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By Avi Greengart, reprinted with permission from Techsponential

XGIMI recently launched its latest smart projector, the MoGo 2 Pro (press release) in New York. The projector belongs to a relatively new category of home entertainment display that combines front projection, portability, and smart TV streaming capabilities over WiFi. As with previous display technology shifts, smart projectors are leading to new companies and brands.

XGIMI (pronounced, “ex-jimmy;” loosely translated from Chinese as, “excellence in square meters”) was founded nine years ago in Chengdu, China. IDC ranked it as China’s projector market share leader by 2018, and it has sold 4.5 million units since launch. XGIMI started selling its first portable 1080p projector, the MoGo Pro, in 2019. There are other notable Chinese competitors using the new category to grow, including Anker’s Nebula brand, but large consumer electronics brands like Samsung and HiSense are also competing (see Techsponential’s CES 2023 report).

All of XGIMI’s projectors use Android TV, which has full global reach (unlike Amazon Fire or Roku which are at least somewhat regional), and allows XGIMI to focus entirely on hardware rather than the content user interface, streaming capabilities, or apps. (Note: the Netflix app is not natively supported, so many people may still prefer to attach a streaming stick from Amazon or Roku.)

XGIMI expects that consumers’ primary entertainment display will be a flat panel TV, but that secondary displays can be well served by projectors so long that all is required is a blank wall. XGIMI also sells ultra short throw (UST) projectors that benefit from a fixed position and screen and can be used without as much light control. At the MoGo 2 Pro event in New York, XGIMI showed off the projector in different use cases: replacing a small bedroom TV with a 100” image, movie night in an eat-in kitchen, and even watching content in the bathroom.

The $599 MoGo 2 Pro is notable for some contrarian design decisions. In a category where portability is a core part of the value proposition, the MoGo 2 Pro is actually larger and heavier than the original. It’s still small and light (2.4lbs) enough to move from room to room, but the larger footprint provides more room for the light engine and larger speaker enclosures. As a result, it is almost twice as bright as its predecessor and audio is significantly louder. This addresses real pain points for a device that is frequently used in less than ideal lighting conditions and without the benefit of a soundbar.

That decision to prioritize performance over size also pays competitive dividends: while the MoGo 2 Pro does not use a laser light source like Anker’s inch-or-so slimmer Nebula Capsule 3 Laser, the MoGo 2 Pro is brighter (400 ISO lumens) and costs $200 less than the Nebula (which is spec’d at 300 ANSI Lumens). XGIMI set up the MoGo 2 Pro and Nebula Capsule 3 Laser side-by-side in the kitchen area of the Manhattan apartment it rented for the event. While the difference was not dramatic, the MoGo 2 Pro was indeed obviously brighter, louder, and faster at adjusting keystone correction and autofocus — all at a lower price point.

While the 1080p MoGo 2 Pro is not aimed at videophiles, it has been tuned to provide up to 90% DCI-P3 color coverage and the D65 Hollywood color temp. In a moderately light-controlled environment and screen sizes significantly below the stated maximum 200”, the MoGo 2 Pro should provide a satisfying picture for casual TV, streaming, sports, and movies. Combing through the specs page, I was surprised to discover that it will even support 3D, though active shutter glasses will cost you $29 each.

The rest of the tech specs are reasonable but not terribly exciting. Connectivity is only dual-band WiFi 5 (not 6 or 6E) plus Bluetooth 5.0, which is essential for headphones. There is a 3.5mm output jack for connecting better wired speakers. The MoGo 2 Pro’s Android TV 11.0 has Chromecast built-in, 16GB of storage, and is supplemented by a USB-C, USB-A, and HDMI 2.0 (not 2.1). The MoGo 2 Pro omits a battery entirely but it will run off of external USB-C battery packs, so you’ll need to invest in one of those or an extension cord if the 8’ power cable doesn’t reach where you place the unit.

XGIMI invited me to its launch event but Techsponential and HomeTheaterView have no financial relationship with XGIMI and do not accept affiliate payments.

XGIMI MoGo 2 Pro Launch Event Read More

It's resting.

This site is not dead Read More

Time flies. I was looking for something I had posted a while ago and discovered that this site has been live and somewhat regularly updated since October 24, 2004. So I'm about a month late noticing, but this site is an eight year old! We're a tween! 

My first post:  Welcome.

Thanks for reading. Now I need to go out and buy a cake.

Belated Happy 8th Birthday, HomeTheaterView! Read More

This.

The most insane home theater I’ve ever seen Read More

CEPro has a new mini-article by Molly Gibson with four tips for selling custom installed home theater products to women, and Julie Jacobson links to an article of hers on the same subject.

