25 September 2007

Video of the Texas Instruments's
prototype projector phone

What we have at the moment embedded in our cell phones!? Internet, e-mail, TV, GPS, Cameras, Video recorders, Dictaphones, Music players, but we still miss something?

The bigger high resolution screen of course, small, two-three inch displays that are common to mobile devices such as cell phones are barriers to growth of exciting mobility markets, because they limit the user viewing experience, projection display solution is expected to eliminate this bottleneck, benefiting consumers, mobile operators, content providers, and consumer electronics OEMs.

Miniature projectors embedded in our cell phones, handheld game consoles and other personal electronics appear very likely to play a major role in the future of information display.

Projector technology has improved considerably in the last few years, but although brightness, contrast, and color are better than ever, size still remains an issue for those looking for a truly portable device.

Texas nstruments’s shows the Pico Projector that is small enough to fit in a cellphone but still bright enough to shine a 15-inch-wide image even in a well lighted room.

Texas Instruments first showed the device at last year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES), and it’s made only one public appearance since then, said TI representatives who busted it out during a small reception in New York last night.

Its enough to point the micro projector at any even vaguely flat surface a wall, someone’s back, the palm of your hand and it’s a movie time.

The shown prototype works by shining red, green, and blue lasers on a tiny digital micro mirror device - the same kind of chip that powers DLP movie-theater and living room projectors and rear-projection TVs.

A new version in development uses light emitting diodes to save money, power and heat. Good thing, too, because the prototype shown last year made a loud whirring sound, courtesy of the cooling fan.

So when can you have your own Pico? It will likely first appear in a cellphone, and probably next year, said TI representative Kateri Gemperle. Will the first cellphone maker break the news at CES in early January? “We don’t think a manufacturer would let CES go by without announcing something,” said Gemperle. —Sean Captain