Pocket projectors: PIQO and Philips PicoPix Max

[PowerGod]

I did some random research about lumens, and found out that a means of improvement is to use special projection screens, that have a surface that concentrates the light to the center making the image brighter, anyway this works only if you are directly in front of them.

In any case for LED projectors the sun is super BAD, and everyone of it's rays must be eradicated from every windows.

 

[Hellfleck]

the size of the projected image also matters a lot e.g. if my 2000 lumen beamer throws an 100" image a 200 lumen beamer would get the same brighteness with a 30"something image size (100" / sqr(10)) ... I want to use mine for throwing my laptop screen for presentations and it might just be enough to get a reasonable size in dimly lit rooms

 

[Binky]

These are definitely knock-off items and infringing our rights

They protest too much, methinks!

Aside, the use of the word "beamer" is interesting. It looks like it should be an English word, and yet, I have only ever seen it used by German speakers. If that wasn't confusing enough, the English term "beemer" refers to a well-known car manufacturer in Germany!

 

[HelenF]

Aside, the use of the word "beamer" is interesting. It looks like it should be an English word, and yet, I have only ever seen it used by German speakers.

"Beamer" makes me think of Canyon Battle on the BBC Micro (even though I probably haven't given a thought to that game in 10+ years). Looked it up just now, and it really was in there:

https://youtu.be/e1obcVv5eAQ?t=23

 

[Inimuk]

1024p (it's an image with lots of other properties)
[doublepost=1555954556,1555953749][/doublepost]I'm not really convinced this is a scam. It does not claim 4k. It has 200lumen, which is, well, a cheap flashlight, now a days (which is not much, because that is white, and movies are in colours, so you need to have a dark room to see anything, at no more than 60 cm from the wall/projectionsurface.

Like looking at a pandora on the beach... meh, barely visible. (also, lots of sand gets in). At that price you get a palmtop or tablet, and see the movie on that.
May be fun for a Lego drive-in movie theater...

also: does it have a heatsink? Because without fan, you need a heatsink... or you watch 30 minutes, then wait for it to cool down, then watch the rest?

Perhaps it would have a good use inside one of those old 65"+ RPTV boxes. Just replace the old heavy projection system, keep the mirrors and fresnel lens. It'd be brighter projecting through a reflective surface than bouncing off a wall (or bed sheet in the case of those that camp outside)

 

[PowerGod]

People are complaining about not having tracking numbers while the producers are telling some batches are already sent, and at some point, after a lot of the same "where is my stuff ?!" questions, they are starting to not answering anymore on the project page, but asking to send questions to their email.

Is the Drama beginning ?! Or is it just a 2 Months (TM) reboot ?!

You will know in the next exciting episode !!

 

[FBnil]

ahh... the problems of not shipping fast enough and people getting angry for not getting theirs first. Guess I'll have to wait for the next episode.

 

[Hellfleck]

from the Indigogo campaign page :

To better focus on fulfillment, we have decided to indefinitely pause our crowdfunding campaign! If you're still interested in pre-ordering your Piqo, please email us at team@piqoprojector.com and we can let you know how we can accept your order during this pause!

sounds legit ...

 

[PowerGod]

from the Indigogo campaign page :



sounds legit ...

Are you interested in getting one ?

For now the only way to obtain it is to ask someone who already has the order, to add another device in the survey.

Anyway, seems to me it was a good move, considering how many orders they are receiving, and how many complaints from people that want the device immediately.

They told that some devices were already sent, but still no one seems to have received it... seems that the company behind the project is used to be always late distributing things.

 

[Hellfleck]

I am following with interest actually, I did not back it early on because the spec promises seemed way off but it kept on my radar (my gut feeling can be wrong of course) also I get at least one mail each week highlighting this project in one form or another so I check back now and again.

By now I think this is another crowdfunding trainwreck (I have participated in a few *cough*) but the way they "stopped" taking orders and have people ask for instructions to sneak additional orders in usually means one thing : IG got concerned and pulled the plug on them and they are simply not allowed to take official order anymore - they can not tell it that way of course.

Here are some of my trainwrecks for reading pleasure :

such a simple idea and easy to manufacture, what could possibly go wrong ... darn

oh they made one already and it looks stylish ...turns out they do not know how to mass produce them, at all

and my personal highlight : Zano
such incredible specs and as it turns out not doable but I got lucky there and PayPal actually refunded me

 

[levi]

usually means one thing : IG got concerned and pulled the plug on them and they are simply not allowed to take official order anymore - they can not tell it that way of course.

