Yeah Jason, I'm not familiar with the AVS discussion that you referred to, but it may be similar to an explanation by a service manager for an electronics company(citing manufacturer techs)that I read a couple of years ago. The point does appear to be that it would be very harmful to restart the bulb in a projection TV while it's still hot, so there're temperature sensors in the sets to prevent this. The fan speeds up the cooling process greatly, but the slower cool-down without the fan if there's a power failure doesn't harm the bulb; it doesn't get hotter, it just takes longer to cool.
A related point he discussed was that the high voltage used on start-up in the TV application was the most stressful period for the bulb and that restarts should be minimized to help extend bulb life. He suggested that strictly from that standpoint, projection TVs shouldn't be turned off for less than about an hour, since the start-up would do more to shorten the bulb life than would the extra hour of normal operation.
