128 laser projectors produce 2,56 million lumens for the museum and create images at a rate of 28 billion pixels per second

The National Museum of Qatar is overhauling the imaging system in its ten immersive galleries, including 128 Panasonic PT-RQ25K laser projectors and over 170 HIVE media players.

The scale is illustrated by the total light output of the projectors: Each PT-RQ25K produces 20,000 lumens of light output. That’s about 7–10 times the light output of a typical home projector and is enough for large museum, event and concert hall screens. With 128 projectors, their total nominal light output rises to 2,56 million lumens – roughly the same as about a thousand 2,500-lumen home projectors – already quite efficient.

In practice, the projectors are not intended to be used continuously at full power, but the large light output reserve makes it possible to reduce the operating power and adjust the brightness of the projectors.

The hardware processes over 28 billion pixels per second

The PT-RQ25K projectors use three DLP chips, where the red, green and blue color channels are generated separately and displayed simultaneously. The DLP chips have a physical resolution of 1920 × 1200 pixels. Panasonic's Quad Pixel Drive pixel shifting produces a 3840 × 2400 pixel image.

In the museum, images are not projected onto regular straight screens. Videos continue onto large curved walls, over corners and around exhibits. A single, unified view can be created with multiple projectors, whose images are aligned, adjusted to the surface contours and blended together at the boundaries using VIOSO software.

All image channels must stay in exact sync. Even a slight timing difference would be visible in the moving image when the subject moves from one projector's area to another.

The image playback is handled by a system from the British company HIVE. Panasonic acquired the company in May 2026, but HIVE will continue as a separate company that also supports devices from other manufacturers.

The museum uses small HIVE Beeblade media players. They can be installed directly into the projector's Intel SDM slot, eliminating the need for a separate media player and long video cable for each projector.

Despite the decentralization, more than 170 repeaters are managed as a single entity. The system distributes and schedules content, monitors devices, and keeps images from different projectors in precise sync. The repeaters are capable of handling up to 8K video footage, which the museum has used in the production of its exhibition films.

In addition to the amount of technology and power, the (small) size of the projectors is also noteworthy. Panasonic introduced the approximately 35-kilogram PT-RQ25K in 2022 as the world's smallest and lightest 20,000-lumen three-chip DLP 4K projector. It is 40 percent smaller and 35 percent lighter than its predecessor.

There is no official list price, but the price of a single projector is tens of thousands of euros before lens and installation. The purchase of 128 projectors alone therefore represents a multi-million euro equipment package.

More information:
Panasonic's press release regarding the National Museum of Qatar
Panasonic PT-RQ25K – features and specifications
HIVE Qatar National Museum project page
HIVE Pluto media player