Straight out of the gate, it's important to set expectations. This is a ~£150 projector. You aren't going to get the same fidelity as a £1,000 laser projector with quantum nano pixel marketing gibberish. Instead, you get a native 1080p resolution, an adequate speaker, and built-in WiFi screen-mirroring.

Photos

In the box you get a UK power lead, HDMI cable, AV cable, and remote (no batteries).

Also included are an instruction manual, quickstart guide, and a set of cotton buds for cleaning away dust

Layout

The projector has a slightly unconventional layout. The speaker is rear-firing - because the projector is designed to be placed in front of the viewer.

This means the input sockets are on the side, slightly untidy, but it works.

Fans are on the opposite sides. While not exactly whisper quiet, they are easily drowned out by the speaker.

There is a single height-adjusting screw. If you remove that, you can mount it on a standard tripod.

Connectors

Two HDMI and two USB. You can use the USB for power - handy for a ChromeCast or Fire Stick - or you can load media on to a USB stick and play it from there.

There's an RCA jack to allow you to connect any older equipment, and a stereo output if you want to hook it up to a sound system. You can also hook an iPhone up via USB and mirror the screen that way - but the really cool bit is…

WiFi!

The projector can connect to 2.4GHz and 5GHz WiFi. Which means you can use ScreenCasting to put your phone on the big screen. Handy for YouTube, or just browsing the web on a massive screen.

Two small annoyances though. The network selection screen doesn't show which networks are 2.4 and which are 5GHz. So I hope you gave yours unique names! But, worse than that, is the password entry box: That's a pain to fill in using the remote!

But, once done, it's dead easy to turn on screen mirroring and blast your phone's contents onto the wall.

Worth noting that the DNS is hardwired to 114.114.114.114. I couldn't find a way to change it. It will pick up the rest of your DHCP settings though.

Picture Quality

OK, this is the big one, what's it like to use as a BIG SCREEN?

It claims 8,500 Lumen which is… probably a generous reading. Here's how it looked when I first booted it up. It was a cloudy afternoon, with the nearest curtains shut.

You know what? That's not half bad! Colours were bright, image was crisp, overall fidelity was perfectly fine.

In a bright room:

This was projected onto a grey wall, with noon-light. You wouldn't want to watch a noir thriller on it - but for cartoons and sport, it would be OK.

I drew the curtains. The room wasn't pitch black, nor was the wall coated in any special retro-reflective paint.

Wow! So much better. Colours were bright and vivid. There are a bunch of options you can play with - contrast, brightness, tint, etc.

All the usual things you expect from a projector.

There's a manual focus ring, to get everything nice and sharp, and a manual keystone correction. There is no zoom on the lens.

Sound

The built in speaker is loud enough to drown out the fan noise. It was perfectly good at reproducing speech and music. You can twiddle with the volume, bass, and treble.

Doesn't make much difference.

At loud volumes it loses all fidelity. It's a fairly small speaker in a plastic housing, so expect lots of booming, rattling, and distortion once you drive it to the max.

Downsides

With any cheap projector comes some downsides. The big one is a lack of zoom. If you want a bigger image, you need to move the projector further away. Smaller image? Move the projector closer to the wall. If you have a small room, you'll need the projector close to you in order to get a decent sized image.

There's a little bit of vertical keystone correction available, but no horizontal. There's no picture offsetting either.

For playing 24fps films, it works fine. It seems to cope fine with 30fps. 60fps content doesn't look silky smooth. At this price, 4K is a pipe-dream.

The sound is mono - and distorts at high volume. So you'll probably want to hook it up to some proper speakers.

There are no built in apps - so you'll either need screen mirroring or a cheap ChromeCast for streaming.

Verdict

Is this the best projector in the world? No. If you're a cinephile you'll cry over the lack of deep blacks and the inability to precisely match the source material. But, if you want a quick and cheap big screen - I think you'll be mildy impressed.

It's lightweight - about 1.2Kg. It boots up quickly and will have your phone's screen in jumbovision within seconds. Stick a Raspberry Pi on it, and you've got a handy portable workstation.

