The Twenty Smallest Portable SVGA Projectors

InFocus LP425z (also Kodak DP900 and Boxlight CD-450m) 

For most of 1999, the LP425z had great success among users who needed 900 ANSI lumen performance in a small package. At that brightness rating, it stood out as a performance leader when compared to its 600 and 700 lumen, 8.6-lb. competitors. However, the Toshiba TLP-450 and the Mitsubishi S50 (scheduled to ship in February), have taken the LP425z out of its performance leadership position.

This 7.4 lb,900 ANSI lumen machine has a current MSRP of $5,499. It currently sells on the street for just under $4,000. However, with the stepped-up competition in the category, the $4,000 street price will not hold much longer.

Even though the spec weight for this product is 7.4 lbs, this is a bit misleading. It comes packaged with the InFocus "Cable Wizard" which is needed to interface an industry-standard VGA cable to the 425z's non-standard connection port. The Cable Wizard adds an extra pound to the carrying weight that other projectors are not encumbered with. So the true apples-to-apples weight spec for the 425z should be more like 8.4 lbs.

The 425z has a DLP light engine with a 270-watt, 1000 hour lamp. Thus it will throw off much more heat than will the Toshiba and Mitsubishi products with their 150-watt lamps. When used in a small meeting room, the difference can be enough to elevate the ambient room temperature. Also, the 270-watt lamp needs additional air to keep it cool, so the fan noise is somewhat higher on this unit than on several of its competitors.

If you plan to put a lot of hours on your projector, note that the 1000 hour lamp life means that the 425z's lamp will be replaced more frequently than is necessary with competing products that have 2000 hour lamps. The replacement lamp is $400.

At 421 cubic inches, the 425z is among the largest of the products in thiscategory. And the Cable Wizard adds extra bulk to the overall package.

At this time, the Toshiba has a street price of about $3,700. In a head to head competition with the 425z, the Toshiba and the Mitsubishi both edge the LP425z in several important performance categories:

Since the better-performing Toshiba TLP-450 is currently at $3,700, this puts the relative fair market value of the 425z in the range of $3,300 to $3,500. So the 425z's current street price of $4,000 is about 15% high for what it delivers at this time.

Kodak DP900

Kodak features the "Image Manager" with this product, which is an interesting marketing twist. All projectors have controls to adjust image characteristics such as contrast, brightness, and color. In general, computer graphics will look better with one group of settings, and video images will look better with a different set. Kodak has predefined settings for color, contrast, and brightness to optimize the image for you, depending upon what kind of material you will be projecting. For those who don't want to mess around with color, contrast, and brightness adjustments, this is a nice value-added feature.

Boxlight CD-450m