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January 9, 2007 - Recently, roaming through the halls of CES has felt like touring the TV section of the local Best Buy… there are so many displays it sometimes seems like all there is at the show. But today, we stumbled upon something truly unique at Nikko Home Electronics: the R2-D2 DVD Projector. Sure, it's called a projector, but it's so much more.

The plastic droid, who weighs 17.64 pounds and costs above $2000, not only serves as a projector for your favorite DVDs (think of the scene from Star Wars where R2 is projecting that image of Princess Leia, but with much better resolution), but also as a CD player and iPod hook-up.

His main function is projecting, and he can take a DVD image and display it on the wall at up to 80" wide (R2 also tilts up to project on the ceiling). The little guy can muster a brightness of 1200l ANSI lumens with a contrast ratio of 500:1, and his projection distance is anywhere from 4.9-16.4 feet, depending how large you want the image.

But wait, there's more! Stick a DVD in him and R2 will play it… and you control him with a Millennium Falcon remote. The remote comes with its own stand, and its Afterburner light will glow if you push the Sound button while it is in the base. The remote portion of the apparatus slides out, so if you are not using the Falcon, the keypad is hidden.

Not only does it control the projector, but you can actually move R2-D2 around with the Falcon remote. The droid is capable of forward, reverse, right, left and pivot turns… and makes his signature noises as he does.

The DVD player in his belly supports DVDs, DVD-R/RW, Video CD, SVCD, Audio CD, MP3, MP4 and WMA, and is equipped to deliver DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1.

His front panel flips around, giving users access to an iPod docking station, which will allow you to play your tunes through him without the help of The Force. The slot supports iPod Nano, Mini, photo, 30G and 60G Video.

R2 is also capable of projecting digital images on a wall with his multi-memory card slot, located in the same general area as the iPod. The card area supports SD, MMC, MS, Smart Media and USB. The bottom of the droid features a speaker system that is 10W x2/Total 20 watts stereo or surround sound. On the back of the droid, you can hook up audio and video via its two rows of RCA sockets, S-Video in, computer in, and optical audio out.

R2 is also equipped with safety features to prevent him from tumbling down stairs and more. He stands at 20" tall. No word on if he will serve drinks as he did on Jabba's skiff in Jedi, but we have our fingers crossed.

The plastic droid, who weighs 17.64 pounds and costs above $2000,

One neat deature that doesn't seem to be addressed, you won't even need to get out of your seat between DVDs because R2 can mosey over to you and then back to his projection spot.

Gandalf wrote:

One neat deature that doesn't seem to be addressed, you won't even need to get out of your seat between DVDs because R2 can mosey over to you and then back to his projection spot.

What a time to be alive.

Darth Tanner wrote:If this thing can move about freely enough to need safety measure to stop it falling down stairs what sort of power supply is it going to use? I hardly think battery power is going to be a good idea for a dvd player. It would be cool if it has a grappling arm that can plug himself into the mains with.

AK-047 wrote:Not saying the Artoo projector isn't amazing as it is, it would be more like the original if it had a piece that popped out to be a drink holder, taking after the stocked science fiction droid