For home theater enthusiasts, the AWOL Vision LTV 3500 Pro represents the evolution of projection-based viewing. While moving to an ultra-short throw can be financially prohibitive for a large swath of enthusiasts, these new wave UST projectors reduce the need for gallery sized living rooms while simultaneously improving the quality of the picture being viewed.
In four short years, AWOL has made a name for itself with a handful of CES appearances and successful crowdfunded releases and its now setting its sights on the premier projection entertainment venue with its latest Triple Laser UST projector, the Vision LTV 3500.
The notion of the old pull-down projection screen displaying an off-grey and dull image while the projector fans drowned out most of the audio, is quickly becoming outdated. Screen technology had improved alongside projectors and the AWOL LTV adds its premium stamp to this evolving experience quite nicely.
Specs
| AWOL Vision LTV 3500 |
| Brightness | 3500Lumens (peak) |
| Resolution | 3840×2160 |
| Aspect Ratio | 16:9 (4K UHD) |
| Contrast | Up to 2TB PCIe SSD Gen 4 |
| Display Type | 2,200:1 (full on/off) |
| Color Processing | 0.47″ DLP x 1 |
| Video Modes | 10-bit |
| Data Modes | 720P, 1080p/60,1080p/120，2160p/60 |
| 3D Modes | Full HD 3D [Glasses Type: Shutter] |
| Lamp Type | RGB Laser |
| Included Lens | Fixed focal length, Powered focus |
| Throw Distance | 1.5′ – 2.7′ |
| Image Size | 79.86″ – 150.35″ |
| Throw Ratio | 0.25:1 (D: W) |
| Digital Keystone | Horizontal & Vertical |
| Projector Size | 5.70″ x 23.60″ x 13.90″ (HxWxD) |
| Power | 100V – 240V |
| Connection Panel | Audio Out: Optical HDMI (HDCP 2.2) HDMI 1.4a HDMI 2.0b， HDCP 1.4 Network: RJ-45 USB |
| Features | Dolby Vision， Dolby Atmos DTS Virtual X Black Level Enhanced 24FPS |
The AWOL 4K 3D Triple Laser Projector LTV-3500 Pro starts at $5,999.00USD but can be financed for $541.46 a month for some. For $5K, the AWOL Vision provides an 80 to 150-inch viewing experience that supports 3500 Lumens of brightness, RGB triple laser, Active 3D technology, Dolby Vision and Atoms, HD10+, an enhanced contrast ratio of 2500:1, DTS Virtual sound, turbo game mode with 8ms latency, and of course 4K Ultra HD resolution.
Designs
AWOL is backed by years of quality, and it shows with the densely packed 23.6 x 13.9×5.7-inch (599 x 353 x 145 mmm) package.
The AWOL Vision weighs a stout 12.3kg or 27lbs, which consists of a mixture of plastic casing and metal framing. The weight of the AWOL Vision is notable in that it should be considered when looking for a place to fit the heavy projector if it’s not to rest on the floor by design.
The vents on the AWOL Vision can be located on both sides of the device in a honeycomb cut out design while the same look is also present for the front bottom of the device.
Beyond those few design elements, the AWOL Vision stands as a discrete black box intended to fan into the background or ground once the included Fire stick is engaged.
Performance
I don’t live in an exceptionally large home, and I already invested in a 60-inch 4K TV before this AWOL Vision review unit was shipped so I asked ETP for temporary projector screen to accompany the projector to help me get the most out of this projector.
Out of the box the Vision 3500 is set to auto focus, and it only takes a few seconds for the lens to find the right resolution calibration.
The screen that sent was the Daylight ALR which is a 100-120-inch mounted projector screen. The AWOL Vision and the Daylight ALR screen are sold as a combo on its website for $5,999 USD which has been reduced from its original $7,398 USD.
Aside from the entire mounting process which could take you the same hour-long process it took me or less, the ALR screen helped boost the color contrast from the projector in daylight situations and is something I recommend when moving over from more traditional laser projectors to short throw ones.
As for the AWOL Vision 3500 in particular delivers on its website marketing material’s promise of being “The brightest and capable of daytime viewing on screens up to 150 inches.” The 3500 peak Lumens allowed for comparable viewing of content during bright indoor environments to more traditional OLED and LCD TVs.
The Vision 3500 adds its own spin on Lumens technology by measuring ANSI (standardized brightness measuring) and sits at 3200 ANSI lumens out of the box.
