An interesting new product

Anytime I travel in the motorhome I take an LCD projector with me. I do this for several reasons. First, I use the projector in my work to give seminars on electrical safety. Second, I use the projector for viewing my photos. Third I like to project movies on the side of my motorhome for friends and family to enjoy, and finally, once a year the group I camp with gets together to watch the Ohio State Buckeyes play the Penn State Nittany Lions and we use the projector to view the football game on a large screen.

I recently became aware of a new product on the market that attracted my interest. The Benq Joybee GP1 Mini Projector. On the surface this is a very clever tool, weighing in at 1.4 lbs. and fitting in the palm of your hand.



Anytime you can reduce the size and weight of the equipment you carry in your RV it is an advantage and this device showed a lot of promise in those areas so I got hold of one to see if it lives up to its promise and if it also provided an image suitable for the above uses.

Being a typical male, when I received my projector, I took it out of the box, plugged it in and fired it up without looking at any of the instructions. At first I was puzzled by the lack of tactile feedback from the control buttons on the top of the projector until I realized that the buttons are sensor type and there is an audible click when you "press" the button. Once I realized this, the control interface was very pleasant. The first thing I did was connect the projector to my computer to verify that I could use my powerpoint presentations. Benq provides a cable that plugs into the back of the projector an terminates at the other end with a USB plug and a set of RCA jacks. I plugged the USB connector into my computer and it quickly recognized the projector and my desktop screen appeared on the projected image. One thing I noticed very quickly was that there is no zoom adjustment and what you see is what you get as far as size is concerned. You do have a focus adjustment and there is a software keystone setting, but if the picture size is not right, you have to move the projector or the viewing screen.



Before I continue with my observations on the operation of the projector, it became obvious that one way they made the projector smaller is by moving the DC power supply out of the projector and putting it inline in the power cord. On my regular projector the power cord is just a power cord. On the Joybee, the cord has a fairly large "block" halfway up which is the DC power supply for the projector. You can see these differences in the photo above, and please don't misunderstand, I'm not complaining about this necessary component, just commenting about where it got put.

All in all, this device is a nice piece of equipment. I found it is necessary to use the included remote control in order to take advantage of features I need or want to use, particularly the direct reading USB port, but that is not a major problem.

When I was doing side by side comparisons with my original projector I noticed that the Benq device did not get very hot while my Optima was very hot. The side by side brightness on the screen was comparable.

I like this device and will be using it in my work. I would like to see them provide a carrying case for all the parts I need including the cords and cables. That would make use much more convenient. I'm thinking the ideal use for this projector is going to be when I make sales calls in a customer's office because it can be used with no other equipment and a USB jump drive loaded. I will also be using the projector in the motorhome to watch movies projected on a screen. This seems to be an ideal way to get large screen video without the investment in a big screen TV. Admittedly at about five hundred bucks the projector is pricey, but considering the life expectancy of the lamp is 20000 hrs. much of this might be made up in bulb replacement cost alone.

Black Licorice

Hey, let's face it, I like black licorice! I'm not going to make any excuses because it is my favorite. Actually, I like all kinds of soft chewy candy including gummy bears, gummy worms, coke bottles, sour gummy worms, good and plenty, and even laffy taffy. My candy preference is really very limited when it comes to hard candy. I remember at Christmas time, at our house, we had some of both and when Christmas time was over, we always had to throw out those red and white minty things that stuck to the bottom of the serving dish because no one ever ate all of them, including me. Somehow there is a satisfaction associated with chewing candy that just isn't there with hard candy. Maybe it's because you can eat soft candy while hard candy you must crunch it or some other sort of barbaric activity. Yes, soft candy is the way to go, no doubt.

However, there is one very special soft candy that just can't be beat and that is chewy black licorice. Left on my own, with no restrictions, I can probably put away as much black licorice as anybody, probably more than is really good for me.

Actually, twizzlers (which is a brand name) don't contain true licorice, but are made to taste like licorice and are much less intense. Real licorice can actually work to raise your blood pressure while twizzlers won't have that effect. I prefer the taste of the real licorice but can pound down a bunch of twizzlers just as quickly.

I like eating gummy bears and all the rest, but for real pleasure, give me a bag of fresh, soft, chewy, real black licorice.