As an adjunct member of faculty for more than one undergraduate institution, I have often had to teach my classes in conditions that were…less than ideal. After one painfully awkward weekend when I had to teach a course in a defunct “education center” where none of the on-hand AV support was actually functional, I took matters into my own hands with the purchase of a fairly popular and very well-reviewed pico protector. The convenience was undeniable–a little square box that fit in my palm simply hooked into my laptop and I was back in business–no matter where the job would take me. The problem was that I was sacrificing picture quality and projection performance for portability and convenience, something that the Epson Pro EX7280 would throw into sharp relief this past weekend when I prepared for an upcoming class in one of my institution’s multi-purpose rooms. These side-by-side images of one of my old PowerPoint decks were captured at a throw distance of approximately 9 feet onto identical white boards after 15 minutes of lamp warm-up in full ambient room lighting. The results speak for themselves…compared to my pico projector, the Epson is able to render a much larger, well-focused image at the same distance with greater pop, color accuracy, and brightness–PERIOD. In fact, the Epson’s color reproduction, brightness, and high-contrast capabilities made the projected image look identical to the slide deck I was editing on my laptop, which helped take the guesswork out of any image rendering or visibility concerns I might have to factor into my presentation before actually throwing it up on the screen. For grins, I also ran a high definition movie stream from my laptop; again, the image quality was exceptional, even with the reduced WXGA resolution hiding a bit of detail on screen. Usability was also excellent, especially if you’re purchasing this projector to use for travel rather than in stationary, board/meeting room-style or permanent ceiling-mount scenarios. A full-featured remote control is provided, but all controls are also accessible from the unit itself (especially useful in case the projector is hanging upside-down from the ceiling). Handily, there is a horizontal keystone correction slider that is just as intuitive as the nearby zoom and focus adjustment rings for those times when your screen isn’t precisely centered in front of the projector bulb; horizontal and vertical keystone correction is also available through the projector’s menus and can be customized based on any combination of elevation and tilt I could manage. Along with the effortless, push-button release of the front elevation support rod, I particularly appreciated the ‘A/V Mute’ slider at the front of the projector housing–this physical slider cuts and covers the projector bulb and mutes any running audio without having to fully turn off the projector so it will still be ready to project an image on a moment’s notice. Additional discrete controls on the remote thoughtfully cover the gamut of quick-change settings like volume (as well as AV Mute) and zoom, source selection, aspect ratio, color mode, split screen and screen freeze. With so much going for it, what’s not to like? For starters, the Epson Pro EX7280 is billed as a “compact” projector, which is maybe being a bit generous. It’s not overly bulky or heavy, and it *is* easily transportable in the provided carrying case, but there’s no getting around the fact that this projector is simply not going to stow in your backpack or overnight bag the way a sexy little pico projector might. But again, the tradeoff is that you’re actually getting far more usable and useful projection performance for your audience. The included speaker is serviceable, but only just–anything more than a few tables away and your listeners will probably still be struggling to hear anything save for non-complex soundtracks (think: spoken word) in a perfectly silent room. Like any high-power projector, fan noise is audible though not unreasonable for a projector of this size. Finally, even though input resolution can run all the way up to 4K, the biggest Achilles heel of the EX7280 is the native WXGA resolution of the LCD displays…the Epson simply cannot render anything at greater than 1280×800. This 16:10 aspect ratio is actually well-suited to many modern business/professional environments as it’s far more friendly to navigating taller webpages and office documents than a 16:9 display. Furthermore, complex images and videos will actually look wonderful because the sources are being down-rezed to a lower resolution where scaling errors, ringing, and other types of image enhancement/video processing are more difficult to spot. However, a quick comparison between even the 1080p screen on my laptop and the image projected on the screen in my classroom revealed a loss of detail in multimedia streams that may be a factor for you if this projector is to serve double duty for both productivity and leisure (i.e. home) projection needs. Very dense areas of text can also look noticeably jaggy simply because the projector has reached the limit of its resolution and has no more pixels left to render the crisp/sharp edges of onscreen text. Again, however, this issue was really only a concern for dense areas of very text-heavy content; a typical PowerPoint or other mixed-media presentation would likely not reveal this shortcoming so readily. Overall, the EX7280 is a very capable, professional-caliber multimedia projector with outstanding color, contrast, and imaging performance even in very well-lit rooms. The fact that you COULD also add a Roku or Chromecast device to the back end and run a movie or two from the projector is a bonus; but the real draw here is the premier image quality that is every bit as engaging and effective on the road as it would be suspended from the ceiling in a professional conference room-style installation. Definitely recommended!