Variation Reviewed: Formovie Theater Ultra Short Throw Projector 2800 Lumen Triple Laser UST Fengmi T1 Global Android OS

This is my 2nd Ultra short throw tv. Last year I purchased the Hisense L9G for my basement theatre room and have been extremely happy with it. 3 months ago my 2 years old decided to throw a tantrum and throw a hot wheels at my 86" tv and break it. This left me with a decision to make about what to get to replace it. Do I buy another large tv and risk Hot wheels again or go with another Ultra short throw TV? After a few months of deliberating I chose to go with another Ultra short throw. I hopped around the internet reviewing new brands and options and came across the Foremovie Theater that rated so well. It appeared that all the experts were raving about this new brand so I decided to give it a try since the Hisense L9G was rated slightly lower than it.  

I paired the Foremovie theater with what Proectorscreen.com recommended the spectra-projection-vantage-100-ust-alr-clr-projector-screen. My L9G is in a walkout basement with some ambient light but not much. The Foremovie is in a 2 story living room with lots of windows. I wasn't sure how it would compare but it was worth a shot. The ALR screens that I have don't seem to be much different. They both work well. With there being a lot of Ambient light having a good screen is a must as projecting on the wall only works well in a dark environment. I hosted a bunch of people for the Ohio State vs. Michigan Football game and they all were blown away with the performance. They couldn't believe the picture quality.  

The picture in day and night is fantastic. I will say the blacks are tougher to see with Ambient light but not that big of a deal to me. The colors are super bright and accurate. I don't see a huge difference in picture quality between the two. The biggest difference btw the 2 is the sound. The Foremovie blows the L9G speakers out of the water. Which says something because the L9G I thought was pretty good. The Foremovie is just that much better.

I'm very happy with my purchase. I'm excited to try it out outdoors for a movie night in the summer time as it will go up to 150".

The only con I had with Formovie is their customer service is non existent. I called about a remote issue and they don't have anyone to talk to. The only communication with them is through email which took them a day to respond between reply's. Luckily projectorscreen.com has great Customer service and was able to help me with my issue immediately. Not sure why I didn't call them earlier.

I can't recommend this product more. If you're on the fence just do it. Bigger is a lot better.

Variation Reviewed: Formovie Theater Ultra Short Throw Projector 2800 Lumen Triple Laser UST Fengmi T1 Global Android OS

Purchased the formovie theater ust projector with recommended spectra projection vantage 120 inch screen. Right out of the box the picture is surprisingly good. I am going to have it calibrated once I fine a good technician near me. I am using the new nvidia shield pro for content and upscaling. I must say this made a huge difference. The projector is capable of displaying a fantastic picture but needs a good source. The oppo player with Dolby vision content is exceptional. You will never get the brightness out of an ust projector that my lg oled had but the size and surprisingly good black levels make you not notice the difference after viewing for a few minutes. I am using this as my main tv, on 4 to 6 hours a day and am very pleased with my decision to go this route. I have adjusted all the settings I can with internet calibration tools. Adjusting blue and white balance, setting contrast etc made the black levels and color better. The color on this projector far exceeds my expectations. I can highly recommend this projector with the 120 inch screen as recommended by projector screen.com.

     

Variation Reviewed: Spectra Projection Vantage 100" UST ALR CLR Projector Screen for Ultra Short Throw Projectors

Looking at the installation manual, my first impression was this would be very complicated to set up and align with the projector. For sure it was a tad difficult but once it was ready to go, the experience was beyond ordinary. The picture clarity, even with the light on or the window open is incredible. I never imagined how I used a normal 55' TV for so long. Everything is wonderful to watch and keeps me engrossed for hours and made gaming with my PS5 super awesome with friends and family. Movies and 4k videos feel so much better to watch nowadays. Everyone I met seemed to be awestruck by it. Nothing goes better with my UST projector other than this screen that we installed ourselves. Must buy with this projector else the experience will be incomplete.

 

Variation Reviewed: Spectra Projection Vantage 110" UST ALR CLR Projector Screen for Ultra Short Throw Projectors

My husband and I host movie day once a week with family. This past October we decided we would like to have the real theater experience, so after much research we purchased the Spectra Projection UST 110” Screen! Boy are we happy we did! The people at Projection Screen are very knowledgeable and friendly! My only complaint is that the directions could be a little clearer but once we got going, we built the screen in a couple of hours. This screen was a great purchase and now it feels like we are truly at the theater but in the comfort of our own home.

   

Variation Reviewed: Formovie Theater Ultra Short Throw Projector 2800 Lumen Triple Laser UST Fengmi T1 Global Android OS

This is our first projector and we've only had it for less than a week so far, but it's definitely met our aspirations for bringing a theater experience into the living room. The picture quality is amazing, does not feel like there is any compromise coming from a relatively new 65" LED TV and that alone exceeded my expectations. On the other hand, the size just transforms the experience whether it's live sports, movies, or just binge streaming a series - everything feels significantly more immersive and it's a real pleasure to watch.

Setup of the projector itself was very straight forward, it updated to the newest firmware without a hitch and configured the wifi and settings from my android phone smoothly. I have it connected via eArc to a Sonos ARC, sub and surrounds again without any issues. I'm also using a Shield Pro with it primarily for streaming and that transferred from the TV to the projector without any issue hdmi-cec worked for both without any work. Still tweaking the picture settings but have no real complaints with the image out of the box. Dolby Vision seems to work fine from the Shield, I kinda like the notification tag it adds to the screen for a few seconds when starting compatible content (vision and atmos). Haven't played with streaming games over the Shield too much yet but looking forward to messing with that next.

The Spectra screen was definitely more work to assemble, but the mounting mechanism with the height adjustments in the brackets made that easier than I had expected too. The finished product looks great and works really well even with reasonably high ambient light. I do have blackout shades for the wall of windows facing the Arizona sun next to it, but it's still entirely usable in less than ideal lighting conditions.

Couple of quirks that I've also seen documented on the AVSForums too, but willing to live with them and hoping they get addressed in future firmware releases.

-WIFI periodically cuts out entirely - the unit can't see any available networks until reset/rebooted. With the Shield on a Gig LAN connection it doesn't impact me much, but would be more of an issue if you were relying on the built in media apps for everyday use.

-If you disable the built in speakers it throws an alert window you have to close every time the unit is brought out of sleep asking you to confirm the setting.

I can live with those quirks, but it would be nice to see them addressed down the road.

As you can see from the pics, I have the projector mounted inside an Ikea Besta TV stand and that took some modifications such as adding a TV slide unit and cutting holes for a pair of USB fans to help with air circulation, but the final result is pretty clean and the projector slides away neatly and is protected when not in use.

Joe was great putting together the order quickly and helping me deal with some unique shipping challenges. Felt much better making the decision to give the Formovie a try based on their reviews, participation in public forums, and hosting events such as the projector shoot-outs. Strongly recommend working with the ProjectorScreen team if you're thinking about making the plunge like we did!