I notice that the much-touted Microvision laser projector is available at last:
http://www.microvision.com/showwx/
Does anybody know what technology/wavelength/power LASERs are inside?
Printable View
I notice that the much-touted Microvision laser projector is available at last:
http://www.microvision.com/showwx/
Does anybody know what technology/wavelength/power LASERs are inside?
http://www.microvision.com/pdfs/pek_specs.pdfQuote:
Originally Posted by weartronics
Wavelengths are 442, 532 and 642. No clue about powers.
Although I'd be very keen to see that 442 in action. :cool:
I would think they'd legally have to keep it under 5mW ...
But it's based on MPE, and since it is not a beam when it exits the device, the same power would be less likely to do damage.
This one is projecting a beam, it uses a MEMS scanner to do raster scanning
http://www.microvision.com/pico_proj...owitworks.html
Therefore could still fall under the same issues as a laser projector
I don't think it could be done with only 5mW/color. There must be an exception for display technology that utilizes lasers.. the power is spread over a very large area, so it doesn't seem far fetched to me that they would be exempt from the 5mW restriction on that merit.Quote:
Originally Posted by Things
The specs are saying it outputs 10 lumens. According to Chroma, for a balanced white, output powers should be something like 13mW 532nm, 22mW 642nm and 12mW 445nm. Another thing is they says it's a laser class 2 product...
http://www.microvision.com/showwx/pd..._userguide.pdfQuote:
Originally Posted by weartronics
pg. 5
Red
AlGalnP laser diode
90 mW
635-645nm
Blue
GaN laser diode
50 mW
440-460nm
Green
Frequency doubled IR laser diode
60 mW
526-537nm
Any idea how much?
Puzzled as to how it can be Class II and yet output 200mw.
Nice, thanks!Quote:
Originally Posted by cjyetman
The power levels are comparable to those of low-powered vector projectors. I don't know if the MEMS scanner could be adapted for vector scanning or if the mechanics are designed around resonant frequencies of the raster scan. But I think this type of product, especially as it becomes more of a commodity/consumer product, could be an interesting source of pre-mounted, pre-aligned, diameter/divergence matched, white-balanced RGB diodes/modules, collimators and dichros. Basically sapping all the fun out of building your own projector.
Of course, if this type of product becomes more of a commodity/consumer product, nobody would be impressed by a comparable vector projector anyway! :(
hmmm... *wonders what would happen if he swapped out the low powered crap for his 4W RGB..."
You'd probably melt the little scanning mirrors at 4W :P
Do it! Do it! Do it! http://www.photonlexicon.com/forums/...chmentid=12915Quote:
Originally Posted by aijii
somehow i don't think i'd fit the beam on the mems chip...
they'd have put some many hours towards getting the beams from each of the diodes exactly the same divergence/beam size...
they probably focus the beam to fit on the mems chip, then re-collimate it afterwards...
pretty cool idea though. won't be long guys before we're ripping apart "macrovision" home theatre projectors to rip the lasers out of... perfectly collimated, 445, 532 and 640nm RGB lasers...
Hi all,
I get the showwx+ (50% brighter than showwx) from amazon to France and I love it:)
The Green laser is not a DPSS (808nm pump diode and Nd-vanadate + ktp doubler, system well known here.)
Microvision use the G-1000 green lasers from Corning, it's a special SHG (second harmonic generation, direct 1060 IR diode + doubler only!) green laser. This Green Laser G-1000 will be one of the most highly efficient, highest blanking speed and smallest size, for the moment.
Attachment 22566
As you can read on the web, Corning stop this "synthetic green laser" because the arrival of direct green laser diodes is imminent.
This green system will probably never find in a commercial lasershow... lol
I want dismantles a "old" showwx v1 next time, I'd like to see this totaly awesome white laser source assembly...
At aperture of the showwx, I can see clearly the resonant MEMS micro mirror, like 1mm diameter, round.
The white beam diam. is like <1mm ! divergence looks very good... and blanking speed is... lol >20KHz ?!
Have a Joyous Holiday Season!
Pascal
i had thought about that a couple of years back (pumping a doubler directly with 1080) but i lack the technical skills, theoretical knowledge and funding to go on and actually build it. so it was more of a half drunk pipe dream. lucky me, someone who knew what he was doing went on and actually built itQuote:
Originally Posted by Serveurperso
http://insightmedia.info/images/ps08-img1.jpg
this "imminent" makes me really anxious..... any more info?Quote:
Originally Posted by Serveurperso
http://ntuzhchen.blogspot.com/2010/1...een-laser.html
My english is bad, sorry, and "imminent" seems exaggerated, but it's soon for sure :
1) http://www.microvision.com/displayground/?p=1030 Microvision Signs Multi-Year Agreement with OSRAM for Supply of Green and Blue Lasers (August 6th, 2009 !)
