Phillips PicoPix Max Projector Review

As I was travelling over the past year I was looking to pick up a small projector that would be easy enough to carry for a great movie viewing experience on the go. When I saw the Phillips PicoPix Max on Indiegogo it looked like the perfect fit, with full 1080p projection in a small size and in-built Android.

After a 2-month delay receiving the unit, I've now been using it for 5 months on a semi-regular basis. Phillips have shipped several software updates in this time, most recently the first major update (version 1.1). This felt like a good time to post some initial thoughts.

I'm viewing on a white 100" projector screen.

Positive Thoughts

• Build quality feels premium and although far from 'pocket-friendly' as advertised, it's small enough to fit in a bag. At 850g it's not much heavier than a large tablet.

• Picture quality is good even at 100" - the image looks crisp without any visible artefacts. Many '1080p' projectors on the market are actually upscaling from 720p - the PicoPix Max uses native 1080p and the difference is significant at this size.

• Brightness is impressive at normal mode, and great for night-time viewing. My flat is bright in daylight it's difficult to view before sunset - an increasing problem as the days have gotten longer.

• When I first got the projector the fan noise was too loud unless I dropped down to the dim eco-friendly mode, but this was addressed in the recent 1.1 patch. Now normal mode is suitably quiet for viewing and eco mode is silent.

Issues

• It's advertised as an Android projector, but this is unlike any Android device I've owned. Largely this is due to there being no Google Play services, so you won't find a Play Store or any Google apps like Chrome or Play Movies. YouTube requires use of a 3rd party app for authentication, which I didn't feel confident to put my Google creditendials into.

• App selection is poor, the in-built 'Aptoide Store' lists many apps that simply don't work, giving errors such as 'Play Services Required'. When I bought the projector I'd hoped to watch The Mandalorian on it, but Disney+ wasn't there. More recently I tried to watch Westworld season 3, but I couldn't get HBO. After trying many apps in Aptoide I've given up unless they are pre-installed, which limits you to Netflix and only a small handful of others.

• The cast support on the device is basic screen share and the device has no ChromeCast support. This is a real shame as it would have been one way of circumventing some of the issues mentioned above, but most apps can't be casted from my Android phone. Other non-Android devices have "ChromeCast Built-In", so I really hope this get's added in a software update.

• I ended up purchasing a ChromeCast dongle to stick in the back HDMI port, but sadly this surfaced another batch of problems. Bluetooth Audio is only supported though the on-board software, so it's impossible to use with dongles like the ChromeCast - I've had to start using an old-school 3.5mm headphone cable to connect to my bluetooth speaker.

• As most display features are handled at the software layer, over HDMI you don't get many of the advertised features like 4-Corner Keystone correction. As a result I have to awkwardly position my screen at an angle to get a correctly aligned picture.

• This is more of a nuisance but other software features are missing over HDMI, for example you can't see the current battery level without switching the Input mode back to Android.

Verdict

The PicoPix Max feels is a nice piece of hardware with over-engineered software that fails to meet some of my basic expectations from a projector. Without Play Services, Android feels like a bad fit for this sort of device and I think Phillips would have been better off focusing on the fundamentals like full feature support over HDMI.

As most of the issues are software-based, it's not impossible to imagine them being addressed with updates before this device hits retail. Receiving Google Play Services might be a stretch, but ChromeCast Built-In would be a great start and give users a way of accessing apps that aren't supported.

The PicoPix Max is an intriguing device that offers a glimpse to the future of portable projectors, but I couldn't recommend it in it's current form.

Papercuts 4.0

As well as updating Paste It to version 4.0, this week I will be releasing Papercuts 4.0, the first major update in over 4 years. Here's what's new:

Custom Keyboard Shortcuts

Papercuts 4.0 will allow the keyboard shortcuts to be customised from chrome://extensions/shortcuts. To set keyboard shortcuts, head to the Notebook tab of the Options page and select a shortcut next to the note you wish to assign. If you see "Shortcut X" instead of a key code, you'll first need to go to the chrome://extensions/shortcuts page to set a key.

Due to a restriction in Chrome, the keyboard shortcuts are now limited to 4 notes (previously this was 9). If you require more shortcuts, consider installing Paste It as well, so you can effectively have up to 8 keys assigned in total.

Workaround for Unsupported Input Fields (e.g. Gmail)

As detailed on my previous post, Papercuts 4.0 offers a workaround for pasting on unsupported input fields, such as Gmail or Reddit, instead of silently failing.

Friendlier Permissions and Bug Fixes

When you install Papercuts for the first time you will no longer see a message about the extension reading the data on "all your data on the websites you visit". This was previously only used for the legacy keyboard shortcut method, which now uses a safe and supported Chrome API.

Papercuts 4.0 also contains a number of bug fixes, including some UI issues which caused a second scrollbar to display and the 'Rename Tab' button to be hidden off screen. Both the popup and options pages have received a bit of polish and clean up.

