mid-size room, and the quality is good. In one test clip, I could make out every word of softly spoken dialog that gets lost with most projectors. If you need more volume, better quality, or stereo, you can plug an external sound system into the projector's audio output.
If you need a bright projector for portable use, keep in mind that 4000 lumens may be overkill. You might be better off with, say, the 3000-lumen NEC Display Solutions NP-V300X ($779 direct, 3.5 stars). Similarly, if you need to show a lot of video, you'll probably want an LCD-projector like the Epson PowerLite 1880. That said, if you need an XGA projector, and you don't need to show long video clips, the MX766 is a perfectly reasonable choice.
Best Projector Picks
- The Best Portable Projectors for 2020
- The Best Projectors of 2020
- The Best Home Projectors for 2020
- More Projector Reviews
- More from BenQ