Now, before writing this review, I used this projector for well over two months. I’ve used it in a couple different rooms in my home, to see how it works in brighter and darker rooms. So with that said, let’s see if you should spend your hard earned money on this projector.
Hisense PX1 Review: Hardware
The Hisense PX1 is a bit cheaper than some of its competitors, like the BenQ V7050i. Their retail prices are about $1,000 apart, though BenQ does have that cool motorized panel that protects the lasers when not in use. So when I first got the PX1, I figured that the hardware build quality might suffer, to hit a lower price point. I was wrong. The PX1 does have a plastic look to it, but it is very much not plastic. Some parts are, but majority of it is aluminum. And it does look really nice sitting in my living room. On the front, you’ll find a huge speaker grille, which is great to see, since it does have Dolby Atmos support. On the top, there’s a power button, and of course the lasers. With the back being where all the ports live. Which we’ll talk about in a moment. On the bottom there are four feet that are adjustable, so you can make the picture as straight as possible. Now as far as ports go, there’s quite a few. There’s the port for power of course, at the bottom. In addition to that, we have a Coax port for cable, Audio In, Audio Out, LAN, a USB 2 port, as well as two HDMI ports. Both of these are HDMI 2.1 ports, though only the first HDMI port is an e-ARC and HDMI 2.1 port. There’s also a few serve ports available for Hisense to work on your projector.
There are only two HDMI ports here, which isn’t the best, but the fact that both are HDMI 2.1 ports is really great to see. For me, I’ve had a Fire TV Cube plugged into one port, and for the last week, the other has had a Sonos Beam 2 connected. Which means if I wanted to use one for my PS5, I’d have to unplug one, which is unfortunate.
Hisense PX1 Review: Video quality
This is a tri-laser projector from Hisense. That’s more lasers than most other projectors on the market. Which does help quite a bit with picture quality. It also uses a single DLP chip that is able to take advantage of TI’s XPR fast-switch pixel shifting, which allows it to give you a full 4K resolution. Some other projectors will claim that it is 4K, but it actually is not. With Hisense, that’s not the case. Hisense uses red, green and blue lasers for its primary colors and rotates them through in sequence, giving you a really great picture quality here. Hisense claims that it is able to cover 107% of the gamut of the BT.2020 spec. This is a spec that was defined to target 4K projectors specifically.
The PX1 is able to fit up to 130-inches of screen on your wall, and surprisingly, even at that size, there’s no issues with focus. It still looks amazing at that size. Some other projectors, once you get over 100 inches, will start to lose focus and sharpness. But not for Hisense.
Hisense PX1 Review: Audio quality
Inside the PX1, there is a 30W speaker inside, which is optimized for Dolby Atmos. That’s going to give you a really great experience. Though I did still prefer to use my setup of a Sonos Beam 2 and Sub Mini with the PX1. That’s not to say that the PX1 is not a good sounding projector, but having a dedicated Sub does make a difference.
Hisense does offer sound for ARC, WiSA and on Bluetooth. So you don’t have to stick with Hisense’s own speakers. But if you don’t have a soundbar, or don’t want to buy one, then it’s not needed.
Hisense PX1 Review: Software
Like a lot of other ultra short throw projectors, the Hisense PX1 is powered by Android TV. That’s fine. Android TV is good, except when it comes to projectors. And it’s not a Google issue either, it’s a Netflix issue. You see, Netflix will only certify devices that sell a certain amount – and it’s a high number, well over a million. So just having Android TV doesn’t mean that Netflix will work. In fact, you’ll need to sideload the mobile version of Netflix, which looks bad and acts even worse on a big screen like this. Not to mention it’s a lot of extra steps to launch the app every time. Outside of the Netflix issues, the software is pretty good. Hisense did include a good amount of storage here and RAM, compared to the Chromecast. So that won’t be an issue. But that is also why I’ve been using the PX1 with a Fire TV Cube and a Chromecast with Google TV.
Should you buy the PX1?
This year, I’ve been lucky enough to review a handful of projectors, mostly UST projectors, and the PX1 is my new favorite. It beat out the AWOL Vision projector, but not by much. Even though the PX1 isn’t as bright, it does have more accurate colors, which makes the picture itself look a lot more rich and contrasty. Making it my pick. It’s also smaller, than some other projectors on the market.
You should buy the Hisense PX1 if:
You are looking for a nice projector to put in your living room.You are looking for a projector to play PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X games at the full 4K/120fps.You want a huge screen in your living room or den.
You shouldn’t buy the Hisense PX1 if:
You don’t like how dim projectors are compared to TVs.You don’t want to spend nearly $3,000 on a projector.