2) http://www.azom.com/news.asp?newsID=18547 OSRAM 50mW direct green laser diode
3) http://www.picopros.com/article/osra...er-development -=> On July 20, 2010 Compound Semiconductor reported an update related to Osram Opto-Semicondustors' solid-state green laser development program... ...Companies such as Microvision have indicated that they plan to start sampling direct-emitting green laser deigns this year and will have a few designs available in production volumes by mid-2011. This gives Osram some (but not much) time to improve things if they want to get into the first PicoP® products using solid-state green lasers in 2011 !!!!
http://www.picopros.com/article/nich...ico-projectors or 510nm direct green from NICHIA....
Mid/End 2011 : Microvision ShowWX "3" with Osram or Nichia direct green:)
Some information for now :
This is the 3ch laser driver used by Microvision, from MAXIM, News: http://www.investorvillage.com/mbthr...1798&showall=1 and Datasheet : http://www.maxim-ic.com/datasheet/index.mvp/id/6307 !
A matching 2D Mems scanner datasheet : http://maradin.co.il/maradin-product/specification/ ...
http://www.picopros.com/article/corn...-launch-timing
Microvision use Corning G-1000 for Showwx 1, and G-2000 for ShowWX+ it is possible.
The G-2000 is 30% brighter (60mW -=> 80mW) and 60% more efficient (blue and red diode can use more power with same battery usage) and offers 20% better bandwidth than G-1000.
I don't understand how the adjustment "COLOR ALIGMENT" work on this product :
Each color can be independently moved horizontally or vertically, it's awesome I dont understand how it is technically possible with three combined lasers, and a micro-mirror MEMS....
Servo Motorised optical part?
I get a small issue with the showwx+, I just noticed that the green output is slightly noisy, from unpacking, I can see slight horizontal lines on all white background, on Windows/VGA.
It's slightly visible even on the green, yellow or cyan part of the embedded image.
I get small power variations on the green laser, like a "superimposed white noise" of low/medium frequency.
RED and BLUE are perfect (No noise)
It's barely noticeable for normal use, but clearly visible on full power green full screen size.
I ask Microvision about this...
Pascal
This new technology seems very promising, despite I see at least two downsides which would temper a lasershow use : first the 510nm wavelength is half as bright as 532nm (and that's not a very true green), and secondly the power we could reach with these don't seem as powerful as the recent blue diodes... Maybe we would be stuck to combine a lot of diodes to obtain bigger power, like we do for the red ones... But wait and see ;)
BTW, how's performing your Lasever 1W 532nm Pascal?? Je pense qu'il a encore une longue vie devant lui avant d'être remplacé par une diode verte native :)
The green is a DPSS, which has been shown to have the tendency to mode-hop when modulating. Since you're modulating it with a high-frequency signal like video, it's not unthinkable that the doubling crystal will just barf at it and modulate terribly bad.Quote:
Originally Posted by Serveurperso
Just to prevent any terminology disputes: The diode is a direct-pumped doubled laser. The lasing *still* happens inside the doubling crystal, so technically it's a DPSS. Furthermore, it's well-known that the temperature variation of the doubling crystal will cause lasers to vary in power and hop modes.
I wonder how these Osram green diodes will end up.
I doubt the dpss is modulated with video-data.
I am sure that the micromirror device does this.
like early television, you raster-scan X and Y on the mirror with a dual ramp, synchronized with the framerate you need at the resolution you need
then all you have to do is modulate the colours separately with the video signal and nothing more
the colours are "separated" as they are multiplexed in time along the raster scan, like one line green, one line red, one line blue, next line, ...
it's the reason the resolution is so small on those... be it black and white and you double the resolution
it's also the reason you can adjust the image position for each colour, it just slightly modifies the X/Y ramps during the colour scan time
I stand corrected, it's actually one scanning mirror.
In theory it could be adapted to have an ilda port *retardo
I'm pretty sure, the MEMS have only one working frequency (because is a self-resonant, and same frequency for all supported video mode), all lasers work together to make the white, and the green is not a DPSS but a very fast direct SHG switched to make all video line.
Video is interlaced as CRT because is known on the web (high speed camera filming found on youtube) and iphone display is fluid as NTSC on CRT.
Regards
It's still a frequency doubled laser. These are known to cause trouble with bad modulation characteristics if the temperature is not kept stable enough.Quote:
Originally Posted by Serveurperso
The fact that there's no YAG producing 1064 pumped from 808nm doesn't mean the problem goes away. We've had lots of trouble keeping a KTP crystal stable when it comes to temperature, and I suspect that may be causing the problem on this Microvision as well.
I forgot to say that almost unvisible after a few minutes of operation!