Xgimi Halo Plus (Halo+) portable smart projector hands-on

The Halo Plus is essentially the MoGo Pro dressed in black (or dark gray, to be more accurate). The Halo Plus is a bit larger (113.2 x 144.8 x 171.5 mm, 4.46 x 5.70 x 6.75 in) and heavier (1.59 kg, 3.5 lbs) than the MoGo Pro, but it is still compact enough to throw in a bag or backpack. It feels significantly more solid than the MoGo Pro, which is robust in its own right. The dark color looks sleek and high-end, but the top plastic panel is easy to smudge with fingerprints. The projector lens is fairly fingerprint resistant and wipes clean with ease.

The Halo Plus shares the same port layout as the MoGo Pro (1x USB 2.0, 1x HDMI, 1x 3.5 mm audio jack, DC in), but the ports are horizontally aligned along the top of the back panel (as opposed to the MoGo Pro's vertical orientation). This allows more room for ventilation along the back. The improved ventilation results in a whisper-quiet fan that is only audible at less than 3 inches from the back grill.

Thankfully, the Halo Plus has capacitive buttons (volume up, play/pause, volume down) along the top panel. This allows users to control the device (albeit minimally) without the remote, which was a sore spot of the Elfin. The bottom has the same threaded hole on the bottom as Xgimi's other projectors, allowing it to be mounted with a standard tripod mount or the X-Desktop Stand Pro.

Speaking of the X-Desktop Stand Pro, it is a beautifully crafted riser built specifically for projectors. The mount allows users to tilt the projector +/-15 degrees in a sphere. Matched with the Halo Plus's good keystone correction (more on that below), this allows the projectors to get a perfectly levelled image on almost any surface. There's a handy cable management loop on the back of the arched arm. The brushed aluminum finish resists smudges and looks clean, even after two months of use and travel.

Lastly, the remote is the same as those of other Xgimi projectors. It's fairly ergonomic and has a good amount of inputs, but it feels thin and cheaply made. (As a note, all three of the remotes I've been sent are still scratch- and blemish-free, even after being roughed up by children and toddlers.)

Like Xgimi's other projectors, the Halo Plus features the same excellent auto-focus and auto-keystone correction features. Auto-focus takes a couple of seconds to tune the image, as does the automatic keystone correction. However, I noticed that the auto-keystone correction failed fairly often (roughly 60% of the time). This may be because the camera used for keystone correction sits at the bottom of the front of the unit, and it may be easy to obscure the camera because of its location.

The same can be said for the Halo Plus's intelligent screen alignment and obstacle avoidance, which attempt to frame the image within real-world boundaries (e.g., a window or picture frame). This feature feels gimmicky with the Halo Plus and doesn't work most of the time, instead aligning the image so that one or two borders line up with the real-world frame. This is something Xgimi still needs to work kinks out of.

Last to mention is the 59 Wh battery. I can eke about roughly 3.5-4 hours from the Halo Plus, which isn't shabby considering how bright the projector light gets and how loud the speakers are. Running at full volume and brightness, the battery lasts closer to 3 hours, which is still enough to get through an outdoor movie with some time to spare.