Using the infinite focus capability of the PicoP display engine, combined with a motion sensing module, it's now possible to play video games on multiple surfaces, all while tracking your character's point of view in 3D space.

Granted, this platform looks cool and everything, but it seems like you would have to have a perfectly spherical room to take full advantage of it. Besides the dinky "screen," the image would become distorted on any misshapen surface. What do you think? Is this a gaming experience you could get into? [Microvision via Crunchgear via TechEBlog]

When separated, the keyboard communicates with the screen via Bluetooth, and can act as a keyboard (duh), microphone, speaker, and game pad. It also serves as a remote control when the pico-projector is used.

Apparently the F-04B's 12.2-megapixel camera takes "nice pictures for a phone", but the touchscreen could do with being a little more responsive.

The phone was first shown as a prototype at CEATEC 2008, but Akihabara News says that Fujitsu and Japanese carrier, DoCoMo, have "officially" announced it as the Separate Keitai F-04B. No word yet on what OS it runs, availability, or pricing (inside or out of Japan). Definitely a unique idea. [Akihabara News]

It'd have essentials like wireless broadband connectivity and a battery, but I'm hoping that we'll have cooler stuff than a laser projected keyboard by 2020. Their time has come and gone already, no? Less of that, more interactive holographic display technology, please. More wacky 2020 shenanigans at: [Ericsson via MobileandNotebook]

Price

$350, just like its predecessor.

Verdict

What a difference 10 months make.

While the 12-lumen projector isn't noticeably brighter, the throw is substantially tighter, so at the same distance you get about 25% more picture. In terms of use, I could comfortably watch a screen of about 32 inches on the 120 (as opposed to the 110's 20 inches) and could get nearly 50 inches out of it in a very dark room before the picture just got too blurry to enjoy. A 32-inch screen size may not be great shakes in the age of $1000 50-inch plasmas, but in a dorm room or other close quarters, it sure beats a laptop.

The MPro120 is a bit larger than the 110, owing not just to better optics, but to a larger battery—with up to four hours of juice, rather than just one—and built-in stereo speakers. (The 110 is really just a monitor.) The speakers are loud, and not as tinny as one would expect. It won't give you the full butt-shaking DTS treatment, but I was surprised when I started a video, left the room, and heard everything clearly, 20 feet away through a doorway. As you can see from the slides, the video handled the Blu-ray of Generation Kill surprisingly well via composite output, and I wasn't even vexed by the 480x640 resolution. Given what I was trying to pull off, it looked good.

Connections & Accessories

• VGA adapter for laptops
• Composite adapter for AV sources
• Female-to-male RCA converters so any video output kit for your phone, iPod or camera will work
• Small Gorilla Pod-style tripod
• Built-in flip-down stand for just a bit of lift

When I reviewed the MPro110, I bitched that it was pretty flimsy too. Not so with the MPro120. It's sturdy, has nice firm buttons for volume and brightness, and has a focus dial on its face that stays where you put it. The MPro110 and MPro120 are so different despite their naming, my theory is that 3M shot the guy who built the 110 and hired his arch-nemesis to build the new one.

Does this mean you should buy a pico projector? If you have $350 to spend and find yourself in situations where a very portable 32" monitor that requires relative darkness would come in handy, go for it. It's still not good enough for corporate presentations, and it's still not a true theater-on-the-go. My thought is, if it got this much better in just 10 months, why not wait another 10 months for even more improvements—and perhaps a tiny cost drop? [Product Page]

Vast improvements in build quality and image size, compared to predecessor

New features such as stereo speakers, plus included tripod, make it a more self-contained theater

Cost didn't go down from last version

As improved as it is, the video experience could be much better

This is still a very niche product

The last 3M pico experiment, the MPro110, was a mixed bag: Passable image quality was tainted by poor build quality and low battery life, and the overall experience, while promising, just wasn't quite there yet.

The MPro120 is a replacement for the MPro110, and on top of the verifiably awesome image quality from its liquid crystal on silicon imager, it multiplies battery life by a factor of six to four hours, pushes the life of its 12 lumen lamp to 20,000 hours, and adds stereo speakers, while hanging onto the prior product's 640x480 resolution and $350 price tag. Another difference: Assuming 3M's tightened up their hardware quality, people might actually buy one this time around. The MPro120 is due to land on September 1st. [3M]

COMING SOON TO A POCKET NEAR YOU: THE MPRO120

3M's New Handheld Projector Set for September Launch

ST. PAUL, MINN. (August 26, 2009) – This fall, Hollywood's biggest blockbusters are coming to a pocket near you! Less than a year after launching the MPro110 - the handheld digital projector that won the "Grand Award" in the gadget category of the Popular Science 2008 Best of What's New Awards – 3M announced today the September debut of the MPro120, the newest member of the MPro family. The MPro120 provides improved functionality, increased portability and an expanded feature set.

