Sprint to exclusively sell ZTE mini Android projector

Gone, at least potentially, are the days of salespeople having to lug around a 4-pound projector to make presentations to potential customers.

Sprint announced that starting Friday, it will exclusively sell the LivePro 14.1 ounce cordless mini projector and mobile hotspot manufactured by ZTE. At just 4.7 inches by 4.7 inches, and 1.1 inches thick, it is small enough to fit into a briefcase or purse.

Sprint claims that it's the world's first commercially available pocket projector and mobile hotspot.

Because it is also a Wi-Fi hotspot, it can be used to download videos and presentations over the Web using the Sprint LTE network. The LivePro also simultaneously supports up to eight Wi-Fi ready devices, which could include a laptop, tablet or smartphone.

LivePro will sell for $450, or $18.75 a month under Sprint's Easy Pay 24-month payment plan.

Mobile data plans at Sprint for the LivePro start at $35 a month for 3GB of data on Sprint's 4G/3G network, or $50 for 6GB, or $80 for 12GB. Sprint has rolled out LTE 4G in 471 cities and has an enhanced LTE service called Spark in 27 markets. Spark delivers average wireless download speeds of 6 to 15 Mbps.

In addition to a DLP projector lamp that can project images from 10 inches to 10 feet, there is a 4-in. touchscreen display on the top of the LivePro unit with 800 x 480 resolution.

The Sprint LivePro pocket projector and hotspot goes on sales July 11.

The lamp's brightness is 100 lumens and is designed to last 20,000 hours. Images will be projected at 1,280 x 800 pixels in either a 4:3 or 16:9 aspect ratio.

The internal battery is rated at 5,000mAh and can be used to charge other devices via a charging cable.

On board, the unit runs Android 4.2, Jelly Bean, and has a 1.2 GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and 1 GB RAM. Images from other devices such as smartphones can be mirrored wirelessly with Wi-Fi Miracast.

Other connections are possible via Bluetooth. There are also HDMI and USB ports. Internal storage is 4GB, but a microSD card slot can support up to 32GB.

In addition to an embedded speaker, there is a 3.5mm stereo headset or speaker jack.

Matt Hamblen covers mobile and wireless, smartphones and other handhelds, and wireless networking for Computerworld. Follow Matt on Twitter at @matthamblen or subscribe to Matt's RSS feed. His email address is mhamblen@computerworld.com.

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