Oh! Gizmo

By Evan Ackerman

Back in September, we wrote about Chinavision’s projector phone. We stumbled across what appeared to be this exact phone on the show floor yesterday, except it was called the Logic Bolt, by a company called Logic Wireless. According to an article at PC Mag, Logic Wireless found “an existing company that made a prototype of the projector-phone. [They] took over the exclusive rights and redesigned all the features of the phone.” I’m not sure what they mean by “features,” but it kinda looks exactly the same as a Chinavision model except with tweaked guts that do include an upgrade to quad band GSM (from tri band) but no other changes that I can easily identify.

Anyway, here’s the specs: quad band GSM, QVGA (320 x 240) touchscreen, VGA (640 x 480) integrated projector and speaker, 3 mpx camera, 4 gigs storage expandable with microSD, 3 hours talk time and 2 hours projection time, accepts inputs from VGA and RCA sources with included adapter.

From the sound of things, the current version of the Bolt isn’t exactly a production model, although it will be for sale. A much smaller/better version is in the prototype stage and will be unveiled at CeBit Germany later this year. It may include a physical keyboard and will likely run either Windows Mobile or Android. So, um, yeah, don’t buy one of these anytime soon I guess.

Rumor has it that the phone is going to be available on T-Mobile, and that it’s going to cost $100 (subsidized) or $400-$600 straight up. Or you can (still) get a kinda the same model from Chinavision for $265.50.

Thanks to PC Mag for the additional info

By Evan Ackerman

At CES last year, we saw a prototype of Microvision’s PicoP miniature laser-based projector. Back then, I was told that the production version would most likely use LEDs, instead. I guess they decided that lasers would just be that much more awesome, because we got a look at the production version of the Microvision PicoP yesterday, and it’s absolutely laserriffic.

The PicoP uses red, green, and blue lasers to project a WVGA (848 x 480) 16:9 widescreen image with 10 lumens of brightness and a contrast ratio of better than 5,000 to 1. It was adequately bright under ambient show floor lightning, and substantially brighter than any of the other micro projectors we’ve seen this week. In a dark room it projects a tolerable image up to a staggering 100 inches, but the best part is that since it uses lasers, it’s always inherently in focus. This is an important feature, since the whole point of a micro projector is that you can whip it out and use it anywhere.

The PicoP uses an integrated battery that gives is approximately 2 hours per charge. There’s a proprietary input jack that will accept (through included adapters) composite video or VGA inputs. Look for it in Q2 of this year for about $500.

[ Microvision PicoP ]

By Andrew Liszewski

While it didn’t come up at the press conference earlier in the day, Samsung was showing off their MBP200 Pico Projector/Portable Media Player at a pre-CES event. I have to admit that the whole pocket-sized projector idea has intrigued me, and after playing with the MBP200, I’m definitely sold. Given the extra hardware on board, the MBP200 is considerably thicker than something like the iPod Touch, or pretty much every PMP currently on the market. But being able to project up to a 50-inch video onto a wall, totally makes up for it.

Besides the standard support for media files such as MP3, WMA, OGG, AAC, WAV, DivX, Xvid, WMV9 Simple Profile, MPEG-2, MPEG-4; Audio CODEC: MP3, AAC and WMA, the MBP200 also supports PDFs, PowerPoint presentations, MS Word docs and Excel files, which means you can justify picking one of these up as a tool for the office. And if you don’t want everyone else in the room seeing or hearing your files, the MBP200 also has a 2.2-inch QVGA LCD display and a 3.5mm headphone jack that can be used in lieu of the built-in speaker. As for availability, “sometime later this year” is the best I could coax out of them.

