By taking on the concept of the analog carousel slide projector which shines a light through a small transparent lens to project slide photographs, digital projectors like the Epson EB-W05 can project the image between 33 inches and 320 inches from a laptop computer onto any surface and in widescreen high-definition.
The Epson EB-W05 projector has a larger widescreen resolution than WXGA (Wide XGA) TV displays supporting 1280 pixels horizontally and 800 pixels vertically (16:10 aspect ratio), as well as a vertical refresh rate up to 120 Hz, which is a really high refresh rate.
Anything above 120Hz is a really fast refresh rate; hence the Epson EB-W05 projector can process fast, smooth video making this projector perfect for movies and even gaming because high refresh rates also produce a 3D image that is 'easier on the eyes.'
At 3,300 lumens, the Epson EB-W05 projector can shine a bright image that can be seen with some ambient light in the room which means you don't have to have a pitch black room in order to clearly see the image projected from the Epson EB-W05 projector.
You can effectively use the EB-W05 projector for viewing purposes with lights dimmed down and some daylight leaking through the windows. However, if you need the room lights turned on and/or windows uncovered for note-taking during a presentation, you will need at least 4000 lumens; hence a brighter projector. The brightness of the Epson EB-W05 projector light can be dimmed down all the way down to 2,050 lumens by going to the brightness settings of the projector.
You can also manually adjust the contrast, color saturation, tint, sharpness, color temperature and image enhancement.
Luckily, the Epson EB-W05 projector has a feature, called Color Mode, with 5 presets ( Dynamic, Cinema, Presentation, sRGB, Blackboard) to choose from which automatically adjust the brightness, contrast and color. The preset you select depends on the type of surface you project on (i.e. green chalkboard, whiteboard, etc).
Projectors also use similar imaging technology as flat screen TVs which can use DLP, LCD or LED. The Epson EB-W05 projector uses 3LCD which instead of using a flat LCD panel and one LCD chip, it uses three LCD chips (one for red, green, and blue colors) and a 0.59 inch D9 LCD panel to create the image. D9 LCD panels have increased pixel fill and less screen door effect (SDE).
DLP (Digital Light Processing) projectors, in the other hand, use tiny microscopic mirrors and a spinning colour wheel to create an image.
Both 3LCD and DLP projectors use lamps, unlike LED projectors which don't use lamp bulbs and have a lifespan of 20,000 hours.
Most lamp projectors eventually burn out at around 3000 hours, but the Epson EB-W05 projector lamp can last much longer thanks to its ultra-high-performance 210-watt lamp bulb which is rated for 6,000 hours of usage in the brightest mode (3300 lumen) and 10,000 hours usage in lowest bright mode (2,050 lumen). When the bulb eventually burns out you can replace it with an Epson projector lamp replacement of third party alternative.
No lamp bulbs means LED projectors run at cooler operating temperatures and are cheaper to run but if you plan to use the Epson EB-W05 projector mostly as a home theater movie screen you will be very much satisfied with the 3LCD Epson EB-W05 projector.
The Epson EB-W05 projector delivers more vivid colors (up to 1.07 billion colors) and better color saturation (contrast) and lower noise levels than an LED projector; hence better image quality than an LED projector, making the Epson EB-W05 projector ideal for watching movies. Unlike other projectors, the EB-W05 projector have built-in 10-bit color graphics capability, just like a 4K UHD Blu-ray player.
The contrast ratio of the Epson EB-W05 projector is 15,000:1 which means the white image is 15,000 times brighter than the black image. The higher the contrast ratio the better the detail of the projected image and the Epson EB-W05 projector is a testament to that, offering even better contrast ratio than you could ever get from a computer display with dynamic contrast ratio (DCR).
Power consumption when running 3300 lumens is 282 watts and slightly less power consumption (203-watt) when running the lowest brightness setting. Energy usage is clearly not as good as an LED projector (approx 190-watt), but the Epson EB-W05 projector still uses less power than a DLP projector of the same brightness rating.
Setting up the Epson EB-W05 projector is as simple as plug and play, literary! Simply plug the power cord cable and VGA or HDMI video cable into the back of the projector and connect the other end of the video cable to your laptop.
After powering on the unit and opening the lens cover, the only bit of tweaking is centering the image horizontally and vertically and adjusting the image focus, which you can do very easily via a dedicated keystone control slider on the projector (no lens shift though). With keystoning you can get the projected image to look like an even rectangle on all sides.
The keystoning correction tool on the Epson EB-W05 is performed manually for the horizontal adjustment up to 30-degrees and vertically up to 30-degrees which is performed automatically via a built-in inclination sensor in the projector which determines the angle of the axis of projection with respect to a zero reference in the vertical dimension.
Keystoning works a bit like interpolated megapixels in cameras where an image is upscaled digitally at the cost of decreased image resolution. Projectors with lens shift are able to physically move the lens up and down or back and forth so there is no loss of image resolution and no distortion around the edges like with keystoning, and you don't have to physically move the projector.
Keystoning is useful but lowers image brightness too so, getting a projector with a decent offset is always a good idea to avoid keystoning. Projector offset refers to the vertical (height) of the projector light, which is important specially if you plan to ceiling-mount the projector. The offset of the Epson EB-W05 is 10:1 so there is very little height.
In the image above, the Epson EB-W05 projector is resting on a 76cm tall chair so the height of the bottom of the image projected is also 76cm.
If you plan to place the projector at the back of the room where people are sitting in front of it, you will need to place the projector on a high bookshelf (around 130cm high). If you were to mount the Epson EB-W05 projector on the ceiling, you may need to lower the projector down.
There is no native Wifi capability built-in to the Epson EB-W05 but if you don't want to have cables plugged into the source device you can purchase a wireless LAN adapter which plugs directly into the USB port of the Epson EB-W05.
Throw distance is another important metric to take into consideration when buying a projector. The projection ratio of the Epson EB-W05 is 1.30-1.56:1, which means the distance the projector can be from the screen is between 1.30 ft and 1.56 ft. The number after the colon "1"represents 1 foot of screen width, so for every 1 foot of screen width, you want to move the projector between 1.30ft and 1.56 ft from the screen.
With that said, the Epson EB-W05 projection distance is limited to a 60-inch screen at a maximum distance between 5.5ft using telezoom (makes image smaller) and 6.6ft using widezoom (makes the image bigger). The closer the projector is to the screen, light will reflect at a wider angle.
The Epson EB-W05 uses a 16.9-20.28mm zoom lens focal length (that is adjusted manually) with a lens aperture (F-Number) from f1.49 to f1.72 and a maximum zoom ratio of 1.2, which means that the image can be resized by 20%.
 On the back of the unit, you get a USB 2.0 Type A port, a USB 2.0 Type B, VGA in, HDMI in, Composite in and Cinch audio in. The EB-W05 projector does not have an audio out port or headphone jack, which is one of the drawbacks. You will need to use the RCA ports or use a HDMI audio extractor. If you want to connect to an Amazon Fire TV stick, you can but, there is no USB port to power the stick; hence you will need to use a wall charger. The projector has a HDMI in port so, you plug the stick in that port. There is no audio out though, so you will have to connect the stick to a compatible Bluetooth speaker.
A few other things the Epson EB-W05 WXGA projector has going for it is low noise even at full brightness (37dB) with the lower brightness setting being even more quieter (28dB).
The 2-Watt built-in speaker is back facing and sounds pretty good. You also get 24 months carry-in warranty with 12 months (or 1,000 hours) lamp warranty. Buy it on Amazon

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