No more tangled cables: Samsung's 8K projector relies on wireless freedom

I admit it: I'm a person with a short fuse when it comes to installation and setup. This is especially true for projectors. The test of Optomas UST projectors, for example, almost drove me crazy a few years ago. Almost all manufacturers now implement solutions that automatically correct the size and sharpness of the image as well as keystone correction if the projector is not facing the screen from the front.

This looks like this, for example:

One problem remains, however: where to connect external devices to the projector? Especially if the projector is to be mounted on the ceiling, for example? This is where a small, inconspicuous box comes into play. A kind of one-connect box, similar to Samsung's high-end TVs - but wireless.

Samsung has an idea

Samsung presented its first 8K projector with ultra-short throw technology (UST) at the last CES tech fair in Las Vegas at the beginning of the year. I was able to see it for myself at the IFA tech fair. First impression: thanks to triple laser technology and almost 4500 ISO lumens peak brightness, at least the demo material looks breathtaking. However, I was struck by a completely different uniqueness that I have never seen before in a projector:

The box in question.

In concrete terms, it is a small box that can be placed up to ten metres away from the projector. External playback devices such as consoles, Blu-ray players or set-top boxes are then no longer connected directly to the projector, but to the box's HDMI connections. It then streams the video and audio signals to the projector in 8K resolution. Incidentally, LG already introduced me to a similar concept for televisions last year.

Great. But the bad news is that the 8K projector with a separate box is not expected to come onto the market before the end of 2025. Perhaps not even until 2026, I was told at the IFA. The final scope of HDMI 2.1 connections and the like has therefore not yet been finalised. And in terms of price, the projector and box are also likely to cost over 10,000 francs - my estimate, not official information from Samsung.

The 8K projector is nevertheless exciting. After all, it shows what we can expect one day in terms of technology, even in more moderately priced devices. Hopefully also outside of the UST projector family. I'm thinking in particular of long-throw projectors, i.e. projectors that are not placed directly below or above the screen, but a few metres away from it in order to project onto it from the front. <p