[ Samsung MBP200 Pico Projector ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Sanyo just announced their new LP-XTC50 projector today (pictured on the right) which is designed for installation in large halls or auditoriums where high ceilings makes regular access difficult. So to give the projector as long a life as possible before someone needs to climb up there for maintenance it comes with 2 unique features. The first is a dual lamp system which basically uses two bulbs rated at 3,000 hours a piece, to give the projector a total of 6,000 hours of run time. Depending on the user’s preferences there’s an ‘Alternating Mode’ where the projector regularly switches between the bulbs on a set schedule or a ‘Relay Mode’ where one bulb is used exclusively until it burns out and the second bulb kicks in automatically.

The LP-XTC50 also features Sanyo’s ‘Active Maintenance Filter’ or ‘AMF’ system which uses a special cartridge with the filter on a reel, somewhat like the ink ribbon on a typewriter. The AMF system is able to detect blocked airflow through the filter due to dust or other particles and will automatically scroll the filter reel to the next clean filter. Each cartridge includes 10 filters which means it should be a while before it needs to be swapped out with a new one. (Unless your office happens to be in a coal mine or a dust factory.)

The Sanyo LP-XTC50 projector will be available as of January 9, 2009 for about $10,700.

[ Sanyo LP-XTC50 Projector ] VIA [ I4U News ]

By Andrew Liszewski

While it might not be the world’s smallest video projector in existence, the Pico Cube from Epoq could actually be the smallest video projector you can actually buy right now. (Or at least in the very near future.) But given its small size, if you were hoping to recreate the digital cinema experience in your living room or at the office, this isn’t the projector for you.

It uses a 3W LED lamp that results in a brightness of about 7-10 ANSI lumens and a contrast ratio of about 80:1. On top of that it’s only capable of projecting a VGA, or 640×480 image from its composite video input which means you can’t even connect a laptop to this thing using a standard VGA connector for your PowerPoint presentations. So unless you absolutely need a low-end projector that can fit in the palm of your hand, I think you’d be better off wasting the $229.95 that Gadget Craver wants for this somewhere else.

[ Epoq EPP-HH01 Pico Cube Projector ] VIA [ I4U News ]

By Andrew Liszewski

While it’s been designed primarily for full-dome projections in places like planetariums, dome theaters and even simulator rides, that doesn’t stop the new powerdomeVELVET projector from Carl Zeiss from being any less impressive. It uses Texas Instruments BrilliantColor DLP technology to not only provide an internal 30bit color depth, but it also manages to pull off an amazing contrast ratio of 2,500,000:1. Compared to other high-end projectors that are capable of 30,000:1 contrast ratios, the powerdomeVELVET is the first to offer an absolutely black backdrop, which is vital for applications like a planetarium where guests are staring at particularly small dots of light. The projector’s expected to be available sometime in early 2009 for an undisclosed and most likely massive sum, so don’t expect to find it on the shelves at your local Best Buy.

[ Carl Zeiss powerdomeVELVET Planetarium Projector ] VIA [ SlashGear ]

By Evan Ackerman

We’ve seen prototypes. We’ve heard announcements. But finally, someone has gotten something out to the consumer, and it’s (again) not Motorola: it’s 3M, with their $359 MPro110 which should be shipping on September 30. The fanless, speakerless, LED lamp palm sized projector weighs only a third of a pound but can display a VGA image (640 x 480) up to 50 inches diagonally at any surface you care to point it at. It’s got VGA and composite video inputs and I assume a battery in there somewhere, although there are no specs on that. You focus it with a thumb wheel. How’s it look? According to Popular Science, who got a peek at a production version:

Images were discernable up to about 11 inches across, even under our bright fluorescent office lights. But they were definitely faded. And some movie scenes were downright indecipherable. The same went for photos. In a dark room, it could project a big enough image to be the ultimate cheap-o home theater.

It doesn’t sound like it’s quite as bright as the prototypes we’ve seen, but so far 3M has been the only company to actually push one of these through to the shelves. I’m really not sure, though, whether this is going to kick off a whole generation of palm-sized projectors, or if the real progress (and money) is in integrated projectors. My money would be on the latter, but it remains to be seen how long it takes to get there.

[ Popular Science ] VIA [