A new pico projector from an up-and-coming UK company is promising to bring out the best projection quality for the popular tiny gadgets.
The Evolution R-1 pico from BeamBox has an LCoS chip that plays images at a resolution of 640 x 480 pixels, and also promises a brightness level at 30 lumens, which is about three times as bright as that of the Optoma EP-PK-101 projector.
The Optoma EP-PK-101, which I reviewed a couple months back, has a pixel resolution at 480 x 320 pixels and I found its projected images to be quite good in an enclosed, very low-light setting. So I'm definitely looking forward to checking this one out and see if I can at least open up the blinds a little and still see a good image.
Using an LCoS chip instead of the DLP used by the Optoma will surely produce a bit of a different quality projection, but we won't know for sure until we try it. LCoS chips use tiny liquid crystals applied directly to the surface of a silicon chip, and have created a higher-res and higher contrast images on TV using DLPs, but we'll see if this difference can be replicated between the tiny projectors.
According to BoomBox, the Evolution R-1 can project images from a few inches wide to up to 100-inches, though other Picos have also promised that and have come up a good 30-inches short.
There's something else that's different about this projector from others -- it comes with 1GB of inset memory and a microSD slot to add more, up to 4GB.
This means that the company is looking to position it as a more self-sufficient gadget than the other picos, which is obvious when looking at its iPod-like scroll wheel controls. Generally, picos have functioned as the conduit between the media that's stored in a computer or a phone, and the projected screen.
With the memory, you could conceivably add a few smallish files of basic media at a time, and won't need it to connect to anything to play some video. It also accepts MP3, AVi, MPEG, and WMV files and the bulb expectancy has been placed at 30,000 hours total.
It also has a tiny (1W) speaker but our expectations for its audio are already quite low -- no pico has so far come up with anything remotely close to accurate audio renders. I'm also concerned that the added light lumen power will sap the battery and cut short projection times. The site has the battery playing without a charge for only 90 minutes, which is already 25% shorter than what the Optoma tested.
The Evolution R-1 pico will be available from the BoomBox site starting April 1, for about $360.
