CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

**Curt Palme** · Posted: Mon Jun 01, 2009 2:12 pm Post subject: Question re HFQ 900 lenses

Guys, I sold a Runco DTV 1200 projector to a customer. It came stock from Runco with the standard HFQ900 lenses, but one lens was missing the ID sticker. Frankly, I didn't catch that, but now the customer is screaming bloody murder as one lens is missing the ID sticker. I didn't take the sticker off, that's the way the set came to me.

Now, for those of you that have seen an HFQ900 lens, they have a very distinct lens barrel. They aren't shiny like the old HD/GT lenses, nor do they look like the G90 HD10F lenses. These have a dull finish to them, in fact the barrel could even be plastic.

Now, in all of the sets I've had through here, I've never seen any lens other than the HFQ900 have this distinct finish, and all three lenses did have the identical finish on them, that I would have caught had someone swapped out a lens. I know Runco did remove some lens labels from their sets in the past, I've seen a number of Runco DTV 1100 and 1101s have the labels missing.

I've offered to swap out the lens if the customer returns it, as I do have one DTV 1200 test chassis here, but as I told him, I can't see the lens being anything but an HFQ 900 lens, as no other lens has the same barrel finish as the 900 does.

Comments?

r.bauer · Joined: 08 Apr 2006 Posts: 280 Location: The Netherlands

Curt you are right all the way. The HFQ-900 lens has the front lens element fitted in a plastic housing. Nothing wrong with that, just cost and weight saving. The HFQ-900 is the only lens that uses the plastic cover.

**Curt Palme** · Posted: Mon Jun 01, 2009 2:55 pm Post subject:

OK, thanks, I'll pass that on. I didn't think there was any other lens out there like that.

Cheers!
Curt

secstate · Joined: 20 Mar 2006 Posts: 720

To add to your experience both of my Runco 1100s had the labels removed from all 3 lenses. So Runco seems to have done that as a matter of course.

jkruger · Joined: 24 Oct 2007 Posts: 2435 Location: Carlsbad, CA

My DTV-1100 has no stickers on the lenses but they are the HD10-GT17's, all shiny black anodized aluminum. I have only seen pictures of the HFQ-900's.

zGman · Joined: 22 May 2006 Posts: 599

The brochure for the Cine9 lists HD-120 lenses as standard.
Also the 1209S. The Runco 1101 and 1200 I have had both
came with the HD-120 lenses. HD-120 is a Barco part #,
stickers found by several people under the HD-120 label
have a Delta HD-10GT sticker from US precision lens.
Runco models don't normally come with stickers on the lenses.

The HD120 lenses I have tested have better corner focus than
equivalent year model HD10GT17's, but they have a limited
range of screen sizes -- seem to do very well at 96" wide.

HFQ900 is also a Barco designation, also on the label is Delta HD-10E and
they have the "plastic" outer barrels (actually glass reinforced plastic - GRP)

I seriously doubt this was easier to manufacture than the aluminum version,
considering the tooling costs for low production injection molding. I have
wondered if they used the GRP material for temperture stability requirements,
since these lenses were intended for very high resolution visualization and
simulator environments.

These have a large range of usable screen sizes and powerful corner focus
correction - Ideal for blending and stacking applications.

G

Citation4444 · Joined: 17 Sep 2008 Posts: 59 Location: North GA Mountains

I think this is a very confusing topic as I don't think Barco (or Runco) has been consistent over the years as to what they fitted to the Cine9.

I have 2 Runco DTV-1200's, one built in 2001 and the other in 2004, and they have different lenses, so Barco didn't always fit the same lens to the DTV-1200's.

The first picture is of the 2004 DTV-1200 lens:

The 2nd picture is of the 2001 DTV-1200 lens:

Subjectively, I believe the 2004 lens is somewhat sharper and holds corner focus slightly better. I don't know what the lenses are. I was told the 2001 lenses are HD120's. That being so, what are the 2004 lenses? HDQ900's? I don't know.

I even read somewhere that the HD120's were identical to HDQ900's. I don't believe that is true, but it shows just how confusing this topic is.

Bob

zGman · Joined: 22 May 2006 Posts: 599

Hi Bob,

Nice pics = looks like your 2004 has the HFQ900 with the GRP outer barrels.

When we demo'd the dtv-1200 here with both sets of lenses, it seemed to both of us that
the HD120's had slightly better "intra-scene" contrast. It would be interesting
to see the side-by-side comparison with perfectly matched PJ's....

How's that stack coming along???

G

cmjohnson · Joined: 03 Apr 2006 Posts: 5180 Location: Buried under G90s

I got a set of those new in the boxes from a government auction some years ago. I tried them out in place of the HD10GT17s that were on my 9500LC and honestly didn't see any difference. So I swapped them back and happily sold them for a reasonable profit.

It turns out I should have waited. People are willing to fork over a lot more for them these days.

Frankly I'm still not quite sure why. GT17s are more than adequate for 1080p and I just didn't see any difference in my setup.

But, yes, my HFQ900s had plastic front barrels. No other HD10 series lens has that. Your customer needs to get a grip. If he's got plastic
barrels on the fronts, he's got HFQ900s and nothing else. No worries about one lens not matching the others.

CJ

mp20748 · Posted: Tue Jun 02, 2009 1:44 am Post subject: Re: Question re HFQ 900 lenses

Gino · Posted: Tue Jun 02, 2009 2:35 am Post subject:

r.bauer · Joined: 08 Apr 2006 Posts: 280 Location: The Netherlands

Corner focus is like a dream with the HFQ-900, especiallly on 3m wide screens. The astig dots on a 1080p testpattern are almost just as sharp in the corners as the center. This I have not seen with any other lens or projector.