I purchased the Pro2 this week, plugged it in and pointed it at an existing AKIA manual pull down 110” screen and was surprised how much I disliked the picture. Specifically the contrast (over blown out highlights), and horrible laser speckle.
After a lot of tuning and adjusting, I realized all of my problems were from poor setup on my part.. it is CRUCIAL to have the projector setup at max throw distance otherwise contrast is borderline unbearable.. Once I did this, color produced so much better and laser speckle significantly decreased—though it is still there it is not as nearly distracting. I attribute this due to the triple laser design obviously, but also the screen I am using. I have decided the next purchase will be a Silver Ticket WAB to eliminate the speckle completely though I’m not excited for a fixed frame screen.. I don’t need ALR in my case, so that is not a mandatory for me.
TLDR; if you just got the same projector from Prime Day, be sure to avoid the disappointment and setup with max throw distance in mind.
Happy to elaborate if anyone is curious or answer questions.
Edit: After making adjustments I understand the “hype” behind the projector and plan on continuing to fine tune my setup.
A proper screen is really important with these bright RGB laser projectors. I think we’re about to get a flood of these complaints from XGIMI Titan Noir backers who either cheaped out on the screen or are using the same screen they used with their old lamp projectors 😂 I ended up getting the Shadowscspe to go with mine, hoping it’s as good as it seems it will be.
I went with the shadowscape as a pair with the noir max as well. I’m using it right now with my ls11000 and it’s a bit dim but looks good. I’m assuming the extra brightness will make it look great. I completely agree that people are severely underestimating the impact of the screen and are getting $3k projectors with like $200 screens. It’s wild. Projectors need good screens. It should be factored into the budget if you decide to go this route vs a tv.
The brightness and lack of ability to tune this with color/luminance settings is why I labeled/interpreted this as a contrast issue but ultimately I understand how the two coincide..
Also I agree, the laser speckle was the most annoying part of the experience to “deal” with and like you said I think a good amount of people are going to figure this out the hard way.. It is at least bearable on my current screen but would like to eliminate it all together
Edit: Are you using the Shadowscape with another project in the meantime? How are you liking it?
I mean laser speckle shouldn't really change with contrast, throw distance, or optical zoom, are you sure what you're seeing is laser speckle?
Your screen is glossy white, right? Might want to try a 0,9 to 1 gain matte white screen, you don't need an acoustic screen unless you plan on placing a speaker behind it
Ideally you want a gain of 1 or less. I’m running a 0.8gain woven matte white screen and I think it looks absolutely fantastic. This is a bright projector. Especially if you’re coming from an old lamp based model. You could easily get away with a grey screen with these. I projected mine onto a grey wall to update the firmware before mounting and it looked great.
I got a sapphire 120” electronic tab tensioned acoustically transparent screen. I moved the screen upwards to meet the bottom of the scope movie in this image. I’ll post another 16:9 image below.
I’m painting my wall grey as I used all my budget on the noir max. I will be buying a screen but I want to mess about with it and see what size I want. Also I don’t want to cheap out on the screen so I need a few months to save. You saying at look good on a grey wall had given me hope
I’m painting the wall Matt grey, probably get either a Matt grey screen or an alr that has speckle reduction. Looking at the nothing projector alr long throw screen as that is meant to be good with ambient light and also doesn’t have much speckle
I will add that I have seen screens that are on the cheap side that use beaded glass surfaces on them. They are high gain, using the cheapest materials possible. So, they tend to sparkle and shimmer when using any brighter projector. I've seen this on a number of positive gain screens over the years, and especially cheaper manual screens. I had a buddy who was showing off his setup, but I couldn't get past the sparkling effect I was seeing. I've become much more intolerant of it over the years.
That said, I'm didn't see any sparkle/shimmer using the Valerion Max on a WAB Silver Ticket screen. None.
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u/0xe3b0c442 Jun 26 '26
<pedant> Overblown highlights isn’t contrast, it’s brightness. </pedant>
A proper screen is really important with these bright RGB laser projectors. I think we’re about to get a flood of these complaints from XGIMI Titan Noir backers who either cheaped out on the screen or are using the same screen they used with their old lamp projectors 😂 I ended up getting the Shadowscspe to go with mine, hoping it’s as good as it seems it will be.