Compare the specs or a broad brushstroke description of the MicroVision ShowWX+ ($349 direct) with the earlier MicroVision ShowWX ($500 street, 2.5 stars), and you won't see much difference, which probably explains why the names are so similar. In reality, however, the ShowWX+ deserves a far more significant name change. It's a more polished product in lots of small ways, it solves the one serious image problem that the ShowWX suffered from, and it's a lot cheaper as well. In short, it's a significantly different projector, and a far more attractive choice compared to the competition.
The most obvious difference in the ShowWX+—the one you can see immediately even before you plug anything in or turn it on—is purely superficial. Where the MicroVision ShowWX's physical design had an industrial flavor to it, the ShowWX+ has much more of a consumer electronics feel, with a sleek, shiny black case.
The other obvious difference is a 50 percent boost in brightness rating, from 10 to 15 lumens. A 5 lumen difference may not sound like a lot, but keep in mind the perception of brightness is logarithmic, which means the perceived difference between 10 and 15 lumens will be just as significant as the perceived difference between 1,000 and 1,500 lumens.
The Basics
As I've already suggested, the ShowWX+ hasn't changed much from the ShowWX otherwise, at least in general description. It draws an image using red, green, and blue lasers, much like cathode ray tubes use electron guns. And although it doesn't have a native resolution in the same sense as DLP, LCD, and LCOS projectors, it has a preferred resolution for optimal performance, at 848 by 480, one of the variations on WVGA and appropriate for the wide-format version of 480p video.
As I've already suggested, the ShowWX+ hasn't changed much from the ShowWX otherwise, at least in general description. It draws an image using red, green, and blue lasers, much like cathode ray tubes use electron guns. And although it doesn't have a native resolution in the same sense as DLP, LCD, and LCOS projectors, it has a preferred resolution for optimal performance, at 848 by 480, one of the variations on WVGA and appropriate for the wide-format version of 480p video.
Aside from the case's color, the physical design is also largely unchanged. It measures 0.6 by 2.4 by 4.6 inches (HWD) and weighs 4.3 ounces complete with the rechargeable battery. The only connectors are a USB connector on the side for power and for firmware upgrades and a proprietary port for input plus a pass-through audio output on the back. The projector itself doesn't have an audio system, and the only potential audio input is through the supplied iPod cable. When you're connected to your iPod (or iWhatever), the audio-out port lets you plug in a headset so you can listen to the sound.
Cables
The projector also comes with an AC-power block, a USB cable, and two video adapters. The power block lets you recharge the battery as well as run the projector when the battery dies, although it can't do both at once. Both adapters plug into the proprietary connector. One lets you connect to a standard composite video cable. The other plugs directly into the Apple 30-pin connector on an iPod, iPhone, or iPad, and is Apple certified.
The projector also comes with an AC-power block, a USB cable, and two video adapters. The power block lets you recharge the battery as well as run the projector when the battery dies, although it can't do both at once. Both adapters plug into the proprietary connector. One lets you connect to a standard composite video cable. The other plugs directly into the Apple 30-pin connector on an iPod, iPhone, or iPad, and is Apple certified.
The ShowWX+ doesn't normally come with an adapter to let it plug into a computer, but MicroVision sells a VGA dock ($49.99 direct) that it supplied for this review. The dock is essentially just another adapter with a cable that plugs into the projector's proprietary port. The reason it's a dock rather than just a cable is that VGA cables tend to be stiff enough to act like springs, and it's not unusual with pico projectors for the cable to make it hard to keep the projector pointed where you want it. The dock's extra mass and rubber feet help the projector stay in place.
Setup and Performance
Setting up the ShowWX+ is typical for a pico projector, with one important exception. The nature of laser light means that you don't have to focus. Just point it at whatever you're using as a screen, at any distance, and the image will be in focus.
Setting up the ShowWX+ is typical for a pico projector, with one important exception. The nature of laser light means that you don't have to focus. Just point it at whatever you're using as a screen, at any distance, and the image will be in focus.
Picking an acceptable image size for a pico projector is always a judgment call, but I ran most of my tests in theater dark lighting with a 48-inch wide image, and found the image more than usable, although a touch dimmer that I would have liked. As a point of reference, with the ShowWX, I put the limit at a somewhat smaller 39-inch wide image.
The really good news is that the obvious increase in brightness is the least important difference I saw between the ShowWX and ShowWX+ images. Image quality has little to do with brightness, and the improvement in quality was by far the more significant change.
Image quality
When I reviewed the ShowWX, I saw a green line flickering across the bottom of screens with black backgrounds. With the ShowWX+ the flickering green line is gone. That by itself translates into a vast improvement in image quality.
When I reviewed the ShowWX, I saw a green line flickering across the bottom of screens with black backgrounds. With the ShowWX+ the flickering green line is gone. That by itself translates into a vast improvement in image quality.
Beyond that, the projector performed reasonably well on our suite of DisplayMate tests. The one issue worth mention is the laser speckle effect, which is most obvious with bright colors, and hurts the readability of black text on a white background. Although white text on black was more easily readable than black on white, however, both were readable at all the sizes we test with.
Keep in mind too that although the speckle effect is specific to laser light, other technologies have their own characteristic artifacts. In particular, most pico projectors, including the Editors' ChoiceOptoma PK301 Pico Pocket Projector ($400 street, 4 stars), show a rainbow effect, the tendency for light areas to break up into little red-green-blue rainbows. Depending on your needs, you may find either effect more annoying than the other. Rainbow artifacts tend to be more visible with video, while the ShowWX+ speckle effect is more of an issue for data.
The bigger issue for video with the ShowWX+ is shadow detail, with the projector tending to lose detail in dark areas. The issue isn't serious enough to be a problem in most of my test clips, but in the most demanding clips, fairly large areas of the screen turned into blocks of black, which is obviously a problem for scenes with low light levels and lots of shadow. I also saw some posterization (colors changing suddenly where they should shade gradually) in skin tones in the most demanding scenes.
Both of these problems are most likely the result of the projector's 16-bit color depth, with only 65,536 colors. Without full 24-bit color (16.7 million colors), there simply aren't enough colors available in the display to show every full color image well, even though 16-bit color can handle most images well enough. Note too, that the loss of shadow detail isn't as bad as it was with the original ShowWX, which MicroVision says is thanks to improvements in laser control algorithms.
In addition to our usual tests, finally, I connected the projector to an iPod Touch, and confirmed that it worked as promised.
Ultimately, the Microvision ShowWX+ is the projector that I was hoping to see with the original ShowWX. It's a lot more polished, has no serious problems, and sells for an appropriate price for what it delivers. Other projectors in the same price range may offer additional features, like being able to show photos and video from internal memory, but the ShowWX+ offers enough for the price to make it a serious contender, and well worth considering.
Taken from PCMAG.COM
Taken from PCMAG.COM
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