The MPro120 is the first projector to incorporate 3M's MM200 projection engine, the next generation of the MPro family. As announced at the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show, the MM200 engine uses an advanced liquid crystal on silicon (LCOS) electronic imager and boasts enhanced image quality with a full color gamut. The MPro120 provides users with a robust battery life of two to four hours (depending on brightness setting) - enough to watch a full-length film – and, in full brightness mode, achieves a brightness of 12 lumens. Featuring an integrated flip stand, tripod, stereo speakers and a variety of input cables, the MPro120 is ready to use "out-of-the-box" with a wide range of today's most popular video output gadgets. And, as with its predecessor - the MPro110 - the MPro120 will be the ideal projection solution for laptops and netbooks. Available optional accessories include an adapter cable for Apple® products, component video cable and car charger.

"Following the success of the MPro110, the MPro120 will further reinforce 3M's leadership position in the development and implementation of advanced projection technologies," said Mark Colin, general manager, 3M Projection Systems Department. "The functionality of the MPro120 represents technical achievements that were manageable only by the long-term commitment to research and development that is 3M's hallmark."

The MPro120 will be on-sale September 1 with an estimated price of $349. Optional accessories are sold separately.

Not much further info was given, but shot in the dark: the specs will probably be similar to every other Chinese-made media player out there.

As far as I remember, the Sunview PMP was the first media player with a built-in projector; it claimed a 53-inch throw. The more recent Nikon S1000pj camera projects a 40-inch image.

As for the Mirage, sounds neat…but yeah, I think I'll do fine with a battery-powered pico-projector for the moment. [Yinlips via Cloned in China]

Light sources using lasers for display applications, such as laser TV's and pocket laser projectors, are expected to have superior properties in terms of size, weight and power consumption. For this reason, R&D activities aimed at commercialization of these devices have expanded rapidly over the past several years. Up to now, only red and blue laser diodes were commercially available, while green lasers (*1) were obtained by frequency conversion of infrared lasers. Gallium nitride (GaN) semiconductors, commercially available for blue LEDs, are also expected to be the key material for light-emitting devices in the green region. However, the material has been plagued with a phenomenon where the luminance efficiency shows a rapid decline with increasing wavelength.

At Sumitomo Electric, we have overcome this problem by developing a GaN crystal which inhibits the efficiency drop, resulting in room temperature pulse operation of a laser diode emitting in the pure-green region at 531nm. It is the first green laser diode in the world.

Sumitomo has applied for 60 patents on the technology, and are currently entertaining offers to use it in a wide range of applications. [Sumitomo via Crunchgear]

While projectors traditionally use lenses to offset the throw of the image (pretty effectively, I might add), the floating ball (suspended from an electromagnetic base) can rise or fall in space to make projection even more flexible. Plus, the projector is not just a projector but a series of microprojectors, allowing users to display multiple images to and from multiple angles. So little Billy can watch the latest Power Rangers on one wall while you pretend to watch CNN on another.

Of course, by the time microprojectors are good enough for home theater use, we'll probably all have HD imaging paints anyway and just cover our walls with electronic wallpaper. (A guy can dream, can't he?) [Yanko Design]

In the most abstract sense, the iJector is fine: it can project videos at a reasonable brightness to diagonal sizes of 50 inches, plays back amplified stereo audio, and has a proper "made for iPod" device certification. It'll work with just about any video-enable iProduct—possibly, though not definitely—excluding the iPhone 3GS.

Now, look closer. That (up to) 50 inches of projected imagery will be resolved at a comically low 557×234 pixels, and will cost around $670 when it ships in Japan next month, which means by the time you smuggle it to the US through your chosen Japanese gadget importer, you're looking at over $700 for a device that can push fewer pixels than your iPhone's teeny little screen.

Your only consolation would be that it comes with a remote, I guess, and that it can at least accept composite video inputs and functions as a regular projector. Still, no. [Impress Watch]

This diminutive 0.49 x 0.59 x 0.19-inch box projects footage from HDMI at 1,280 x 768 resolution for 30,000 hours thanks to LED lighting. There's no word on price or availability.

Oh, but we don't recommend you buy the thing. Sharpness alone is only part of the equation, and with no brightness or contrast ratio listed, those measurements can't be good. We're really just posting this to light the fire under Dell, Samsung and the like. Forever Plus is doing it, why can't you?? [Forever Plus via Engadget]

There's really nothing exciting about micro projectors now other than where they can go. And TI's second generation projector is a promising step to mobile media "is that HD in your pocket?" nirvana. 20% smaller than the first Pico (and, maybe more importantly, 20% thinner as well), the new Pico projects an 854x480 (DVD quality) image with a contrast ratio of 1000:1. The missing spec is, of course, probably the most important one—brightness.

Still, how cool is that picture? Really cool. OK? Really cool. [TI via bbGadgets]

Yep it's a bit chubby, as any projector-toting phone most certainly will be, but it's not as horrible as some of the other projector phones we've seen. Aside from the 480 x 320-res projector that uses Texas Instruments' DLP tech, the Show also has a fine-looking 3.2-inch, 400 x 240 OLED touch screen, 5MP camera with LED flash, and Samsung's widget-based touch OS. It's dropping in South Korea soon, but there's of course no news on a US release.

