Updated 21 May, 2013, 11:50 am IST

LG HS201 Ultramobile Projector

03 Aug, 2010 | by Anand Tuliani

It’s compact and yet offers a lot more than its larger siblings.

The LG HS201 affirms the fact that good things come in small packages. This sweet little lunchbox-sized projector weighs only 800 grams and by its diminutive size it would be difficult for anyone to believe it’s more versatile than its larger siblings. What sets it apart are FM radio transmission and a built-in media player which has native support for DivX, MP3 and JPEG files.

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Features
The HS201 employs DLP projection system and has a native resolution of 800x600 pixels which is offered by the sub-Rs 30,000 entry-level DLP projectors. Larger projectors use powerful halogen lamps for projection. But since this projector is too compact to handle the heat emitted by a halogen lamp it uses a powerful LED lamp. LED lamps offer two advantages; firstly they don’t heat up much and secondly they consume less power. But the drawback is that they aren’t very bright. Halogen lamps have a brightness of over 2000 ANSI Lumens, but the LED lamp fitted in this projector has a rated brightness of 300 ANSI Lumens which restricts the size of projection. The projector draws power from a 19 V adapter and consumes only 85 Watts when functioning.

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LG has provided an array of video inputs which allows you to connect a wider range of video sources. The rear panel has composite and HDMI inputs along with the standard D-sub port. Component input is supported via a component-to-D-sub dongle which is included in the package. A pair of 3.5 mm jacks is provided for feeding the audio and sound output. The presence of HDMI input is a big bonus, the advantage being you can connect laptops, Blu-ray players and gaming consoles. Also it’s hassle-free because digital video and audio signals are carried over a single cable. If the resolution of the source video is higher than 800x600 (for example 720p or 1080p), the output is automatically downscaled to 800x600 pixels by the projector.

User interface
The user interface of the HS201 is extremely intuitive. You can adjust the settings using the control panel on top or the remote control, the latter being more user-friendly. The control panel features tinted button that look metallic. But when you adjust the settings the buttons illuminate. Right on top is the button for selecting the input, followed by buttons for navigation, menu and power. After pressing the menu button, everything is self-explanatory. The menu levels are minimal and the tabbed interface is very user-friendly with big icons and clearly-labelled functions. The IR remote control is about the size of a candy bar phone and offers more functions than on the projector’s control panel such as volume control, keystone correction, USB host hotkey, page up / down, and playback controls for audio and movies.

The main screen has icons for picture quality, screen, audio, sleep timer, options, information, input and USB. Although these are present in the tabbed interface when you enter the GUI, it was very thoughtful of LG to provide direct access to the sections to speed up navigation. The most important function in projectors is adjustments for picture quality. You can choose from five built-in presets (Vivid, Standard, Cinema, Sport and Game) or fully customize up to two presets of your own. In addition to brightness, contrast, sharpness, saturation and tint (red and green), you can also fine tune the white balance and eliminate noise. The expert mode allows you to set the method for adjusting the white balance (IRE or 2 points) and contrast and brightness for RGB and CMYK channels.