UST’s mid-range projector lags behind its competitors

Formovi Theater It took the projector world by storm when it first arrived, offering triple laser, a 150-inch ultra-short throw (UST) image, and Dolby Vision for $3,000. This was a relatively unprecedented price for such a set of features, especially from a brand that almost no one knew anything about.

This model helped make Formovie’s name, but $3,000 is still expensive for a projector. To attract more buyers, the company recently unveiled $1800 Edge Cinemaa much less expensive option that still offers a laser light engine, a clear 4K picture, Google TV for streaming, and 15-watt stereo speakers.

There are some fairly serious trade-offs, particularly the lack of Triple Laser Engine and Dolby Vision, as well as modest color accuracy and brightness. The new model also faces some stiff competition from the likes of Hisense, Epson and Optoma. It all adds up to a projector that’s not quite as exciting as Formovie’s first attempt.

Key Features of Formovie Cinema Edge

As a reminder, Formovie is a joint venture between Xiaomi and Appotronics (the latter makes laser engines for high-end brands like Barco). Formovie now offers three projector models: Cinema Edge, Theater $2400 and Theater premium is $3,000. It also sells a cheap and cheerful $199 Episode One Google TV projector, a 120-inch floor-standing display, and a 100-inch wall-mounted ALR display.

The Cinema Edge is more compact than a theater in all dimensions and features a square design and a subtle dark gray exterior. You can project onto a wall, or preferably a dedicated ALR screen to reduce glare, at a distance of about 13 inches for a 120-inch image. All this makes it discreet and allows you to install it in relatively tight spaces.

The Cinema Edge comes with a pair of 15-watt speakers, but projector geeks will no doubt want a 5.1 audio system to make better use of the built-in Dolby Atmos and DTS-HD. The Google TV system includes Netflix (unlike the Theater at launch) but the processor is a bit behind. This can make navigating and adjusting settings a chore, though it’s par for the course on other projectors I’ve seen, especially the Optoma and HiSense models. As a result, some users may still prefer to use Google TV or another streaming device.

Similar to a theater, the Cinema Edge sits on three rubber feet instead of four, which can make it difficult to adjust level when setting up. Although it supports fine-tuning of the digital keystone to square the image, it should be used as little as possible, as it reduces the image resolution slightly and increases latency for gaming. Because of that, as well as configuring the various applications, setup took longer than I expected.

Fortunately, there are plenty of inputs for adding accessories like Blu-Ray players, including three HDMI 2.1 ports (one with eArc for high-quality return to your audio system), 3.5mm audio and optical audio connectors, and two USB-C ports For media/streaming stick power and an Ethernet port (plus Wi-FI support of course).

The included remote is required to change most settings, control playback, and more, plus it uses standard batteries with no charging port. As with most ultra-short-throw projectors, the Cinema Edge has a sensor that detects if someone gets too close and automatically dims the output so you don’t get a laser blast in your eyeballs.

Image quality

Like most modern projectors (except the Epson), the Formovie Cinema Edge uses Texas Instruments’ DLP technology that displays a 1080p image twice to create a sharp 4K image using what’s called fast-switching pixel shifting. It combines that with a monochrome RGB+ laser to keep the price down compared to triple-laser setups like the Formovie Theater or Hisense’s $3,500 PX3-Pro.

The Cinema Edge delivers 4K video at up to 2,100 lumens, which is decent, but it doesn’t measure up to competitors like the 2,400-lumen Hisense PX2-Pro or Epson’s EpiQVision Ultra LS650. This latest model pumps out 3,600 lumens. However, the Cinema Edge’s brightness level was sufficient to watch some content in daylight, such as Netflix content Driving to survive Or stream live sports on Amazon Prime.

4K detail is excellent, which is something I appreciate when watching sci-fi series silo, Extension and 3 Body problem. Contrast is also strong, allowing for better viewing of movies with dimly lit scenes like the one pictured here joker and Batman.

Where Formovie Cinema Edge struggles compared to the theater model is in color rendering. With a single laser light source, it lacks the stunning 100 percent BT.2020 color gamut found in the Formovie Theater or Hisense PX2-Pro. It’s also limited to HDR10 support, rather than premium modes like Dolby Vision found on the slightly more expensive Hisense PX2-Pro.

As a result, the visuals are more bland in films like Transformers: Rise of the Monsters and airwith primary colors failing to appear on the screen as I’ve seen on those other models. However, colors are accurate by default, and there are extensive image quality settings if you want to fine-tune everything. Other issues I’ve noticed with HDR not having good performance are bright lights and some blemishes in the shadows or dark parts of images, especially in… Batman.

Motion smoothing (called MJC on Cinema Edge) is enabled by default, unfortunately, but it’s relatively easy to disable. Without this, the projector sometimes experiences some motion artifacts during fast action sequences, which is common with DLP projectors. For these types of movies, I found the Low Motion Smoothing setting to be a good compromise, limiting the soap opera effect while removing any stuttering from active action scenes.

Cinema Edge isn’t bad for light gaming, but with a refresh rate limited to 60Hz and input latency of around 40ms, you can’t play anything as demanding as fast-action FPS shooters. For example, I played Resident Evil Village From my Mac via my monitor, and the lag, tearing, and corruption made gaming a challenge.

The speakers provide good sound quality, with clear voices, music and sound effects. However, the bass is a bit thin and there’s little to no sound to add realism. Given the projector’s Dolby Atmos and HDMI 2.1 eArc support, anyone serious about audio will want to add external speakers or at least a subwoofer.

Conclusion

Considering how good Formovie Theater is, Cinema Edge is a disappointment. Performance is very low for the price, with relatively low brightness and average color rendition. The built-in Google TV is a bit slow, and setup is more difficult than it needs to be due to the lack of a fourth foot. The speaker setup is also good, with better sound quality available on some Optoma and LG projectors.

The Cinema Edge is still a mid-range UST projector, but the problem with the Formovie is that there’s a lot of competition in this price range. For just $200 more, you can get the Hisense PX2-Pro triple-laser UST projector, which offers higher brightness (2,400 lumens), along with Dolby Vision and over 100 percent BT.2020 coverage. Another option for the same price of $1,800 is the Epson LS650, which offers similar specs but nearly twice the brightness at 3,600 lumens. Cinema Edge is a good choice if you want a versatile projector with a small, precise design, but if brightness and image quality are paramount, look elsewhere.