rs55611 (11/24/82)
I'd like to thank everyone (about 20 responses) for their help. As many of the responders wanted to see the results, I'm posting this relatively brief summary. The major discussion concerned Kodak vrs. Bell and Howell Slide Cube system. Kodak Carrousel: In general, the class act in projectors, with high optical quality, best reliability, and the advantage of being the most popular format. Some key points were that Kodak uses a curved-field projection lens that accounts for the curvature of slides in cardboard mounts, and that Kodak has a stack loader option that would allow compact slide storage on a par with the Bell and Howell unit, if that was a concern. Bell and Howell: In theory this system is very nice, with very compact slide storage in 40 slide cubes. Although several people who responded were very happy with their B & H units, problems with slides jamming were reported. Also a flat-field lens is used. Others: The only system mentioned favorably other than the two above was a Leitz projector. This looks very nice but is expensive, as are all Leitz products. Finally, I was referred to the latest issue of Consumer Reports, which rates Slide projectors (what timing!). They tested Kodak, B & H, Sears(Hanimex), and one other I can't recall. Kodak won in all categories, for the same reasons as mentioned above. They also said that the B & H internal mechanism is prone to jamming because the slides travel through a complicated 4 part path through the projector. This scheme also sometimes results in wearing out or fraying of the mounts on frequently shown slides. They recommended Kodak hands down, but did say that you should carefully determine which Kodak features are important to you, and get the cheapest model that meets your needs. All the projectors by Kodak are optically identical. They also recommended getting the fixed-focal length lens rather than a zoom, as it is brighter and sharper, unless you will have no control over screen to projector distance. Furthermore, you can get two focal lenths of fixed lenses for less than the zoom. In short, I'm sold on Kodak, and am now ready to start looking seriously. Bob Schleicher Bell Labs IX-1A269 ihuxk!rs55611
smith@umn-cs.UUCP (06/06/83)
#R:ihuxk:-21600:umn-cs:9000003:000:380 umn-cs!smith Dec 1 14:35:00 1982 I've got a Sawyer's projector (also sold by Sears and various other vendors). It's an OK machine mechanically, supports round and straight slide trays, and you can get accessories everywhere. It also has a dreadful stack loader (it jams on about 1 slide in 75). But I've had it for about 10 years, and I haven't had much trouble with it. It was cheap and it's been reliable.