And IGG don't take it as standard that they themselves should mail out to anyone who's paid money to these supposed shysters to tell them that that's what they think they are? Is that has happened, I'd expect IGG to be more open about what they're doing for us - they're no longer getting any income from them, so what exactly have they got to lose?

 

[Hellfleck]

IGG had a lot of trouble / bad press with the Vega recently so they might be more carefull ... the Pico was promoted by them to no end (at least towards me) so that may just be a shy move to save face (or may not and I am totally wrong - again)

If IGG sofficially suspends a campaign it gets a new status and people get mails etc. but they only do that if they are 100% sure its a fraud

Like I said, very interesting so far and I think they will deliver something - very interested how much of their specs they hit if they hit their specs dead-on I will probably order one later though

 

[PowerGod]

Some of the first receivers tested the device and reported that it has a 720p native resolution, so the scam screaming started.

In the meanwhile there was answer from the Piqo Team:

Dear contributors, with regards to the 1080p resolution issue, it appears that there was a bug with the 720p – it looks like TI (our lighting manufacturer) set it to the wrong setting. We’ll send out a firmware update to be able to get the true 1080p. Thanks for your support!

Will it be the solution to the issue ?! Or is the Drama beginning, AGAIN ?!

You will know in the next exciting episode !!

 

[PowerGod]

Some little reviews are starting to appear.

Overall people seems happy with build quality, sound quality (considering the size), keystone angle auto-correction and easy of use.

As said before, brightness is good but only in the dark.

Still no news about the 1080p that is not 1080p.

EDIT:
About brightness, I found this review for another projector of the same size, that has only 80 lumen, and seems pretty clear to me.

 

[PowerGod]

Piqo is responding to every single complaint about resolution with this:

Hi <Name>, please note that the output resolution is indeed 1080p, the firmware upgrade will only fix the setting

If this is true, either all the ones complaining are just looking at a reported number from some apps, or they just can't see the difference between a 720p and a 1080p image.

Could it be so difficult to see if a 1080p pixel on a projector is intact or not ?

 

[TrashyMG]

My older 720p projector could handle a 1080p signal, just converted down.

I bet the difference would be clear if put side by side with a true 1080p projector.

 

[levi]

Yeah, I wondered about that. The only way I can be sure if I'm watching 720p or 1080 something for general TV on my 1080p screen is to press info and get the screen to tell me what the input was. I only know my TV has a 1080 line screen, it won't tell me that, and I'd expect the same to be true with this projector.

Although perhaps with a box that you can switch between 720p and 1080p and see if there's a difference on more specially constructed scenes might be effective.

 

[PowerGod]

I can understand that in a monitor could be difficult to see the difference, unless it is a REALLY BIG monitor, but with a projector you can just move it back from the surface and the pixels will enlarge.

Or maybe I didn't understand what that "firmware setting" does, and maybe the projector is really outputting at 720p for now.

 

[Hellfleck]

I think the difference is very hard to spot in normal usage

if you use a 1080 test pattern of alternating white / black pixels you should see it cleary on 1080 but the algorithm for downsizing to 720 would output a grey image, this should be noticeable even on smaller projection sizes

 

[levi]

I think the difference is very hard to spot in normal usage

if you use a 1080 test pattern of alternating white / black pixels you should see it cleary on 1080 but the algorithm for downsizing to 720 would output a grey image, this should be noticeable even on smaller projection sizes

I just tried this in gimp, making alternating one pixel vertical stripes across a 1080p image. No interpolation, by which I assume it means nearest neighbour creates a similarly striped image, but with each stripe actually being two pixels wide. Every other interpolation scheme it supports (linear=bilinear, I assume, cubic=bicubic, nohalo=? lohalo=?) resulted in an image with similar striping, but somewhat greyed out. Especially on a projector with significantly non-black black levels and no massive grid effect, I suspect you'd need to count visible colums to be sure to tell the difference, which isn't ideal. Perhaps using a black bordered image beforehand you could get used to the proper black level, then switch to this image and see how the blacks look, but I'd have thought there's still a better test image you could use (assuming gimp's build in interpolation schemes are at all representative, and there's still the chance it's using simple nearest neighbour, and you'd be limited to counting columns).