The idea of buying a portable projector for my home and adding it to my stable of devices seemed like a no-brainer. Allowing me the opportunity to bring a TV-like setting outdoors or into another room was enticing. I had imagined that this could potentially replace the TVs that I have in some of the rooms in my home.
But what I really wanted this for was to squash any notion that I might want to buy an outdoor TV. Sitting out on the deck and watching something as night descends on my home was a dream. I was able to enjoy this a few times, but after a while, the projector felt like a waste of money. I have the Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector, and it just doesn’t quite live up to what I had hoped. Granted, it fits for its price point. But I had thought getting a portable projector would be a game-changer, and it hasn’t been.
The idea of a portable projector is better than actually having this one
It just hasn’t made its way into my rotation
The Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector is not large or heavy, so it’s simple to carry and easy to maneuver. It costs less than $50, so it didn’t cost an arm and a leg. But because of that, I don’t find myself stressing about not using it often.
I did think I would use it more than I do. Some rooms in my house don’t have TVs and some rooms have dumb TVs. But I find myself more likely to use the dumb TV with a Roku Streaming Stick in it than just relying on the portable projector.
Part of that is an inherent problem with projectors, period: they typically aren’t as good as TVs when the sun is up. When you think of a projector, you think of a dark room where the brightness from the projector can be shown off. While the colors of the Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector aren’t bad, they aren’t anything to write home about. Nobody is buying this projector because of its color and vibrancy.
This isn’t to say that I’m never going to use this projector again. With the Winter Olympics coming up, hooking this up outside, sitting by the fire table, enjoying a warming beverage, and watching skiing or snowboarding sounds like a great time. But other than spotty usage, I don’t rely on this as a TV replacement as much as I thought I would. There are a few reasons for that.
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The speakers are mediocre
It’s just a small piece of equipment
What is nice about the Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector is that it comes with its own remote, so you can control everything that the projector displays. You can also adjust the sound, which is piped through the small speakers on the bottom of the projector.
You have to crank the volume to the highest level in order to hear it at all. That being said, the fact that it has built-in speakers at all is a plus. Not every projector has one, let alone a few. But the Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector’s speakers can do the trick if you’re sitting close to the speaker. If you’re not directly near it, you will struggle to hear well.
The Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector does offer Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connectivity, so you can hook up a Bluetooth speaker to it to amplify the sound.
You more or less have to connect a separate speaker for it to be valuable as an outdoor asset. But if you’re indoors, you can get away with the built-in speakers.
The operating system is basic
The experience feels cheap
It is nice that this is a smart projector with a built-in Android OS. You see that there are a few apps loaded onto it from the start, so you don’t have to worry about every addition. But there is the Google Play Store available for you to download other apps to your projector, letting you use this to turn your living room into a movie theater.
You have 16GB plus 8GB of ROM storage to play with, meaning you can download apps and use this to its full potential. That potential, however, is built on a bit of a clunky operating system. The OS frequently tells me it has to do updates (which is fine).
But in order to do so, I’ve found that it erases the previous version of the OS and installs a new one. While this is also not the biggest issue in the world, as the updates take a rather short amount of time, it basically resets the factory settings of the projector every time. This means not only do I lose the apps I have, but I also lose the Wi-Fi settings and the log-ins for all the apps I use.
I did mention that the projector comes with a remote. But I don’t want to be typing in passwords for streaming services every time I have to do a system update. Yet, that’s what the Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector forces me to do.
With the Winter Olympics coming up, hooking this up outside, sitting by the fire table, enjoying a warming beverage, and watching skiing or snowboarding sounds like a great time.
It allows for screen mirroring, which is a nice touch and makes it easier to stream things that might not be easily accessed through the apps available. But the screen has to be darker to really take advantage of this, as there aren’t many tangible brightness settings that work with the projector.
Some of the intangibles are odd
These are just more things I don’t love about this projector
For a portable projector, you’d think that it should be able to work from many different locations. Maybe a battery-powered one would make sense if you want to use this as a truly portable device. But the Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector has one of the shortest cords for any device I can imagine.
This projector needs to be plugged in to work. Not only does it need to be plugged in, but it also has to be backed away from a surface that it shoots at in order for the resolution and screen to become clear (it offers a native resolution of 1280 x 720 and a display resolution of 3840 x 2160). How can you possibly get the most out of your display if the cord is so short?
You can correct the resolution by adjusting the lens, making it clearer as you fine-tune the setup. But you limit the size of the display and projection by keeping it closer to the surface. The short cord really makes no sense.
The Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector can be positioned and rotated 180°, giving you flexibility in how you deploy it. This lets you shoot it at the ceiling, walls, screens, and more. But each time you move it, you have to make it correct itself. The auto keystone helps level the picture, but you have to manually fix the clarity yourself.
I’m going to rely on a more name-brand projector next time
The good news is that I haven’t been scared off from ever using smart projectors again. I think I would just opt for one that was better next time. The Magcubic Auto Keystone Mini Portable Projector does some good things, the top of which is being friendly to your wallet. But for a projector with more advanced features and an easier layout, you need to look elsewhere.
