The Best Way to Demo Websites for Clients

For the last few years, my web team has used a projector to collaborate on web projects. We use it for going through our weekly work items, demoing designs, doing training, and so on.

Unfortunately, it was an old projector with a weak bulb so we always had to turn out the lights to use it. Even then it was hard to see because the contrast and color depth were poor, and the resolution was only 1024×768. So last year I budgeted to get a new projector to solve these problems.

Instead of getting a new projector, I decided to get a LCD HDTV and use it as a monitor. I found a killer deal at Sam’s Club on a 65" Olevia. The screen isn’t quote as nice as something like a Sony, but for what we are doing, it is absolutely amazing. The 1920×1080 resolution and super bright LCD screen is perfect for looking at web designs. In this pic, We have our task app on the right and a full size web page on the left. Even though the text is tiny it’s readable from about 8′ away:

I have an old PC running the display, and I’m using a few little utilities to make enhance presentations:

• PowerStrip – Some PCs and Macs can’t natively display 1920×1080 resolution. This little Windows app helps out and can usually enable even really old machines to do HD resolutions.
• ZoomIt – this is a little app by the former SysInternals.com guys. It lets you zoom into a screen with the mouse scroll wheel and draw on the screen. This features are invaluable for mockups.
• Zune Theme Modified – I also used a modified Zune theme, because I like how the dark colors make the UI fade into the background and focus attention on the design.

On the fun side, we can occasionally use it for things other than web design. Since we’re in a basement, we don’t have a good way of getting an antenna to pipe in some HD goodness, but we can watch trailers in full 1080p goodness!