Projectors are not just for PowerPoint presentations anymore. We’ve seen some cool new projectors at the last few trade shows, and Mobile World Congress is no different. Lenovo is showing off a compact pocket-sized projector. This device can connect to a number of devices, and easily be thrown in a bag or carried in a pocket. It’s pretty nifty.
The whole thing is only about 4-inches square and 1-inch thick. Speakers are built right into the projector, which means this little gadget is all you need to project movies. To play a video on the projector you’ll need a device that supports DLNA and Miracast. Unfortunately videos only play in 480p, but with a device of this size and price (only 0) that’s what you get. The Lenovo Pocket Projector will go on sale later this month.
Lenovo had a lot of interesting announcements to make at their Tech World conference in Beijing today. Let’s jump right into the first one: they have made the next big Chromecast competitor.
Simply called Lenovo Cast, this is a dongle that hooks right up to your TV via HDMI. Compare that price tag to the Chromecast (which you can often find even cheaper than that through periodic deals) and it doesn’t sound all that amazing.
But Lenovo’s pitch here is that their device is fully DLNA and Miracast compliant, meaning you have very flexible and open options for streaming to it (as opposed to Chromecast, which requires developers to add support for it within their apps). Still, there are cheaper options that allow you to do the same (and even more) already on the market so we’re reserving judgment until we see if there are any other unique and redeeming qualities. The device will be available on a worldwide scale this August.
Moving on, Lenovo did have a couple of other announcements that did well to pique our interest. First up is a smart watch that sports a secondary display, a contraption which might appear wonky in mere inner-thought visuals. In actuality, it’s integrated fairly neatly and doesn’t do much to hinder the otherwise good looks of a smart watch.
The question is about functionality and purpose, and the answer is simple: it’s for privately viewing your content. You see, you have to move the smartwatch to your eye to even see what’s on the display. Lenovo’s goal is to let you see what you need to see, and without letting anyone else see what you have to see.
We’re not sure what sort of sensitive content you’d be viewing on a smart watch to need something like this, but there it is. We’d argue covering your wrist with your hand is nearly as effective, but hey — you can’t get mad at unique ideas. Unfortunately this is little more than a concept right now, though the fact that Lenovo has working prototypes is a good sign they want to bring this thing to market.
Lastly, there’s the Smart Cast, a phone Lenovo has dreamed up with a laser projector. A projector on a phone is nothing new — the Samsung Galaxy Beam says hello — but Lenovo’s claiming that theirs can project a fully interactive display onto whichever surface you fancy. Whether it be for typing, playing a virtual piano or whatever, they’re confident they can make it happen.
The core technology already exists, though not within a consumer device such as the one they’ve shown off. Whether we can ever see something like this hit the market remains to be seen, but if Lenovo’s feeling confident enough that they’re on the right track we’ll certainly keep an open mind about it.
When Google unveiled Cardboard during last year’s Google I/O, they proved that innovative hardware doesn’t always need a complicated manufacturing process to get the job done. Running with that idea is Pizza Hut who, in their latest marketing stunt, has transformed a few limited edition pizza boxes into make-shift movie projectors.
The technology behind it is actually pretty simple and like Cardboard only involves a lens to project a smartphone’s display onto a wall. Yeah, you’re going to need a really dark room if you want to see what’s going on. Even if the quality is somewhat lacking, the boxes more than make up for it in wow factor. Something about this reminds us of tying cups together to form a telephone as a kid — not because it was an effective form of communication, but because it was damn cool.
Marketing stunts like this aren’t too uncommon in fast food. Last week, we saw KFC introduce a Bluetooth keyboard tray that allowed patrons to continue chatting without getting their phones all greased up. Like KFC, Pizza Hut’s boxes didn’t make it stateside and were instead only available in Hong Kong. Even if we couldn’t appreciate this for ourselves we have to admit, it’s still a pretty great idea.
