School Visits anyone?

I've been doing some school visits and parent night presentations (more and more just recently). Over the last few years, I've always just carted my grandma's old old slide projector around and showed my slides through it's dirty lens. But it finally died on me. The last time I did a little 50 minute presentation at a young writer's conference a week ago, I borrowed my brother's digital projector (thanks Eric). IT WAS SO MUCH BETTER! Since I already have 2 more visits scheduled in the next 2 weeks, I figured it was time to pony up and buy my own. I didn't want to lug a laptop every time along WITH the projector so I thought of my options. I could use a video ipod but those are a few hundred dollars. OR...I could use a USB Thumbdrive.

I found that some digital projectors have a USB 2.0 port and will read jpg images or mpg4 videos. The one I bought is the HITACHI CPX1. It is VERY lightweight and has a high number of lumens and all sorts of great functions for computerless presentations. TheNERDS.net was the cheapest place I found it (that was reputable) and they were GREAT. The projector arrived and I LOVE IT! It's much brighter than my brother's was for those school rooms that don't darken well, and the USB reader worked beautifully. All I have to take to schools now is this little 3 lb projector and a thumbdrive. I can't wait to try it out next week! Wish me luck.