Papercuts can be installed for free from the Chrome Web Store, with the version 4.0 update coming within a few days pending approval from Google. I'm not planning on bringing Papercuts to the Edge Add-ons store, but the Chrome version can be installed on Edge.

Papercuts is both offered 100% free with no ads or paywalled features. Please show your support by leaving a review in the Chrome Web Store or sharing it with your friends.

Paste It 4.0

This week I will be releasing version 4.0 updates to both of my browser extensions, Paste It and Papercuts. Each features a number of new features that I hope you find useful, including a long-awaited workaround for sites like Gmail.

First off, here are the changes you'll find in Paste It 4.0, which offers further enhancements to the recently released 3.6 update.

Workaround for Unsupported Input Fields (e.g. Gmail)

One of the most commonly reported issues for both Paste It and Papercuts is that pasting was unsupported on some websites, particularly those that use rich text editing such as Gmail or Reddit. This has proven difficult to fix as it would require a deep understanding of how these sites operate, and their implementations could potentially change over time.

With the version 4.0 updates, I have implemented a workaround which will intelligently detect when the text does not paste successfully, in which case an option will appear to allow you to copy the text to the clipboard instead. From there you can paste your text using regular system commands such as Ctrl+V or the context menu.

Paste Text for 4 Different Keyboard Shortcuts

Another popularly requested feature for Paste It has been the ability to support more lines of text. With the new update, Paste It will support up to  3 alternate paste texts in addition to the primary text, which you can set from the "Alternate Paste Text" section of the Options page. By default these use Alt+Shift+V, Alt+B and Alt+Shift+B, all of which can be customized from chrome://extensions/shortcuts.

Note that Alternate Text can only be pasted from keyboard shortcuts - Chromium has a hard limit of one toolbar icon and one context menu entry per extension, so these methods will only support the primary text string. Some people have suggested  using a dropdown menu to allow these to be expanded, but I believe that would detract from the speed and simplicity of Paste It. I recommend looking to Papercuts if you wish to store and paste multiple notes.

Dyamic Keyboard Shortcuts and Better Mac Support

Paste It 4.0 also improves the recently added custom shortcut feature so that the Options page will now show the correct keyboard shortcut if you customise it. Additionally, on MacOS this will now display as "⌥+V" by default.

Paste It can be installed for free from the Chrome Web Store or Edge Add-ons store. The version 4.0 update will be available within a few days, pending approval from Google and Microsoft.

Paste It is offered 100% free with no ads or paywalled features. Please show your support by leaving a review in the Chrome Web Store, Edge Add-ons store or sharing it with your friends.

Paste It 3.6

Paste It is a browser extension I started work on in 2010 ago as lightweight alternative to my note keeping extension Papercuts, with the primary aim of being able to paste a single line of text - typically the user's email address - in the quickest and simplest way possible.

Over the past decade Paste It has found over 10,000 users on Chrome worldwide. This week I released Paste It 3.6, which brings a number of new features and improved support for Edge.

Friendlier Permissions

If you installed Paste It prior to this week, you may have seen a message that the extension could “read and change all your data on the websites you visit”. While this may have sounded a little scary, it was required so that the extension could add the neccessary code to each website to support keyboard shortcuts i.e. pasting text when the "Alt+V" key was held down.

With version 3.6, I've rewritten how the extension interprets keyboard commands using Chromium's in-built commands API. As this is a standard and safe method supported by Chromium, there won't be any warnings when you first install Paste It.

Customizable Keyboard Shortcuts

Paste It 3.6 also brings a commonly requested new feature - customizable keyboard shortcuts! If you don't want Alt+V to be the keyboard command, just open chrome://extensions/shortcuts to change it to anything you like. This could be useful if you have another app that's using the default command already.

I'm hoping to bring this update to Paste It's bigger brother Papercuts, though that will take a bit more work due to the more complicated nature of the extension supporting multiple keyboard shortcuts.

Other Tweaks

There are a few other tweaks in this version, such as a cleaner Options page with clearer usage instructions. I've improved feedback for some unsupported pages such as the Chrome Web Store or internal browser pages - if you try and use Paste It on these websites you will now get an alert instead of a silent failure.

Some sites such as Gmail will still fail silently - this is due to the complicated nature of their rich text input which has proven difficult to work around.

Improved Edge Support

While it was already possible to install Paste It on the new Chromium-based Microsoft Edge browser, version 3.6 makes a few changes to the terminology used inside Edge to provide a more optimal experience.

Today I'm also pleased to announce that Paste It is now available in the Edge Add-ons section of the Microsoft Store. It works exactly the same as the Chrome Web Store version, but if you are using Edge I'd recommend installing via Microsoft's store to ensure future updates are downloaded automatically.

Paste It and Papercuts are both offered 100% free with no ads or paywalled features. Please show your support by leaving a review in the Chrome Web Store, Edge Add-ons store or sharing them with your friends.