Here's the summary:

Molly thinks that women need a soft sell based on listening to her needs and discovering how she thinks that the system will be used. She also rails against pushing features and future-proofing that goes beyond the buyer's needs, and pushes style as a critical part of the woman's buying criteria.

Julie thinks that this has nothing to do with selling to women and everything with not being a bad salesperson. Every man would like a system tailored to his actual needs, would prefer not being condescended to, and cares about style. Do this, and both men and women will be happier.

That is certainly true, but… a hard tech sell does seem to work on many men. Also – speaking from personal experience here – some men easily succumb to featuritis. (Not all. Some. And I agree with both writers that focusing on what the product needs – and just what the product needs – generally creates a better long term relationship with the product/vendor/service provider.) The emphasis on creating your sales pitch around design is also much stronger in Molly's pitch. In Molly's view, it isn't about whether the color matches or it's a nice minimalist design, but she suggests you start showing TVs by asking which bezel style they like and in-wall speakers by focusing on the type of grill weave. That's really quite different.

To borrow marketing from a (slightly) different industry, that's the difference between touting the BlackBerry Playbook for its dual-core processor and micro kernel architecture – while ensuring it ships in a beautifully understated thin case – and Apple touting the iPad 2 as "magical" and incredibly thin while also adding a dual core processor. One reason Apple has sold 25 million iPads and RIM has sold 500,000 PlayBooks is because Apple's marketing is aimed at women and men, and RIM's marketing uses the male-centric tech approach. Style-conscious men, to be sure, but manly men, who must have a micro kernel architecture in their tablet… whatever that is.

Selling CE to Women: Two Views Read More

Wisdom Audio has figured out a way to properly demo its super-high end architectural (in-wall) speakers: it's offering "qualified" prospects a free trip to its Carson City, NV headquarters.

"Offer: Wisdom Audio will provide round trip transportation for a visit to our factory for someone with qualified interest in a large-scale Sage Series system. They will tour our factory with their dealer, meet the Wisdom Audio team and spend time in our sound room listening to their favorite music. (Limited to North America and must occur before January 31, 2011)"

I've never been there – or heard Wisdom Audio's speakers – but Google Maps says Carson City is near Reno. A couple of interesting points here:

• This neatly sidesteps the need to have super-expensive inventory tied up in dealer installations. The dealer is also invited on the field trip, which is a great training opportunity.
• If they're flying prospects in coach, it really isn't that expensive a proposition. Of course, it also might not be the way people who can afford the system are accustomed to traveling – a full Sage System costs in the $50,000 – $100,000 range.

Want to Go to Reno? Read More

CEPro reports that Quixel Research says home-theater front projector sales rebounded in the first
quarter compared to a year earlier, with
a 51% increase in unit sales and 17% increase in revenue. Woo hoo! Then again, sales are down consecutively from last quarter (the overall market
value was $72 million at the end of the first quarter, down from $97 million
in Q4 2009). Q1 sales declines are normal – most people buy projectors for Christmas, not the Super Bowl. Nice to see that the high end of the market is recovering overall.

Front Projector Sales Up! (Or down. Depends on your point of view.) Read More

Here's one from the mailbag:

I’m thinking about upgrading my receiver. Currently I have a Denon AVR-987. It’s 3- 4 years old and does not have the current technology for blu ray. I’m thinking of going with a Sony STR-DA2400ES receiver. I have a 52” Sony XBR and a Sony BDP S-300 blu ray player. My speakers are Soundworks MC300 front/Soundworks original surrounds and JBL Northridge for the center. Any advice would be appreciated.

It really depends on why you think you need the upgrade, but I
wouldn’t do it.

You’d be surprised, but your current receiver can handle Blu-ray
just fine – rather than upgrade your receiver to a model that can decode Dolby
TrueHD, you just have the Blu-ray player do the decoding and send the bitstream
(PCM) on over to your receiver – it will sound the same whether the player does
the decoding or the receiver. In fact, depending on which Blu-ray player you
have, it may work that way by default. For example, Sony’s Playstation 3 can’t
send unencoded TrueHD to a receiver, you have to go the PCM route (the newer
Playstation 3 Slim can pass an unencoded signal, but, again, there should be no
difference in the sound). In your specific case, the BDP-S300 can decode Dolby TrueHD, but only if you download a firmware update. You should be regularly updating your firmware anyway to ensure that newer discs play on it without incident.

