Impressive projector: +sharp image/usable for text reading/short projection distance/ silent/ usb connection - must adjust screen resolution
Product: Philips PPX2055;
Price: 40£ including delivery, 2nd hand, ebay;
Date: 30 April 2020.
I bought it as a laptop screen replacement because the latter was causing eye strain.
Previously I had tried Artlii Your Home Projector. That had optical distortion which made letters that were not in the centre of the screen unreadable/ blurred. Surprisingly (because the Philips PPX2055 has a much lower resolution, 854 x 480 pixels) this small projector is better at projecting matlab programs and articles on a wall: one can easily read all the letters, regardless of where they are on the screes (centre or periphery).
Good:
-image sharpness in spite of relatively modest resolution; text legible regardless of its position on the screen;
-extremely compact, focus adjustable, can run directly from the laptop's power, so one can project the desired information anywhere, with only a laptop and this projector. I don't know ho much the battery can sustain both, as it depends on battery capacity and laptop and projector needs, but what I can say is that I had forgotten to plug in my laptop, fact noticed only after considerable time, and there were no signs of strain from the computer.
-USB connection, you only need one USB port to use it not two, as you might read elsewhere; I am mentioning this because my laptop only has 2 USB ports and, when I first read that both are required, the first thought induced was to reject the device as a candidate.
-everything I needed to get it working on Windows 10 was present in the projector's internal memory.
Note: I bought this second hand, from e-bay, so it could be that the previous used had already installed the software.
-the small (0.5 - 3 m) projection distance of the image is optimal: at ~1.5 m I obtained the optimal balance between image size and contrast. Reducing the size of the image will increase the intensity of the light hitting the wall so you may still view the projection in a more luminous room, at the expense of its size.
-it is silent, not at all noisy as I had read elsewhere;
-the luminous intensity is sufficient for a room that does not receive direct sunlight (windows viewing the North) and in conditions of Spring Sun. I suspect that during Summer, this will not be usable for reading text, unless the curtains are blocking most of the window.
-if you are careful, whilst holding the projector in your hand, you can feel the precession torque of the spinning colour wheel, as you tilt the functioning projector. This is another indication of how light the entire device really is.
Not so good:
-For a usable screen, the resolution of the laptop screen must be reduced to one that the projector can match; I used 1280 x 800 pixels. If you don't adjust the resolution and continue to use 1920x1080, for example, you will still see the desktop but only the central part, the rest being cropped; also, the position of the cursor displayed by the projector is not the actual position that you see on the laptop's screen; in other words, you click an icon on the projected image but in reality, the cursor is clicking on a blank portion of the desktop.
-we bought a film from youtube and could not view it on the projector, which is connected to the computer via USB instead of the usual HDMI/VGA. Every other youtube free content can be viewed without any problem using the projector, but not paid for films (at least this was my experience).
-because it connects via USB and not the standard laptop connections, I could not opt to just view the projected image and turn off the laptop screen.
-the running software, Pico Pix Viewer 2, presents several option out of which only 2 are selectable, the default and 'fit screen', which does nothing observable. A bit of a mystery.
In conclusion, for the price, 40£ including transport, this is a very impressive projector, one that I would recommend.
Verified purchase: YesCondition: Pre-owned