How can your life be truly full and rich when you don’t have a personal digital projector? (I ask myself this kind of stuff all the time.) Two different companies—LumenLabs and Benq—are offering $500 projectors for the first time that might make our collective personal projector dream a reality. The LumenLab (http://www.lumenlab.com) PM Projector is the first full product from a company that focuses on do-it-yourself projector kits (PM stands for “pre-made”). It’s $499 shipped, supports component and S-video input as well as VGA, has a built-in TV tuner, and it uses extremely inexpensive bulbs, unlike many professional projectors. It includes built-in speakers, a remote and picture rotation for mounting to the ceiling, if you’re so inclined. The Benq model (http://www.benq.com) only offers 800×600 resolution for PC connections, but it’s brighter and pre-configured for HD TV output. (It’s also $100 pricier.) Hook it up to your theoretical Apple iTV device and you’re in the home project theater business for just a few Cs. (Both are due for release in November, just in time for someone else to feel obliged to buy it for you. Yahtzee!)
The Mississippi Free Press produced this story through the MFP Solutions Lab, supported by the Solutions Journalism Network. This series digs into Mississippi’s systemic issues and sheds light on responses to them in other communities. Beyond just reporting on problems, these stories interrogate their causes and inspect potential solutions.