The Gadget Professor awards his TPN Picks Best of CES 2020 Award to MicroVision.
Over the past few years, the cost of projection technology has come down significantly. That has been paired with the size of the technology getting smaller. On Black Friday 2019, we saw pico projectors being offered for less than $100. However, these devices don’t provide a lot of value for most consumers. That’s because the way we interact with our computing technology has changed, as well.
Most people expect the screens in their life to be touch. Nearly all laptops, definitely all phones and tablets, and even a lot of desktop (all-in-one) computers offer touch input. Projection screens, however, still require external input – that is until now. MicroVision has developed the Interactive Projection Engine – a very small hardware array that allows developers to produce devices with touch-enabled projection.
The demo device we got to see allowed for nearly any standard video input and computing output to connect to a device. We saw the projector connected to a phone with impressive touch recognition capabilities. But, the possibilities are endless, especially when connected to a computer. Even in our portable broadcast studio, this projector would make traveling easier, because it would eliminate the need for monitors.
Imagine being a business traveler, maybe you’re a salesperson. You don’t know what your client might have in a conference room. You don’t want to pack a full projector, but the pico projectors tend to be too dim. This technology, however, is laser-powered, making it possible to use it in standard lighting. We even saw it on our wall in the studio with our lighting and the light of the convention center.
The demo device is available for developers through an application. The company is working with manufacturers to produce commercial products based on the technology.
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