I'm actually pretty surprised at how good the image looks here. I'm still pretty skeptical that anyone will ever find an actual day-to-day use other than novelty from any pico projector, but if it's built into your phone in a bulky but not Zach Morris bulky package, maybe that's the answer. Check out more photos and impressions over at: [PopSci]

The bad news is that it's a Korea-only phone (shipping next month) and according to Gearlog's Sascha Segan no one seems to know much about it.

But on the good side, the phone runs on Samsung's TouchWiz UI, can project any of the visual media stored on the phone, animated Korean kids stories and DMB-T mobile TV signals, or functions as a de facto flashlight.

Segan says Samsung reps promised more details soon. For now check out more pics on Gearlog, or take a peek at CrunchGear's video below. [Gearlog and CrunchGear]

They had two prototypes on view: one played video off SD cards, the other plugged into an iPhone and played videos off that. Unlike other pico projectors, these have an RGB LED inside rather than a straight white LED, which is a significant step forward. Both were very nice looking, but alas, both were mere prototypes. The projector the prototypes were based on is smaller than ever, which is great, but until we see these things built into actual phones rather than in relatively bulky separate devices, I don't know how far they'll go.

Some of these shots could use a penny for scale, because it's unclear exactly how small we're talking. But basically the entire optical module is squeezed into that tiny matte metal box up front, which includes an amazing sugarcube-sized fly-eye lens, with tiny facets used to focus light from the RGB LED light source (one tiny LED for each color) onto the microscopic mirrors of the DLP image processor, with accuracy down to the micron. One day all of our cellphones will have these; until then, marvel at how something that used to be size of your massive audio receiver can now fit in your pants. More images and details at: [Tech ON]

In terms of styling, the CV-MP01 is much more toylike than business-oriented PowerPoint machines from the likes of 3M and Dell, but it boasts roughly the same specs: a blacklit LED projection system, VGA (640x480) resolution, a 10,000h predicted lifespan and a small speaker to round out the minimal featureset. It's Japan-only for now, but the projector—or something like it—will likely meet our shores before too long. [Akihabara]

I'd like to imagine that one day all cellphones have such components built in, but until then this is the best way to put a picture on your wall with hardware the size of a remote control.

What should we play on it? What should we aim it at? I don't know, but if you've got the time, please stop by and try it out.

[Thanks to REED ANNEX and thanks to our benefactor gizmine.com]

Gizmodo Gallery

Reed Annex

151 Orchard Street

New York, NY 10002

Gizmodo Gallery Reader Meetup

The reader meetup takes place across the street from the Gallery, at a place called The Annex (not to be confused with REED ANNEX where the gallery is hosted.) The address is 152 Orchard Street and we'll be there at 9 PM SHARP on Friday December 5th.

Gallery Dates:

December 4th-7th

Times:

12/4 Thursday

12-8

12/5 Friday

12-8

12/6 Saturday

11-8

12/7 Sunday

11-4

[Read more about our Gizmodo Gallery here and see what else we'll be playing with at the event.]

The Price: $300

The Verdict: If you have the cash and really want a little projector that can go wherever you go, this is the one to get. It's got a much better build quality than the visually comparable 3M MPro110, but it's got so many more goodies, you'll be entertained for hours before even loading your first movie.

The key difference is that, unlike the 3M, the Aiptek has an SD card reader so it's always ready to play something, even when nothing's wired to it. You transcode files to Motion JPEG AVI or MPEG-4 ASF—you can use whatever software you want, but if you don't have an app, the thing comes with ArcSoft's PC-only Media Converter—and they're recognized with ease by the projector, along with JPEG stills and MP3 music files, which play fine by themselves, but not in the background of a photo slideshow where they belong.

The 3M, if you recall, had a VGA input along with a composite A/V input, but of course no SD reader. The Aiptek doesn't have the VGA input, but it's a tradeoff I can live with. The Aiptek does have a basic component video input, so you can run low-grade standard-def sources in there with no trouble.

You get a lot more for the money, too. Aiptek's projector comes with a nice little tripod for quick-and-dirty setup, and a remote control if you're going to give a presentation. (Speaking of that, the manual recommends converting PPT and PDF files to JPEG and loading them on SD card for best results. Like I said, "quick and dirty.")

The beefs I had with it were basically the same as with the 3M: You really can't set the thing back more than five feet or so when by which time the picture—at that point about 50 inches diagonal—really starts to blur. I'm not even going to begin to talk about contrast, color accuracy, motion blur and all of the things we examine in higher TV technologies, but I do have to admit, in a sufficiently dim setting, the video for both projectors was entirely watchable.

In two weeks I've gone from not believing much in the pico movement to being a fervent supporter. And if you're going to be an early adopter, I am happy to say that, because of the Aiptek PocketCinema V10's better geek features and much improved build quality over the 3M MPro110—and $50 cheaper price to boot—I found a pico projector that I can genuinely recommend. The only hold back is that they're just gonna get better and better. [Aiptek Product Page]