Home micro projectors have shortcomings, screenless TVs may be just a concept hype

After more than a year of launching its "screenless TV" products, XGIMI, which has gone through two rounds of investment, hopes to establish itself as a leader in this field. On June 30, XGIMI released three new products, targeting home use, portable use, and a cooperative product with Mango TV. The latter participated in the strategic investment of XGIMI Pre-B in June 2015.

While emphasizing that it was "the first in China" to enter the smart projection field, it cited data from Analysys International, claiming that its market share reached 49%. However, some people from outside China questioned that the "screenless TV" created by XGIMI was just a concept, and there was no difference between it and the LED projectors launched by Optoma, Epson, Sony and other manufacturers.

"If there is a breakthrough, it is only in price, but the price of around 2,000 is actually a waste." An industry insider commented on Xgimi's projection products to Tencent Technology.

From the outside, traditional manufacturers such as Optoma and Ricoh have eliminated related LED products and mostly chose hybrid light sources. The main reason is that the brightness of the former is too low and the indicators are not good. Although some manufacturers have hyped LEDs by claiming that they can last for tens of thousands of hours without changing bulbs, the market response was also cold because the price was not low.

Therefore, in the cost-advantaged Internet channel, LED projectors can obviously help manufacturers lower prices to participate in the competition. But from the current point of view, XGIMI is not the only player in this market.

What exactly is “smart micro-projector”?

According to XGIMI's introduction, the three newly released products are defined as "smart micro-projectors", which are the continuation of its "screenless TV" products. They use the DLP optical projection technology of chip manufacturer Texas Instruments, which can produce IMAX cinema effects in specific usage scenarios.

Taking the flagship product Z4X as an example, XGIMI emphasized that it uses the S8 optical engine and dual optical path design, and emphasized that the brightness is 30% higher than the 0.45 optical engine commonly used on the market; it has 27 picture enhancement technologies and material enhancement technologies to improve the sharpness and smoothness of the picture; and the audio system cooperates with Harman Kardon, which has provided product solutions for luxury car audio.

At the same time, in order to attract users, XGIMI also emphasized its large-capacity battery. According to the information, it has a built-in "South Korean LG 13600mAh high-efficiency rechargeable battery", and emphasized at the press conference that it can charge users' mobile phones when necessary. However, when not connected to a power source, this projector can only support 2 hours and 40 minutes of playback.

When users have too high expectations for the product, they will encounter greater problems during use. Specifically, during use, users may need to add an additional tripod, and if it is suspended, the installation will be more complicated because there is no zoom function. From the official store of XGIMI, tripods and hangers are one of the main accessories.

In fact, when placed in a hanging style, the sound is heard overhead, which is not the best experience for users.

In addition, XGIMI is not the only company with similar positioning in China. According to the above-mentioned industry insiders, Huole Technology's product Nut has a similar positioning to XGIMI, and another company called "CoolLeTV" has also released products in this field early.

Can the introduction of Mango change the content ecology?

XGIMI emphasized the 300 million yuan investment from Mango TV, which includes not only funds but also content resources. A document provided by XGIMI shows that XGIMI and Mango TV will have an exclusive strategic cooperation in the future, integrating various types of high-definition legitimate sources such as movies, TV series, variety shows, and animations, and providing offline download functions. In addition, Baidu Music will also provide it with a legitimate music library.

However, an internal staff member of XGIMI told Tencent Technology that its product is similar to an Android box, and users can choose the applications to install by themselves. This means that users can use this product to watch products other than Mango TV, such as Tencent Video, iQiyi, Sohu Video, etc.

Regarding the extremely fast downloading function, the staff member said that XGIMI has cooperated with Xunlei. Users can download cracked pirated sources, but the official will not promote this.

In response to questions about the source of the content, Xgimi said that it "will not be influenced by any factors in making any decisions, especially decisions that will affect the user experience."

In other words, "micro-projector" products like Xgimi are similar to set-top boxes, and they only provide a channel for users.

There are risks for "Xiaomi"

The main problem of XGIMI is that they have no real innovation. The aforementioned industry insider said that the DMD chip, the core component of the optical engine, is currently only supplied by Texas Instruments, unlike mobile phones, which have many chip manufacturers to choose from.

From the product experience point of view, most LED projectors are still produced in small workshops. Due to the low precision of the lens and uneven quality, the problems they cause are far more than those of LCD screens.

In terms of price, XGIMI has not yet reached the extreme. Generally speaking, the price of a projector product with about 100 lumens, battery, portable, and supporting 720P can usually be reduced to about 1,000 yuan. At present, the price of XGIMI's new products is generally around 2,000 yuan.

Moreover, for ordinary users, their needs for watching movies can already be met through a variety of smart terminal devices such as tablets and set-top boxes. The emergence of projectors only provides a novel way, not an absolute rigid demand. Therefore, although the niche market exists, it is difficult to expand rapidly.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.