Types of Projector

Anytime we want to watch or display something from our laptop or PCs or even phones, the first thought is always to connect to the TV. Which sounds to be an obvious choice when it’s just you and a few other people. But sometimes being ordinary is not enough.

To answer the tough question of why a projector, the easiest way to convey your answer is to just ask them back, why movie at the theater and not at home? To experience big and better, is exactly when we get the instant thought of projectors.

When the need is to convey or display to a big audience, TV is never an option. One, because of the size of display and second, because it lags in terms of the reach and drawing attention.

While projectors on the other hand, provide mesmerizing large displays so you capture even the smallest details. With increased sharp and clear reach, your display will definitely make the eyeballs of the audience glued to itself.

Types Of Projectors:

Before we jump onto the uses of projectors, it is extremely important to go through and understand the various types to make your selection easier.

1. Cathode ray tube Projectors:

Mainly consisting of Cathode ray tubes (CRT), a lens between them and the display screen, these are one of the oldest kind of projectors. CRT are small and high brightness tubes used for the image generation. Modern CRT projectors come with 3 such tubes.

One for each of the primary colors, Blue, green and red.

Input video is first segregated and then sent to the respective color tubes for processing. The images generated by these tubes are then focused on the display screen using the lens between the two.

Cons:

• Heavy and bulky
• Difficult to setup

2. LCD projectors:

Liquid crystal display projectors are one of the latest type. The basic principle behind these is, light is sent through lamp to a liquid crystal prism or through various panels splitting the video elements to three parts: the blue, green and red.

Lamp is used because it can produce a broad spectrum of colors. Resulting in wide range of color shades to be displayed and enhancing details and appearance of the display.

Pros:

• Lighter in weight and easy to carry
• Easier setup compared to older technology

3. Digital light processing projectors:

Invented and bagged by the name of Texas instruments, these projectors use microscopically small mirrors arranged to form a Metrix. The entire arrangement is done on a semiconductor chip.

Number of mirrors present is directly proportional to the resolution and quality of the projected image as every mirror in the metrics represents one or more pixel.

Pros:

• Ultra-sharp and clear images
• Easy setup and light in weight

What to look for in a projector:

1. Throw Ratio:

To explain in layman terms, the throw ratio tells you what size of the picture will be projected on screen from a given distance. Larger the image to be projected, the smaller the throw ratio of the projector.

2. Brightness or Lumens:

Needless to say, brightness plays a very important role. The brighter the screen, the better is the experience. You should go for a higher lumen count projector if you are using it in a bright room.

As the rule of thumb says, a lumen count of 2000+ is good enough for dark rooms. But for people looking out for a real life like golf experience, its always recommended to opt for lumen count of 3000+.

3. HDMI Connectivity:

Crucial requirement for any golf simulator projector is the HDMI connectivity feature. This is the most used HD signal for transfer of both HD video and audio. While most modern projectors do comes with this feature, one must look out for this while they buy.

4. Resolution:

Resolution of your projector directly impacts the quality of the image displayed. The higher the resolution, the higher is the pixel count in your image and the better is the quality of image. Thus improving your play experience.

5. Aspect Ratio:

This factor defines the ratio between the height and the width of the projected image plus the shape of it. Most common aspect ratios that most projectors in the market offer are 4:3, 16:10 and 16:9.

Uses Of Projectors:

Most people in today’s world use projectors only for classroom and conference rooms. What is a lesser known fact is, that the uses of projectors are not bound only to that.

You can probably use projectors in every single situation where you can imagine wide audience presence.

To list the most common uses of projectors, here goes our list:

1. Classrooms and other educational institutes:

With increasing betterment in teaching technology, people prefer smart classrooms. Most important feature of a smart classroom is the projector.

Have you ever wondered why kindergarten and primary school assignments are mostly with pictures and activities? Yes, you got it right. It is a well-known fact that pictures and videos are a better way of conveying your message.

Not only it makes understanding of the topic easy but also grabs the attention real quick that lasts longer.

Words at times can result in discrepancy and confusion but pictures or videos prevent all such problems. Schools and colleges have the maximum users of projectors.

Use them for presentations or for explaining a topic or during the annual function, it will make everything a good experience. With features like zoom in, zoom out, you can also focus on details.

Features to look for:

Good lumen count of at least 3000 or more. As schools and colleges function during the day and classrooms are well-lit, one should check out the lumen count of the projector for bright display during presentations.

