LOOKING FOR A really small projector? Well, Acer’s K11 might not be the smallest projector out there and despite Acer calling it a pocket projector, you’d need rather large pockets to actually fit it in one, but it does beat the competition in just about every sense when it comes to features. One drawback of LED projectors is the fairly low resolution, but Acer is still better than most here.
The K11 measures 122x43x116mm and its one of the lightest in its class at 610g. However, neither of these features are the big selling points of the K11 as it’s not significantly smaller or lighter than it’s competition. What makes this a tempting option for the travelling presenter is the fact that it can deliver 200 ANSI lumens of brightness, not much compared to traditional projectors, but still better than just about every other option on the market. It also has a contrast ratio of 2000:1 and a 30,000 hour lamp life.
Where things start to get really interesting is when you get to the connectivity options, as Acer has kitted out the K11 with an HDMI port as well as a D-sub and a composite video connector. The latter two aren’t anything special, but HDMI is still a rare sight on small projectors like this and only LG offers a competitive solution here. Acer has also added a USB port which is fairly common, but there’s also an SD card slot which we haven’t seen on projectors this size before. With an iPod or iPhone A/V adapter you can also connect these devices directly to the K11.
Sadly the native resolution of 858×600 pixels isn’t all that impressive, but it’s something of a standard in this market segment. It’s less than ideal for movies and as Acer is not only targeting the K11 to road warriors, but also home users, this might be a feature that many aren’t overly impressed by, at least not if they already have an HD capable TV. The K11 can project a 47-inch picture at 2 meters and it also features automatic keystone correction, something Acer’s competiton doesn’t offer. One final neat trick is that it can use your notebook powerbrick as the power source, as long as you have an Acer notebook. Of course this requires your notebook to run on battery power.
The built in media player handles AVI, MOV, MPEG-4 (but only simple profile), MJEPG, H.263, H.264 and 3GP video files as well as JPEG and BMP pictures. Additionally, It will play back audio in MP3, WMA, PCM, ADPCM and OGG audio formats, although the 1W mono speakers isn’t likely to impress. As a presentation device we’re missing support for PowerPoint files. At around $500 the K11 is anything but cheap and it’s set to launch in the US shortly, although it’s already available in Europe.S|A
Lars-Göran Nilsson
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