So, is it worth upgrading your receiver? Your Denon has more power than the newer Sony, it has basic room
correction by Audyssey, and it has plenty of inputs/outputs as long as you
don’t need a lot of HDMI switching or video upscaling. While the Sony has all
the latest audio decoders, it doesn’t have the most HDMI inputs, the best video
upscaling, or the best room correction, so I’m not sure it’s enough of an
upgrade even if those were your priorities.

Your biggest bang-for-buck audio upgrade would be to keep the Denon
and upgrade your speakers. At the very least I’d get matching front speakers
(either get another MC300 for the center or get another pair of JBL’s for front
left/right) and a sub.

Mailbag: Is it Time to Upgrade to a “Blu-ray capable” Receiver? Read More

I'm off to Apple's Special Event tomorrow. Journalists who want to contact me
for comments afterwards can call me at 201 658 7729 or email me at agreengart @
currentanalysis com.

Once Apple madness is behind us, more HTV posts are coming, including a post-CES wrap-up, VUDU review, and an end to my quest for an A/V receiver with enough HDMI inputs to serve as a test center.

Off to Apple’s Special Event Read More

I'm a bit backed up here at Home Theater View, both with posts (they're in my head but haven't quite made their way out of my head and onto the site) and with products to review. Logitech had sent over the Harmony 900 remote control just before it launched, but I first attempted to configure it last night.

 
The Harmony 900 is essentially an RF version of the IR-only Harmony One. In English, that means that the 900 is a universal remote control that looks nearly identical to another universal remote control in the Harmony line, but instead of just being able to control components line-of-site using infrared (IR), it can also control components that are hidden behind walls/doors/retractable screens using radio frequency (RF) commands that are relayed to the components with little IR blaster pods. The Harmony One lists for $249 (and sells for $182 on amazon) while the Harmony 900 lists for $399 (and sells for $315 on amazon). The added money also gets you a higher resolution touchscreen and a few extra buttons, but the two products look basically the same (a good thing, as I love the Harmony One's button layout), act basically the same (instead of controlling individual devices, the Harmony line is activity-based), and are set up using the same process (using an online database). The Harmony 900's value proposition is pretty simple: most infrared repeater systems cost a lot more than the $150 price delta, and some of them are fairly complicated, while the hallmark of Logitech's Harmony line is simplicity. 

As I noted in last year's Holiday Gift Guide, I liked the Harmony One so much that I refused to wait for a review unit and instead simply bought one. I later added the Harmony PlayStation 3 adapter, a $60 add-on that seamlessly integrates the game console into a Harmony system (the PS3 uses Bluetooth, which sounds like a good idea but is completely incompatible with any universal remote control). I also have an infrared repeater system, the Microsmith Hot Link Pro that I am eager to replace with a more elegant and responsive solution (I should note that I can heartily recommend the Hot Link Pro; when all the wires and the receiver eye are placed properly, it works perfectly, and at just $67 on amazon, it is a stone cold bargain). The Harmony 900 should have been perfect.

I have been reviewing remote controls for a long time and have been following the Harmony line since before Intrigue launched it (and well before Logitech bought the company). One of the best things about the product is that setup is done entirely online, the online database grows as users add new devices, and upgrading to a new remote control is a simple matter of telling the online software what you just bought.

Except when it isn't. The first problem I had was that Logitech's site claims that there is no software to download for the Harmony 900. A CD is included in the package, but you always need to download the latest updates anyway, and I had intended to use a netbook to do the setup down in my home theater rather than run back and forth between my office and my home theater. This problem was just an annoyance, but an odd one.

The next problem – and one that only affects people upgrading from earlier Harmony remotes – is that you cannot upgrade from earlier Harmony remotes. Despite the fact that the software is identical and the remotes look nearly identical and they function in nearly identical ways, a new Harmony account is required to use the 900, which meant I needed to go back and log every component in the home theater and re-figure out how they are all connected, which inputs are required, etc. The process is straightforward, but it is a chore I would have gladly done without.

The next problem – and the one that simply stopped me cold – was that much of the work that went into getting the Harmony remote controls working with my components over the years seems to have vanished from Logitech's database. Not only do I need a new account, but apparently I need to re-teach Logitech that the monoprice switcher has more than five inputs, that the TiVo doesn't have a power button, and that I am using Logitech's own accessory to control the PS3. I don't have time to troubleshoot all of this – again – so for now I will continue using the Harmony One/Microsmith combination.

If you are coming to the unit without an existing Harmony account, most of my setup problems won't affect you – you would need to set up your system from scratch anyway. Nonetheless, I'm holding off recommending this product until I have the time and energy to get it working properly.

Logitech Harmony 900 First Take: Not a Pretty Upgrade Read More