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First Looks: 3M Micro Professional Projector MPro110

By Seow Tein Hee - 4 Nov 2008

Made for Micro Meetings

Made for Micro Meetings

Mention the word "projectors", and without a doubt, many will associate these products with the word "huge", both physically and the projection it throws onto the screen. As manufacturers move towards the high definition realm with their projector lineups, we see an interesting twist from 3M, in the form of its Micro Professional Project, the 3M MPro110. Here's the story of how even the smallest fry, can make the biggest difference.

Micro Sized

The truth won't be too far off if we said that our editorial team was pretty impressed with the MPro110's design. At one glance, you will notice that this miniature projector is extremely portable with its dimensions at 114.3 x 50.8 x 22.86mm. The MPro110 fits neatly into your hands akin to a mobile phone, and weighs a comfortable 159g. Thus, you'll find that the MPro110 slides neatly into the pocket, and is easy to handle, which bodes well for its mobility.

Moving on, you have the on/off button at the left profile, designed with a groove for better traction. The input ports, which include a RCA video input and VGA input, is situated at the rear of the device, which allows the connecting cables to be placed inconspicuously at the back. Focusing can be done via the scroll wheel located at the front of the device, just above the MPro110's lens.

Macro View

With a rated strength of 10 lumens using an LED light source, some may wonder if the MPro110 is able to fill the big shoes of its larger siblings, so that's what we set out to investigate. Inside the product package, you'll find the RCA video cable (with a converter) and a VGA cable that we utilized to test the projector using a variety of devices.

We first tested it with PowerPoint presentations from a laptop using the VGA connection port. We pushed the MPro110 to the limit and tested it out on the maximum display size of 50-inch according to its specification. In all honesty, you are unlikely to use such a setting due to the lack of details and sharpness, not to mention brightness. For normal usage conditions, you'll probably be looking at a distance of probably 1 to 1.5 meters from the screen, and to increase visibility, in a darkened room.

Under such situations, the colour and detail reproduction were adequate, though it got a little tricky with text, which lacked sharpness. As mentioned, the MPro110's luminosity is rated at 10 lumens, but it did manage to distinguish between different color shades properly, which became noticeable when we looked at images with a discernible amount of black.

3M has mentioned that the MPro110 should last up to 60 minutes on its 1050 mAh battery, and these figures are not too far off since it managed to run for almost 50 minutes on a full charge of the battery, and if you're low on juice, there's always the AC adapter to fall back on.

Future Projection

As far as we know, the 3M Micro Professional Projector MPro110 is one of the smallest projector to date. Ultimately, what makes the MPro110 a product to look out for, is not its face value at being able to deliver a mobile display solution with no frills, but the possibilities it represents with its technology.

As it is, there are talks of mobile device manufacturers taking on the 3M projection technology and incorporating it into upcoming devices, but as mentioned by 3M, such collaborations are still in the development stages. So in the meantime, if you'd like a slice of this mobile projection pie, you can opt to spend S$540, and take stock of how it will work out for you and your display needs.

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