Hands On: Epson EX70 Multimedia Projector |
Those who tote around a portable projector for presentations will appreciate this one. Connecting to your computer with a VGA or DVI cable is very clumsy. The great advantage of the Epson EX70 is that you can connect via a USB cable. There are maybe one or two other projectors that can do this. If you want that convenience, check out the Epson EX70 for $799. You’ll like the fact that a USB cable is pretty easy to carry with you rather then a DVI or VGA cable. It makes setting things up a breeze.
The WXGA 1,280 by 800 resolution will go good with widescreen notebooks and the EX70 is easy to carry around. You can even show presentations without a computer, using an SD card or a USB drive. All of the ports are easily identified. Even a monkey could do it.
Setting it up is easy. When you first connect to your computer via USB, the projector installs the software. After that, a moment later the image of your desktop shows up on the screen. Then you can adjust the zoom and focus via 2 rings on the lens. The focus is overly sensitive, at least in the unit we reviewed. I had a hard time getting things crystal clear and always felt like things were just a bit fuzzy.
The EX70’s range is on the short side so it should be placed a little closer to the screen than most projectors. It should be mentioned that it seemed ultra bright with it’s 2,000 lumens. Great for the office lighting conditions.
Bottom line when it comes to presentations: It’s a great projector for the office setting.
Watching movies on the Epson EX70 didn’t fare so well. Everything I tried to watch at a largish size failed. First I tried viewing some DVDs via the USB cable. Everything was full of lag and choppy. Not at all like the awesome experience I had with the MovieMate 55. Once I used the Component video cable instead, it cured the choppiness and one could watch a movie, however I seemed to be getting a strange line on the screen in either case. Once I took the video down to 480 size, everything seemed fine however.
As far as watching movies on the Epson EX70: It will do it’s job as long as the image is small.
Sound was pretty disappointing. It didn’t want to pump out room filling sound like the MovieMate 55. However that may have been my laptop that I tested it on.
Movie issues aside, this is a fairly good projector for the office. It will do what you need it to do from not too far away.
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Okay I am a little surprised at the bad video quality. Perhaps the USB connect is a very bad choice for video and DVD connection. There should be an HDMI connection for video/Blu Ray. The reason I am concerned is because this projector is essentially the exact same projector as the new Epson Home Cinema 700, which have been waiting for a review on. It’s a 720P projector meant for Home Theaters so I wonder if the USB provides a very bad video signal and the HDMI is much better. If anyone know more please comment.
The USB connection should only be used for static presentations, it doesn’t have enough bandwidth for high-quality video. The EX70’s HDMI or component video input should be used for video.
The EX70 is essentially identical to the PowerLite Home Cinema 700 except for the case color (black vs white) and resolution (1280×800 vs 1280×720). Unless you prefer the white case, I would choose the EX70 to get the extra 100K pixels.
Office Depot has it on sale for $699, free shipping. I just ordered one.