Comment text appears below:
Well, I certainly agree with Kevin although I would be surprised indeed if it cost the manufacturers anywhere near $1000. to manufacture one of these projectors. In fact, that's probably where the price should have migrated to by now. Countless insider commercial articles--one appeared recently in The Atlantic-- point out that the cost of manufacturing (generally in the orient) usually represents the smallest fraction of the sales price. As another poster pointed out a few letters ago, these are not 'state of the art' projectors but, supposedly, 'value priced home theatre'; on the other hand, this is certainly a mature technology so why shouldn't the price of base 1080p models have dropped faster? I think we are being subjected to some industry moles here--whoever heard of a potential customer arguing for high prices? It's farcical. The artificially hi price point is partly maintained so as not to jeopardize the bread and butter phenomenon of people 'trading up' their TVs for larger and larger screens every couple of years or so. Most people haven't even heard about projectors--the large electronics stores hide them away. The projector is still being targeted almost exclusively at business people and videophiliacs.