Our New Egate Home LED Projector & Screen :)

Here is our new Egate LED Projector & Screen that we bought recently to watch movies on a bigger screen during the weekends.

It’s been eight months since I watched a movie because mobile/computer/TV screens cause eye-strain when I watch for a long time. So unless I am working, I stay away from these light-emitting gadgets as long as possible.

The last time I went to my eye doctor, he told me that there would be no eye strain if I watch something from over 20-feet of distance. That’s why we don’t strain our eyes while watching movies in the theater.

Also, with a projector, we are not exposed to light directly. We just see the reflection of light from the screen. This is softer on the eyes.

Considering all these things, I checked on Amazon India and I was surprised to find that there were a number of inexpensive LED projectors selling on that marketplace.

After a little research, I zeroed-in on Egate LED projector. I guess this is made in China, but most electronics are made in China anyway.

Since these are low-cost projectors, the brightness and resolution are quite less. So it’s not possible to use it for work purposes – text is difficult to read. However, it’s more than sufficient for watching movies and youtube videos – especially at night. Which is what I wanted it for.

I was able to connect my DTH set-top box and my laptop with the projector easily with the HDMI cable supplied by the manufacturer. I also bought a longer (5m) HDMI cable because I wanted the laptop to be near me as I need to select youtube videos frequently.

I also bought a large projector screen from Amazon. There are many in the 4:3 aspect ratio but I searched for and bought one in the 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio. This one is bigger and the projector display fits it perfectly – it occupies almost the full screen from where we have placed it.

The projector has a built-in speaker. It picks up the audio too via the HDMI cable and automatically plays it while playing the video. The audio is loud but not always clear. For better audio, I guess I’ll have to buy and connect a good external speaker via the audio out port in the future.

Actually, I bought the ‘Miracast’ model thinking I’ll mirror my mobile screen to the projector display. But while setting it up I discovered that Android has dropped miracast in its recent versions. So, for now, I am trying to figure out how to connect the mobile without buying Chromecast or Amazon Fire Stick.

I think I should have bought the Projector model with built-in Android. That way, we can just connect it to WiFi and load apps directly from the projector. If you want to buy one in the future, buy an Android projector. The price difference between the models is not that much.

Try to buy the max. resolution and brightness your budget will allow. Mine is 720p and 400 ANSI Lumens (I think). There are better models than this. If you just want to use it to watch movies at night this is fine.

Destination Infinity

PS: We have already watched two movies – that too continuously without any break. So far I did not face any strain on my eyes. I hope to watch at least two movies every week from now on – on the weekends. Who needs a theater when we have a projector? Thanks to the Chinese