Powered by a Texas Instruments 0.47-inch 4K DMD chip that uses a shifting 1080p image to reproduce a comparable 4K output helps the Vision 3500 compete with LCD and OLED panels when it comes to color contrast and FPS.
There are some initial adjustments that need to be made to get a great viewing experience that includes trudging through some wonky settings UI. The Vision 3500 comes with its own viewing presets that include greyscale, 2-point adjustments, color calibrations, modes, and brightness levels.
If you’re quick enough to make on the spot decisions or you know exactly how you want your picture to be adjusted, the calibration process won’t take exceptionally long, but if you don’t, the menu timeout will extend this situation by several unnecessary minutes as each menu window closes after ten or so seconds.
Fortunately, the Vision 3500’s Movie mode works for most viewing situations and takes only a few clicks to get to. However, for anyone looking to view sports, including this year’s Super Bowl, might want to take a few minutes to adjust brightness so get the best viewing experience since most games are played during the day with brightly lit environments.
Vision 3500 supports a sort of motion smoothing it calls MEMC which is a filter applied to various Picture modes and boosts the frames-per-second output of the projector, up from typical movie standards of 24 to something closer to 54 or 60 at its highest settings. To avoid the uncanny smoothing effect of something like Gemini Man, it’s best to keep MEMC set at low for film already set to 24 fps while saving the boosting effect for sports and gaming to medium or high.
Once the basic viewing settings are in place, you can finally get into the Android 9 based OS that’s supplemented with an Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max dongle. The Fire Stick isn’t an add-on but core enough to the Vision 3500’s viewing experience that it has its own nook built into the base of the device for storing.
Once connected to the Vision 3500, the system boots right into the Fire Stick and for millions, this will be a very familiar experience. During the initial streaming stick wars, I chose to side with Google and its Chromecast platform so moving over to the Fire Stick UI took a few minutes to get acquainted with.
Logging into accounts on startup are as complicated as any other large screen TV-based format where directional buttons are used to click through annoyingly slow virtual keyboards but once past that, viewing HDR supported content from apps such as Netflix was extremely rewarding.
The Vision 3500 does an admirable job of pushing audio through its 36W speaker setup, but if you’re spending upwards of $5,000 on the image, chances are there is an investment in sound as well. The Vision 3500 can connect to a handful of audio inputs through a S/PDIF jack or HDMI eARC which supports the full extent of Dolby Atoms.
You’ll want to connect the Vision 3500 to an external audio source that supports surround sound since the fans on the projector can deaden the in-box audio by a significant amount and focus your attention of the projector despite AWOL Vision’s claims of 30bd sound heights.
The Vision 3500 also supports Control4 to connect to Smart home platforms so users can operate this projector theater as any other part of their home app routines.
3D viewing was a nice addition to the Vision 3500 and something that seems to be getting less and less marketing over the years. I’m unfamiliar with the exact tech that AWOL Vision put into its goggles but it’s amongst the best implementations I’ve experienced. The only issue is finding content that supports 3D format to view, and unfortunately, I was relegated to watching Avatar 2 over and over to review the experience.
Summary
Laser projectors have come a long way since the prop up and fold screens that projected faded, semi-blurry and jittery images. The AWOL Vision LTV 3500 is among the latest evolution of the projector entertainment experience pushing the enterprise into a future that offers parity with the latest LED, micro-LED, and OLED screens alternatives.
While the Vision LTV 3500 does cost a cool $5,000 to get that larger theater viewing experience, people who have the room and enthusiasm for home entertainment won’t be let down. Ironically, there are only a few other alternatives that offer this level of image quality and feature sets and one of them happens to be a partner OEM of the AWOL Vision.
There are a few caveats to the Vision LTV 3500 viewing experience that include fan noise, the necessity for an ambient light rejection screen, familiarity with Amazon’s Fire Stick UI and content library, navigating the base UI image settings, and the cost of the entire package.
I’ve outlined the cons of each of the caveats to the Vision LTV 3500’s viewability but at the end of the day it’s been the best projector experience I’ve encountered to date. For projector hobbyist the Vision LTV 3500 may come with a prohibitive price tag, but for someone who plans to be a full projector convert by using it during the day with opened windows as well as at night or in darken rooms, this may just be the price of early adoption of daylight viewing projector tech.
