Epson has launched its new laser 3LCD home-cinema range in China, and it is selling all four models there: the CH-LS5000, CH-LS6000, CH-LS7000 and short-throw CH-LS7500. The range was announced on October 26. The Chinese versions support the Matter smart-home standard and carry a three-year warranty. Epson China hasn’t published prices for any of the four.
That makes China the third market to get the complete lineup, after Europe and Japan. The US has three of the four. When Epson launched the range in America in September, it left out the 3,600-lumen LS7000, made no mention of Matter, and paired the projectors with a two-year warranty.
The Chinese specifications match the US models we covered in September. The CH-LS5000 is rated at 2,500 ISO lumens, the CH-LS6000 at 3,400, the CH-LS7000 at 3,600 and the short-throw CH-LS7500 at 3,500. The three standard-throw models use a 1.62x optical zoom with a 1.32 to 2.15 throw ratio. Epson China says that puts a 100-inch image at about 2.9 metres at the closest setting. The CH-LS7500 uses a 1.0 to 1.31 lens with 1.3x zoom.
Underneath, it’s the same platform everywhere: three LCD panels, a laser rated at 20,000 hours, and a MediaTek MT9681 processor. The Chinese copy describes the picture as “8.3 million native pixels.” Epson Japan’s spec sheet for the same chassis is more precise: three 0.62-inch 1080p panels with two-axis pixel shift putting a 4K image on screen. That chip runs what Epson China calls its AI Imaging engine, covering scene-based picture adjustment, upscaling and dynamic contrast. Gaming support is 4K at 120Hz with ALLM over HDMI rated at 48Gbps, and Bluetooth 6.0 handles wireless headphones and speakers. According to Sina Tech’s launch report, the Chinese models also have MEMC motion smoothing.
Two changes stand out in the Chinese material. The first is placement: Epson says the projectors exhaust air from the front and can sit 10 centimetres, about four inches, from the back wall, half the clearance the previous generation needed. That matters for the shelf-behind-the-sofa setup these projectors are designed for. The second is certification. Epson China says the CH-LS7000 and CH-LS7500 have passed ISF calibration certification, and the CH-LS5000 has a visual low-fatigue certificate from the China Electronics Standardization Institute.
Epson’s own Chinese comparison table rates dynamic contrast at 3,000,000:1 for the CH-LS5000 and CH-LS6000 and 5,000,000:1 for the CH-LS7000 and CH-LS7500. The US spec sheet gives 800,000:1 for the LS5000 and LS6000 and 1,000,000:1 for the LS7500. The Chinese footnote says the figures were measured in Dynamic colour mode with dynamic contrast switched on, at the wide end of the zoom and with the lens centred.
The hardware is the same. The difference is in how each region’s spec sheet is written. Dynamic contrast on a laser projector measures how far the light source can dim between a full-white and full-black frame, and a mostly black scene can push that number almost as high as a manufacturer wants. Shoppers comparing an Epson in China with an Epson in the US should read the 5,000,000:1 and 1,000,000:1 figures as the same projector. The measured number that matters is native contrast. In the US, a reviewer measured the LS6000 at about 2,200 lumens in Natural mode, and black level is still the open question.
Matter is the cross-platform standard that lets devices from different brands talk to Google Home, Apple Home, Amazon Alexa and SmartThings without a separate bridge. Epson China says the new projectors are the first high-end home projectors in the Chinese market to support it, and pitches a one-touch “movie mode” that turns on the projector, dims the lights and closes the curtains.
The European versions are promoted with Matter as well. The US models aren’t, at least not yet. For a range aimed at living rooms rather than dedicated theatres, Matter is a practical feature. It’s odd that American buyers, who get these projectors at a higher price than Japan, are also the ones without it.
Epson China describes the CH-LS5000 as a “10,000-yuan class” projector but hasn’t given a price for it or the other three models. If it does land near 10,000 yuan, that would be about $1,320 before China’s 13 percent VAT, a third under the US LS5000’s $1,999.99. That’s only an estimate, and we’ll update it when list prices appear.
The useful benchmark is Japan, where the EH-LS7000 went on sale today, October 29, at ¥327,800 including tax from Epson’s direct shop. As we reported earlier this month, that works out to about $1,885 before tax, less than the dimmer LS6000 costs in the US. China’s version of the same projector will be priced against that, and against Chinese single-chip DLP laser projectors that sell for less.
That’s the competition Epson faces. In China, 4K at 120Hz and lens shift have reached projectors well under 10,000 yuan. Epson is selling 3LCD, which has no colour wheel and no rainbow effect, along with a three-year national warranty. Our LCD projector guide covers the 3LCD and single-panel LCD models American buyers can get, and the US LS6000 is still the one to beat at its price.