There are projectors out there which cost ten times as much as this little one. If you can afford them - go nuts - but if you want a cheap and cheerful way to get some big screen action in, this is a good start.

It's important to emphasise that it is an excellent little projector in this price range. For about £150, you get bright colours, WiFi screen mirroring, and USB playback.

Special Offers

If you register your purchase with ASAKUKI within 60 days of purchase, they'll extend the product warranty to 3 years.

Buy it direct from Amazon UK to get it at the cheapest price.

Readers in the USA can buy from Amazon.com.

But projectors are still wildly expensive and out of reach for most people. Aren't they?

DBPower have sent me their RD810 projector to review. It costs £60. That's not a typo. Sixty Quid.

Let's get two things out of the way first.

1. This is not an HD projector. The resolution is 800*480. That's fine for standard definition US TV shows, but a little underwhelming for anything else.
2. You're going to need a dark room in order to get the most out of it.

This isn't a laser-powered, 4K, 3D, super-projector. This is a quick and cheap way to watch cartoons on the big screen.

Let's get on with this sponsored review...

Unboxing and First Use

I used Big Buck Bunny as a test source. The projector played a 1080p 60fps MP4 without complaint! I was expecting it to stutter on that, but it worked flawlessly.

Connections

• USB - possibly the most useful port, you can load movies up on a USB stick and play them back from there - no laptop needed! It will also work with an MHL cable, so you can play directly from Android.
• HDMI - standard connector. Will take up to 1080p video.
• Headphones - there's a small mono speaker on the projector, so if you want stereo, you'll need something plugged into here.
• AV - a weird little port. The projector comes bundled with an adaptor so you can plug in a composite source. Handy if you've got an ancient device hanging around. Personally, I think this could be dropped.
• VGA - yup, the good old standard connector.

Nothing too exciting - but it doesn't need to be. There's no WiFi or network connections, no TV tuner, nor any serial ports. But you don't expect that on a cheapo machine. You'll see some cheap media projectors run Android - this does not, it just has a simple operating system. The UI is sparse, but does the job.

At the bottom is a standard tripod screw fitting. Handy if you want to raise the height.

The remote is a cheap bit of plastic. No backlighting, so you'll need to remember the layout.

Screen Size

Because of the low price, there's no zoom mode.

Parody Kryten: NOW ON THREADS

@KrytenRD

Human eyes don't have a zoom - Well then how do you bring a small object into sharp focus? - You just move your head closer to the object!

---

Yup - you literally have to move the projector nearer to and further from the screen in order to change its size.

There is a adjustable foot at the front, so you can change the angle of projection. There's also focus and vertical keystone correction. They're both built into the lens, give them a twist and off you go.

Depending on the shape of your room, you might struggle to achieve the maximum available width. The brightness of the LED is surprisingly good for the price, but you'll need a pitch-black room to get the most out of it.

Colours can be adjusted in the projector's menu. There's also options to adjust aspect ratioa, brightness, and noise reduction.

Sound

There is a small built in speaker. No volume control that I could see - which is a pity, as the fan rather drowns it out. There's a basic set of EQ which allows you to change the bass and treble - but they don't have much effect.

At the back of the projector is a headphone jack. I suggest either plugging in some cans, or hooking it up to a more powerful set of speakers.

The speaker is mono. Again, good enough for simple sounds. The manual advises that the system doesn't support Dolby. It happily played an MP3 encoded stream in an MP4, I used Big Buck Bunny as a test.

Wrapping Up

You're not going to use this for your executive PowerPoint presentations, and you're not going to wow everyone with your in-home IMAX.

But, for sixty-notes, it's pretty damn good! For a second screen, projected onto a wall, or at a party it's a decent choice.

The colours are more suited to cartoons than David Attenborough documentaries. They claim that the LED lamp should last 50,000 hours. It appears to be replaceable but, honestly, for this price, it's probably just easier to buy a new one.

The small speaker is basic and the fan is a touch noisy.

Buy it

Readers of this blog can get 20% off at Amazon using the code KYZTI4EQ - valid until 31st December 2017.