Samsung Galaxy Beam projector phone shown in official pics

Samsung's latest phone to grace Mobile World Congress, the Samsung Galaxy Beam, has a projector built-in for beaming pics, movies and games onto the big screen. No kidding.

The Beam's 15 lumens projector blasts a picture of up to 50 inches across onto any nearby surface, meaning you can embarrass friends with holiday snaps in a very public way. Or, should the urge take you, you can break out an impromptu presentation.

The projector is described as High Definition, though there's no exact resolution given. The camera is a 5-megapixel job though, and the phone records and plays back movies in 720p HD at 30fps.

A dedicated projector app lets you control choose what you want to share -- vital if you have anything, ahem, personal on your phone. Though I think a remote would've been welcome. As it is, you'll have to activate it from the phone's 4-inch, 480x800-pixel screen.

The Beam runs Android 2.3 Gingerbread rather than Ice Cream Sandwich, which is a bit of a shame. On board is 8GB storage, though you can add an extra 32GB thanks to microSD. A 1GHz dual-core processor powers things, which isn't up there with what we're hoping to see at Mobile World Congress this week, but should handle movies with aplomb. Despite having a projector built in, the handset is only 12.5mm thick, which is about 3mm fatter than an iPhone 4S.

Samsung actually demoed the Beam a couple of years ago at MWC, but now it's ready for release. It should appear in the UK sometime after April, but there's no word on price yet.

Luke went hands-on with the Galaxy Beam in Barcelona today -- check out his first impressions here.

Is a projector in a phone a gimmick? Or is it the future? Let me know below in the comments, or over on our Facebook page.