Portable projectors are a great alternative if you are looking for a bigger screen that doesn’t take up too much floor/wall space in your home. After the announcement of the Samsung Freestyle, an all-new portable screen and entertainment device, it is essential to look at a comparison of the alternatives from BenQ and Anker. While there are many options available for portable projectors, the Samsung Freestyle falls in the same category as the BenQ GS50 and Anker Nebula Mars II Pro. Let’s have a look a comparison between these portable projectors to determine which one is the best option.
While you can use these projectors in your home theatre but their main purpose is to project the screen wherever you want and whenever you want with almost no setup time. If you are considering a portable projector, there are many functions you need to consider including Brightness, Battery Life, Fan Noise, Speaker Fidelity, App compatibility, and Picture Quality.
The Samsung Freestyle, BenQ GS50, and Anker Nebula Mars II Pro all feature DLP projection technology and LED light source. The Digital Light Processing (DLP) technology works by reflecting light off microscopic mirrored panels called Digital Micro-Mirror Devices (DMD). The standard measurement for projector brightness is the ANSI Lumen, which is calculated by projecting a pure white screen and dividing it into nine sections. Individual brightness measurements are taken for each section using a lux meter and an average reading is calculated and multiplied by the screen size to obtain the ANSI Lumens brightness reading. All three portable projectors offer approximately the same brightness around 500 ANSI lumens but Samsung Freestyle offers the highest brightness of the three with 550 ANSI lumens.
Image clarify is basically the result of the native resolution and quality of the focusing lens. Samsung Freestyle and BenQ GS50 feature native resolution of 1080p while Anker Nebula Mars II Pro features only 720p resolution. In terms of black levels of the image, the BenQ GS50 offers the best contrast at 100,000:1, followed by Nebula Mars II Pro at 1000:1, and Samsung Freestyle with a very small 300:1 contrast ratio. The Samsung and BenQ projectors provide HDR10 functionality for a brighter image. The maximum projection size of all three projectors is around 100 inches with Anker Nebula Mars II Pro around 150 inches.
All three devices feature a built-in speaker for audio entertainment. The BenQ GS50 features two 5W speakers with 10W woofer, whereas Anker Nebula Mars II Pro has two 10W speakers and Samsung Freestyle offers a single 360 degree 5W speaker. The sound quality of the BenQ is definitely superior compared to the competition. It is important to note that Samsung Freestyle does not offer an Aux port for audio out functionality.
In terms of portability, the device size and battery life is very important. The Samsung Freestyle offers the smallest form factor followed by Anker Nebula Mars II Pro, while BenQ GS50 has a larger size in comparison. The weight is also proportional to the size as Samsung Freestyle is the lightest and BenQ GS50 is the heaviest of the three. This is mainly because the Samsung Freestyle does not have a built-in battery whereas the BenQ and Anker offer ~3hrs of battery life for ultimate portability. It is also important to note that BenQ GS50 does offer IPX2 Splash Proof and 2.3ft drop protection, which is quite useful when using the projector in outdoor settings. The Samsung Freestyle definitely wins the portability round as it has more versatility thanks to the hinge, which allows you to project at any angle by simply rotating the device. In addition, the Samsung Freestyle can also be plugged into a light bulb socket adaptor (sold separately).
Samsung Freestyle vs GS50 vs Mars II Pro: Specs Comparison
Most of these portable projectors are smart projectors with built in apps as these are supposed to be all in one unit that you can set down and turn on. Samsung Freestyle has the Tizen operating system while BenQ GS50 runs on Android TV 9.0 and Anker Nebula Mars II Pro feature Android 7.1 operating system. BenQ GS50 is also the only portable projector with built-in Chromecast and AirPlay, which not only allows you to mirror your screen but you can also cast your chrome browser tabs, while Samsung only features AirPlay, which is limited to Apple devices only. Samsung Freestyle offers all of the streaming services via its Tizen operating system and it is important to note that Netflix is not natively available on BenQ GS50 smart home projector as Netflix only supports specific authorized devices. On the other hand, copyrighted content from Hulu, Netflix, and similar services can NOT be mirrored or screencast using Anker Nebula Mars II Pro.
Based on the above comparison, we would recommend BenQ GS50 as the best portable projector. The Samsung Freestyle definitely offers more portability compared to the competition given the smaller form factor. However, the lack of built-in battery, low contrast ratio and a price tag of $900 make the Samsung Freestyle very difficult recommendation over the BenQ GS50. In comparison to the Anker Nebula Mars II Pro, the BenQ GS50 also offers a higher resolution (1080p) and contrast ratio (100,000:1) with built-in chromecast and splash/drop proof construction. In addition, the BenQ GS50 offers the most number of connectivity options and an unbeatable 3 year warranty.
I am officially a tech addict and enjoy providing my views on matters related to this industry. I am always interested in trying out new tech gadgets and I have owned multiple smartphones including the legendary HTC One, SGS2, Nexus 4, iPhone 4, 5S, 6S, XR, Note 9. You can ask me any tech related questions in the comment section or on twitter @hookedNav