Philips NeoPix 750 Home Projector Review

Performance

The new NeoPix is designed to be a projector for anyone, rather than just your deep-pocketed enthusiast who has lots of spare time. So it’s meant to be plug-and-play, and very easy to set up. Take it out of the box, provide it with power, and you’re honestly good to go. It has a few built-in apps and wireless connectivity, so short of some simple setup menus on the first boot, it really is plug-and-play from there on out.

Of course, with the HDMI and USB inputs, it’s really up to you what you want to connect, and you can just as easily plug in your AV receiver, consoles, external storage, SkyTV, FireTV or whatever you like, and again, this should all work absolutely fine. The projector is Full HD, but it should accept a 4K signal just fine. However, if that doesn’t work, just set your device output to Full HD in the settings menu if it doesn’t automatically default to that mode.

Point it at a clean wall or surface, and you’re good to go. I actually have a 100″ projector screen in the living room, so obviously I’m going to use that. If it’s out of focus on first use or when you move it, you can simply twist the lens at the front to focus it, it’s pretty simple to do though.

It’s got a decent brightness too, 700 lumens really isn’t that bad for a reasonably affordable projector. It uses an LED light source too, which is not only fantastically efficient but with a 30K hour lamp life, it’s going to last a very long time indeed. That efficiency also comes with another benefit, LED light sources generate a lot less heat than their bulb equivalents, meaning the fan in this projector is just a quiet whirring that’s not really going to be any bother during movie time.

The NeoPix 750 runs on LuminOS, which is pretty decent, as it’s basic just an Android-based mobile OS that works like you would expect. There’s all the usual stuff in here, like Disney+, Prime Video and even Apple TV, YouTube, etc, and while I doubt every app you want is going to be here, it ticks more than enough boxes for out-of-the-box features. Personally, I was going to hook up the Xbox Series X as my media player, but the built-in applications were really snappy and worked very well, including Plex and VLC!

Navigation is easy enough, with a remote that has all the usual functions laid out clearly. There are shortcuts to settings, source, menu, and home, as well as basic media controls and volume.

The OSD is simple enough, like I said, it’s Android, so you have an app store, a settings menu, etc. There’s an overlay menu to jump to different image sources, picture settings, sound settings and projection modes.

I am happy to see there’s an adjustable colour temperature, brightness, contrast, etc. While most users will not need anything beyond the default settings, these are certainly still welcome to correct for lighting and colour issues on a per-room basis.

So far, impressions are positive, the image has good brightness and is usable during the day. Obviously, close the curtains and turn the lights off, but that’s a given for using a projector during the day. However, at night time, or in a light-controlled room, the image is really going to pop. There’s a good level of contrast, the colours are vibrant, and overall, I think anyone would be very happy using this for movie night.

Just keep in mind, that the larger the image, the more surface the light has to cover, so you lose brightness. I’m not maxing this out at 120″ I’m using it on 100″, so I get a slightly brighter image. If you’re going for 80″ for example, it would look even brighter still.

For getting up to a 120″ image with little to no fuss, the NeoPix is a strong contender in the affordable projector market. One thing that really lends credit to it, is how easy it is to both set up and fine-tune should you feel the need. There’s full keystone support so you can adjust the tilt if the image should your projector be too high or too low relative to the screen or surface you’re pointing it at. There’s also 4-corner digital correction, which is a big one, as squaring up the image manually can be tricky sometimes.

There’s also digital zoom, and while admittedly, keystone, digital corner correction and zoom can have a minor impact on image quality, generally, it’s better to have those tools available than not. My own projector has zero correction beyond manual dials, and let me tell ya, it was an absolute headache of a weekend getting it all dialled and mounted in the right spot on my ceiling… the NeoPix 750, by comparison, took me two minutes, not two days.

There are built-in speakers too, and I’m always surprised by how loud the speakers in projectors can be, and the NeoPix 750 is no exception. With 2 x 7.5w, it can really throw out quite a racket! Plus you can hook up a Bluetooth speaker, so if you have a soundbar or something similar, you can use that too. There are no fancy DTS, Dolby or Harmon Kardon logos on this projector though, so it’s just a pair of punchy built-in stereo speakers, but honestly, I’m fine with that. I see a lot of projectors that boast about these audio partnerships and features with little actual change or benefit to the end user, as most projectors are still just packing a pair of stereo speakers anyway.