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Mitsubishi LED Projector: Small, Cheap, Durable
mcaycedo writes "This new projector is my top number 1 "must have" gadget. The reasons: price (US$699), size (fit in your hand), convenience (uses AC, batteries, card adaptor) and duration (lamp life:20000 hours). The cons: only SVGA (800x600), lumens (N/A)" There are tons of applications for a LED projector of this size, too: in cars, integrated into portable video players, information displays of all kinds ... and as resolution and brightness improve, even more will emerge.
Yeah yeah, when they first came out they were mainly used by rich people with laptops doing cheesy sales pitches. But nowadays I expect everywhere I present to have a projecter already set up, so I don't care about size, weight or running of batteries. Why is it that I'm forced to pay for features I don't want?
I suppose there are a few people who do sales pitches to people who don't have a projector to use, or who carry one around just so it is one less thing to rely on, but what about the majority of us who care about price, bulb price/hour, brightness, and resolution?
It seems the manufacturers haven't got it into their head that lower costs means they are selling to a different market.
A related complaint, I wanted an alarm clock radio that could play MP3s. Sounds easy? It isn't. I found a total of one product under $500 that can play MP3s and has an alarm. Why? Because they only make tiny little MP3 players that run off batteries, not ones the size of an alarm clock with a display I can read across the room.
You could build a full-resolution cinema-sized display, then all you'd need is a couple of matrox multi-head cards to drive them :)
I keep looking, but I cannot see how this is anything more than a product pitch. No comparisons, just 'this thing is really cool and think of all the cool things you can do with it'. TFA is nothing more than a rewarmed press release of the projector.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
uhm, i dunno maybe i'm missing something, but how exactly is that useful in a car?
Wouldn't it be ideal to buy an ATX case or computer that has the projector built in with a reflecting lense so you can aim it? Park your living room computer next to your recliner and plug the keyb/mouse right in. Put your stereo/cd/dvd/radio stack and media next to you so you can frob it directly.
In addition, I predict that the small projector technology is going to show up in laptops this end-year. Once the cell phone, PDA, media box, and personal computer are merged into one small device, chip level projector technology will become one of those things that kids can't imagine we lived without.
As with 56k modems, TI has innovated in the right places; their factories will be churning this and core RFID technology out for years.
Video projectors haven't been following Moore's Law lately. A 2000 lumens 1024x768 for under $1000 has been years in coming, since that profile dropped below $3000 a few years ago. It appears that it's because the projector vendors target salespeople, and are feeding them with ever more portable projectors, more costly to produce than big, stationary ones. Maybe the higher turnover of travelling salespeople means they sell more units in that sector, always needing the "brand new" one, at the highest price, than across the board. I'd have thought the mass-marketing of home theater would have offered larger profits on more sales, without competing on miniaturization R&D.
Where is the 20lb ceiling-mount livingroom projector for $1000, that does 1024x768 @2000lm? Maybe this Mitsubishi projector will help compete them into existence.
--
make install -not war
The skewing you mantion is referred to as "keystoning" (because it turns your nice rectangle into a keystone-shaped trapezoid).
Most projectors (decent ones at least) will have a 'keystone adjustment' in their menu that you can use to correct this to a reasonable extent (they are limited as to how much of an angle they can correct for).
Check the specifications on a specific projector to make sure it includes keystone correction if you plan to use it at a non-trivial angle.
This project sounds like it will need a screen like Sony's upcoming black screen that allows for viewing of projected images with lots of ambient light. Of course, the Sony screen might be a bit bigger than what this little projector can handle.
Any idea about how Fast the refresh is? I know older LCD monitors didnt' display moving images well. Is this one say good for power point but say not good for Doom or TV or a DVD?
http://www.hawknest.com/
So for 20,000 hours of viewing it's:
$ 699 for the new LED unit.
$2100 for the InFocus X1a.
While 800x600 might seem all that great to most of the geek crowd, its more than enough to show a powerpoint presentation in a confrence room or hotel meeting room wall.
The trade off of size versus performance here would be a no brainer if you travel.
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
Are you/they sure it's 20,000 hours of lamp life? If that were true, that would be about 10 times more than for a typical projector. Just recently I purchased a Panasonic projector. During my research and shopping around I observed that all bulbs have between 2,000 and 3,000 hours of life in them.
So.... I question that 20,000 hours of life time quote...
You shouldn't... this projector uses LEDs, not lamps. The projectors you were looking at all used incandescent or flourescent technologies; a bright/hot/charged region getting electricity slammed through it to force it to give off photons.
This uses solid state LEDs; silicon junctions whose atomic makeup cause them to give off a specific frequency. Suitably heatsinked (and these come from the factory suitably heatsinked) you can give off TONS of light for a very long time.
This is good. This is exciting. These LEDs probably cost LESS than a bulb for a traditional projector, and last for a much longer period of time.
I am disrespectful to dirt! Can you see that I am serious?!