Short throw ratio enabling big displays in smaller rooms.

2. Home Theatres:

Another wide use of projectors is for home theatres. With rapid increase in the number of people preferring Home theatres, there has been a surplus increase in demand of projectors.

While most spaces for home theaters are dark, you would not need the lumen count to be too high but around 2500+ will do fine.

Features to look for:

• Multiple input options like HDMI port, audio out etc. At home you might want to connect sometimes your laptop and sometimes your phone. So make sure your projectors has flexible connectivity options.
• Noise cancelation: Older projectors are noisy which can highly impact your experience. Modern ones come with whisper quiet technology, which reduces the noise generation to minimum possible. While you watch you are sure there isn’t any issue because of the noise.
• Amazing picture quality: Most projectors out there offer fair enough display quality. But if you are looking for ultra- sharp and clear pictures, do check out for the contrast ratio and resolution of your projector.

3.Business use projectors:

Offices are incomplete without meeting/conference rooms and meeting rooms are incomplete without projectors. Business meetings always contain very important data in the presentations.

Imagine missing out on such important details because of the bad display quality of the projector. Nightmare right?! We know.

Features to look for:

• Sharp vivid and clear display: For Business use, it’s extremely important that projector has good enough contrast ratio and lumen count so you never miss out on details
• Flexibly connectivity options so you can connect to any device of your choice and project.

4.Engineering projectors:

Gone are the days when engineering students and architects had to use pen and paper for displaying their plans and ideas.

With advancing technology, special type of projectors have made it easy for them to display their thoughts and plan. In real world and real world projects, there is no scope for mistakes.

While pen and paper just give you rough ideas, special featured projectors can be used to bring these ideas lively for better and deeper understanding.

Lively projection of designs also helps in risk and danger analysis. Whenever and wherever necessary, corrections can be made before it gets too late during execution.

This use of projector has definitely proved to be a blessing for architects and engineers.

Features to look for:

• High contrast ratio: Projectors with high contrast ratio make you experience more colors and details uniquely distinguishing between various shades of colors. This gives you an idea of how the final look would look.
• Bigger display: The larger the display, the better display of details.

5. Concerts and shows:

Concerts and shows attract very wide audience. For such gatherings, we need projectors that provide 4K HD quality of display and widest possible display.

While most projectors come with in-built speakers, for reaching to such wide audience, you would need to plug in additional speakers but everything with display will be taken care by your projector.

Features to look for:

• High lumen count:
  Modern day LCD type projectors come with lumen count as high as 15000 ensuring bright and attractive display.
• 4K UHD display:
  Such commercial events need everything to be top class. So should be the display that modern technology projectors offer you. You can get ultra-sharp, clear, colorful real world like pictures with such 4K UHD projectors.

6. Projectors for frequent travelers:

Imagine having gone for a trek. After a fun filled day amidst nature, how cool and relaxing would it be to be able to watch your favorite movie?! Yes, this is now possible.

With expanding travel market, projector manufacturers have come up with travel suitable products. You can now carry them with you wherever you go and you are all set.

Features to look for:

• Light weight and durable so one can carry them everywhere and anywhere
• Anti-dust sensor to prevent dust accumulation making them more durable

7. Gaming:

In this fast pace world, where technology has solution to almost all our needs and problems. For the gamers out there, projectors offer life size experience of playing game on wide screens with crystal clear graphics.

One such solution is for golf lovers so they can experience playing golf from the comfort of their homes. The whole golf simulator setup requires projectors to display the golf course and game updates giving it a more real world look.

Features to look for:

• Lesser input lag: No gamer would want the screen to lag in updates. There are ample number of options that offers you input lag of just 3-4 ms.
• Faster refresh time for faster and almost up to date refreshment of screen.

8. Commercial theatre projectors:

One of the widest commercial use of projectors is in the movie theatres. Who does not go to theaters for movies?!

Yes even they use high motion projectors to project the movie. These are special kind of projectors that projects multiple frames at a rapid rate.

Conclusion:

Ordinary is sometimes not enough. We all deserve a little more than ordinary sometimes. For all of you with the same thought and looking out for projectors, we hope that we could help. Below are our suggestions of best projectors to help you out a little:

1. Optoma UHD38 for best gaming experience and least input lag of 4.2 ms.

2. Everycom X7 LED Full HD Projector for the best home and office use

3. BenQ TK800 for motion graphics without delay and clear sharp pictures

Hope it helped!