This year to add something to my Christmas Houser lights see HERE I brought one of these laser light projectors, they go under all names like starlight, laserlight etc and can be brought from major retailers between £20 – £60. I got one of a business through ebay at just under £25. You can get all types ones that display snow flakes in white or multi colours, static red and green lights or moving red and green lights.
The one I purchased is the red and green lights that move. The unit is compact and comes with a ground stake and the power supply is non removable. Which not sure of the others that are on the market but the cable length is very short at only 3ft, and because the plug is a transformer type and not a normal plug can be hard to get into outdoor sockets. For my use I made a water proof extension that I could fit it in. The power is only 5w anyway, so in theory could extend the wire but that would make any warranty invalid. Though make sure when on you dont look into the laser in the unit directly.
There are no controls on the unit it is just plug and go. The display is bright I took a quick video of mine working. I have it about 7 ft away and raised of the floor by about 2ft and does cover the whole of our back wall. Like always don’t trust the photos on the box as does show large houses cover with the dots of light, I would say for the average house it will work well. The movement of the lights is a nice pattern.
I have a few concerns with these units though some do say only run for around 4hrs , I have had mine set up now for a few days and is working longer than that, as I have my display on timers switching on at 4pm and off at 11pm, so that’s 7hrs continuous and no problems.
The other concern is that the waterproof rating is only IP44, some readers may not know about IP rating, IP44 is rated as Protected against water sprayed from all directions – limited ingress permitted ie just splash proof. So for a light rain shower it should be ok, but really not designed for use in heavy rain or snow. For my job servicing fish ponds any out door electrics I use is normally rated at IP68, this is for safety. So if using one of these first make sure it wont be anywhere there is standing water or preferably have it under some form of shelter. Like with any electrics out door make sure connected to a RCD (circuit breaker) to be safe and shouldn’t see any problems.
For the price of these units they are good value and do a reasonable job of covering a surface of lights, Myself I will be getting another few with snow flakes to add to my display next year.
Specifications:
Laser Color: Red,Green
Shell Color: Black
Input Voltage: AC 100-240V 50/60Hz
Output Voltage: DC 5V 1A
Laser: Green: 50mW @ 532nm, Red: 100mw @ 470nm
Impact: Firefly point over 2000-4000
Waterproof: IP44, Cord Length: 74 cm
Size: 131010cm, Handle Length: 30cm/11.8″
Material: Plastic