I just got this email as well. Thought I would come here for some info. It is down to $199 for projector and dongle right now. That's tempting just to SEE what it's all about.
They must be making a loss at that price - surely - you can't get the components for that.
I'm not real aware of indie gogo vs places like Kickstarter and gofundme. I assumed (perhaps wrongly) that indie gogo added credibility to it - not took it away. No?
I would have thought that indie gogo would suffer a pretty big credibility hit if something like this took a bad turn.
Wouldn't be the first time that's happened.
I note that someone suggested the gold star group purchase instead. I haven't been on here in a while, and I haven't seen it. But I have a fairly big issue with a > $1k show from them - it still works, but last Halloween I pulled it out with my laptop that has my software on it and was firing up one of the Halloween shows.
I fired it up and it turned on immediately. I mean THE LASERS turned on immediately. The lockout was NOT hooked up, but I was shooting a beam...
Not cool. I turned it off and treated it with extreme care until I had the beams aimed up at the screen and above any possible eye level, and it worked great from then on - except I don't have a working safety right now. I haven't looked at it to see what happened, or how that happened. But it freaked me out. Now that I know it, I am ok with being careful with it. But I'm bothered by the incident.
That said, it is otherwise a great unit. But it cost easily 6 times what this kit is claiming to cost, AND this kit has what looks like a neat software package. Not something I think that I can do with mine right now. It certainly has me curious.
Again, they must be taking a loss at those prices - the RGB1000 from Goldenstar is very reasonably priced. As for the lasers coming on when you plugged it in ... that definitely shouldn't have happened. Switch setting somewhere maybe? Was it just a static full power beam... Low power, just above lasing threshold beams used to be common on projectors because you'd always set the modulation off current to be just above threshold.
Of course, I respect the pros here a lot, so I'm going to sit back and watch right now. I don't see how they've come down from $500 or so to $199 or why they would. It is very odd.
And while I do think of Wicked Lasers as a sketchy, or at best, worrisome operation, I kind of look at ALL of the Chinese laser-makers that way. You always want to have some reassurances before buying. That's what makes the GP's here so good, the laser manufacturers know if they mess up badly here, they never sell again to this crowd. I trust GP's here over a lot of other options.
Another comment, someone said the dongle wasn't tested with the laser. Here's one of their videos that seem to show that... I don't know though.
https://youtu.be/TtNN8HDkOho
Not sure how much I'd trust that - don't think I saw the box actually projecting anything - just a video of a projection on a screen. To me the beam quality looks too good to be coming from the WL box - although I could be wrong! Impressively sharp if I'm wrong, both the beam quality/alignment and the actual quality of the projection. Although the latter could be down to a low scan angle I suppose?
Good to see some of you still kicking around here. I really need to buy something new and fun, it has been far too long. I have a few bills to get paid off (like the last three payments on the Vette - WHOO HOO) and I'll have some extra play money to waste here without the wife complaining. But I am itching for some seriously evil firepower. I have what used to be a pretty awesome blue in pieces that I took apart to give someone the driver I think, I regret that. I need to put it back together. And I've slowly but surely fried all my 405's over the years, usually putting a battery in backwards. :-(
Most of my greens still work, but seem to have lost focus to the point of still being cool, but not as amazing as before. The reds are all still kicking, interestingly enough. They are hard to kill, but I don't love the 635 pattern much so I don't use them often. Once I get flush with cash, maybe I will engage in some wavelength collecting.
I miss you guys!
.
) ... Will be nice once that's out of the way.