Given the fact that the economy is pretty much going bust, it's really no wonder that pretty much every major manufacturer of consumer electronics and computer peripherals is trying to come up with some sort of "crisis" product, which will combine fairly OK features with a very attractive price point. And that's exactly the case with the latest projector from Epson, the PowerLite Home Cinema 700, a device designed especially for home users, which delivers 720p resolution, while retailing at quite an affordable price point.

The device, which supports a maximum output of 1280 x 800 pixels, is powered by a 3LCD, 3-chip optical engine, accompanied by a 140 W UHE E-TORL lamp, plus F: 1.6 – 1.74, f: 18.4 – 22.12 mm optical lens, with manual zoom and manual focus. This whole assembly allows the device to generate up to 16.7 million colors, diagonal sizes of up to 270 inches, and a 1.2x optical zoom. The throw ratio range varies depending on the specific aspect ratio, namely 1.58 – 1.90 (16:10) and 1.79 – 2.15 (4:3).

The lamp deserves some special attention. It generates white/color light outputs of up to 2000 ANSI lumens, it can last for up to 4000 hours (in Low Light Output Mode) or up to 3000 hours (in High Light Output Mode), but, unfortunately, it consumes quite a high amount of power, its 140 W representing more than half of the overall power consumption of the device, of around 246 W.

Connectivity-wise, the projector from Epson is quite well-endowed, featuring D-sub 15 pin, S-video, Composite video and audio inputs, plus one HDMI port, one USB connector, an SD card slot and even a monitor output.

Of course, it remains to be seen just how many people will actually rush-in to purchase such a product, given the fact that this will probably be the "poorest" Christmas in a very long time, but the price/features ratio is quite a good one, so Epson might record a pretty good level of success with this thing.


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