If you’re shopping for a portable projector, you know about trade-offs. You can buy a projector with the brightness level you need, but it will probably weigh more than you want. Or you can buy a projector that’s lightweight enough to lug around easily, but it won’t be bright enough for every situation. If you’re presenting in a small room with little or no ambient light, a lightweight 1200- to 1500-lumen projector is fine- in theory. In reality, the room can change at the last minute, so shouldn’t you bring along a 2000- to 3000-lumen projector? That’s the dilemma. How much extra brightness is worth how much extra weight, especially if you may not need the additional brightness?

Fortunately, projectors are constantly improving, so these days you really can have your cake and eat it, too. And you can get that cake to go. The 5.7-pound Panasonic PT-LB30NTU lets you have it both ways, by pushing the envelope on brightness while holding the line on weight. It’s the first under-six-pound projector that’s rated at 3000 ANSI lumens. That’s enough for most lighting conditions in most venues.

This LCD projector has an XGA-native resolution and 400:1 contrast ratio. The contrast ratio is limited compared to what you get with DLP projectors, but it’s more than sufficient for most types of business graphics. Overall, I found the displayed colors to be accurate and well saturated, with only minimal levels of bleed-through, visual noise and chromatic distortion.

In addition to being a brightness leader for its weight, the PT-LB30NTU has some unusual features that help it stand out from the crowd. The projector has an ambient light sensor that matches the color intensity and color balance to the light in the room. It does this by measuring both the level and color temperature of the surrounding light. It works best in environments where the light is consistent throughout the room, because the sensor reads the light falling on the projector, not the screen. If the screen has ambient light from a fluorescent lamp, and the projector is illuminated by an incandescent lamp, it could adjust the color temperature in the wrong direction. Similarly, if the screen area is dark and the projector area has spot lighting, it could over-intensify the colors. You can easily turn on or off this feature using the onscreen menus, so the best approach might be to switch it on, see if it improves the look of your presentation, and- if it does- leave it on.

Like other recently released projectors, the PT-LB30NTU supports wireless presentations through its support of the 802.11b and 802.11g protocols. While it’s good news that manufacturers are building WiFi into their projectors, many presenters aren’t sure how to use the wireless capabilities with their presentations. Panasonic helps to address this problem with Wireless Manager Mobile Edition 2, a software program that’s supplied with the projector. Using the program’s Motion Streaming mode, you can send ASF, WMV, AVI, MPEG-1, MPEG-2 or MPEG-4 files from your computer to the projector. For copyright protection, the software doesn’t support wireless projection of DVDs. Using the program’s Multi Live mode, you can simultaneously display content from as many as 16 WiFi-equipped computers. For example, you could split the screen into four sections so your audience could compare regional performance charts from the four previous speakers. It’s an interesting visual effect and relatively easy to implement, though it may not be worth the trouble to setup and test prior to mission-critical presentations.

Other useful features include a fast startup time, unusually quiet operation and environmentally friendly construction. It takes just two seconds for an image to appear on the screen after pressing the power button, though it takes about a minute for the image to reach its full brightness. The projector runs a remarkably quiet 30dB when set to its low-power mode, which can be a real plus with smaller rooms. And while few companies evaluate purchases according to environmental qualities, it doesn’t hurt to be a good corporate citizen. The PT-LB30NTU uses lead-free solder on the circuit boards, lead-free glass in the lens, no halogenated flame retardants and no Styrofoam in the packing materials. (Panasonic also recently took the lead out of its DVX100 line of camcorders by introducing an eco-friendlier model.)

The built-in 24.0mm-28.8mm manual-focus lens has a relatively short throw. You could use this projector as close as 3-feet, 7-inches from the screen, or as far as 35-feet, 5-inches from the screen. Given the short throw, this would be a good projector for a ceiling installation in a tight space. Panasonic offers an optional ET-PKB30 ceiling mount bracket for this model. The projector can automatically correct for a vertical keystone distortion of ±30 °, so you would have a fair amount of latitude in positioning the projector and screen.

This model also has a power-off feature that lets you disconnect the power cable without having to wait for the lamp to cool. The cooling fan continues to operate until the lamp is no longer hot. Another thoughtful feature is an RGB connector that can be configured either as an RGB-2 input or an RGB-1 output. When configured as an output, it can be used for loop-through monitoring. A blackboard mode allows you to project your images on a standard blackboard (handy for classroom presentations). And a natural mode provides full compatibility with the sRGB color space for situations where color accuracy is of the utmost importance.

Though often heavily discounted, the PT-LB30NTU is far from the least expensive six-pound or 3000-lumen projector you can buy. If the price ($4,299) is too much of a stretch, but you like what you see, you might consider purchasing Panasonic’s PT-LB30U projector. This model is nearly identical to the PT-LB30NTU, except it doesn’t include the wireless capabilities and lists for $500 less. Panasonic also has two 2000-lumen projectors (the wireless PT-LB20NTU and non-wireless PT-LB20U), which share many features with the 3000-lumen series, such as the ambient light sensor, fast startup time and short-throw lens. If you have an extremely tight budget, these projectors probably wouldn’t qualify, but if your funding is flexible, these unusual features could be very useful.

Environmentally Friendly Construction
Why hurt the environment if you don’t have to? The PT-LB30NTU uses lead-free solder on the circuit boards, lead-free glass in the lens, no halogenated flame retardants and no Styrofoam in the packing materials.

Fast Startup
Press the power button, and in two seconds an image is on the screen. In about a minute, the image will reach its full brightness.

Daylight View Technology
The top-mounted ambient light sensor automatically adjusts the projector’s color intensity and color balance to match the light in the room.

Bright for Its Weight
Even though it weighs just 5.7 pounds, this projector has an impressive brightness rating of 3000 ANSI lumens. That’s enough for most lighting conditions in most venues.

Quiet Operation
Hate projectors that are so loud you have to raise your voice to be heard? This model has a relatively quiet 30dB noise level when set to the low-power mode.

Weight: 5.7 pounds
Brightness: 3000 ANSI lumens
Resolution: XGA
Size: 12.84 x 3.25 x 9.15 inches
Engine: LCD display, 1.2x manual zoom
Wireless Support: 802.11g/b