Little Bitty, Big Deals

	Little Bitty, Big Deals Tiny projectors good enough? by Gary Kayye, CTS

	Historically, the ProAV integration and installation market has been dominated by a handful of LCD-based projectors all weighing over 20 pounds. The sub-20 pounders and even sub-10 pounders have been relegated to luggable, portable and ultra-portable product categories for traveling presenters or cart-based projection in corporations and schools. But not any more. Virtually every projector manufacturer has what they deem as ultra-portable projectors that are finding their way onto the ceilings of the world’s conference rooms and boardrooms. How did this happen and are they good enough? Let’s take a look. For two years starting in 1999, Proxima (now part of InFocus) owned the install market with their ProAV line of 9300 and 9400 series LCD fixed-install projectors. Some statistics even had Proxima with an 80% market share at the end of 2000. These projectors, made by Sanyo, garnered a lot of attention as they were the first 2000+ ANSI lumens boxes that were designed from the ground-up as install-projectors including all the features required to hang one of these in a conference or training room including RS-232 control, RGB gain and bias, interchangeable lenses and multiple-input switching. In addition, they handled RGBHV, HDTV and video sources seamlessly. But, they were big. At over 34-pounds they screamed ‘install me’. But, no one cared as once a projectors in the ceiling, how cares how much it weighs – unless it falls onto the head of a client or an expensive boardroom table. [an error occurred while processing this directive] Then Sony, NEC and Epson all decided to get into the installation-market. From mid-2000 until the end of last year, the average weight of an install-box dropped a whopping 20-pounds. At just under 15-pounds, every maker of LCD projectors has an installation projector with all the bells and whistles needed to outfit virtually every boardroom, conference room or training room. Projectors once deemed as portables are now being hung all over the place. All of them have all the control, input features and output resolutions required to connect any PC or MAC as well as image videoconferencing and HDTV sources. It’s amazing how fast this all happened. One year we were without any over-1000 ANSI lumens projectors that are under 75-pounds and less than 5-years later, portables are more powerful than that original Sanyo/Proxima box. Now, here come the ultra-portables. Five, six and seven pound projectors that are being used for installs are the norm. All of a sudden, in less than four months, the average installation projector is weighing in at just under 7-pounds. They’re not quite as bright as the 15-pounders, but they all have RS-232 control, some have gain and bias control, all have multiple input capabilities including DVI and HDTV. And, they’re not only LCD’s any more. Some ProAV dealers are outfitting their installs, regularly, with single-chip DLP projectors for all sorts of applications – even home theaters. Last month, I even saw an installation using HP’s xb31, a 3.5-pound 1500-ANSI lumen (although it looked more like 1200), XGA projector that uses DLP technology. In this case, the user actually had what he called a “quick-release mount” that allowed him to take in on the road whenever he needed to make a traveling presentation. I don’t recommend this as a normal install, but it’s clear that there is a lot of cross-over in this space and there are more to come. Sony, NEC, Epson and even InFocus have all either introduced ultra-portable install projectors or have plans to this year. One of the aforementioned manufacturers even told me to expect a 3-pounder to have not only RS-232 control, but over 2500 ANSI lumens this year! Wow! What I want to know is when’s my battery-operated, 1-pound palm-projector/PocketPC coming out? Gary Kayye, CTS, is Chief Visionary at Kayye Consulting, Inc., a Chapel Hill, NC-based marketing consulting firm that serves the ProAV and Home Theater markets. In addition to strategic marketing consulting, Kayye Consulting, Inc. is also a training development company. Gary can be reached via e-mail at gkayye@kayye.com or through his Web site at www.kayye.com. Source: Kayye Consulting, Inc.