Halo - is the battery capacity a lie?
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@fonix232
I have never ever read such convincing, mathematically correct argument. You've been introduced us to the rules of the energy consumption. I am a physics teacher in Hungary and I think I will use your calculations in our next study group.
Anyway I was absolute convinced in Halo's battery cheating and sadly to say as an owner of it.
The only solution that I could imagine would be Xgimi company send us an external power bank with proper capacity. But they won't....
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@SurixTM feel free to use it! I'm also Hungarian by the way
I've messaged the manufacturer of the battery, since they're the ones who print the labels. It is quite possible that someone at the battery manufacturer fucked up big time, the product got mislabeled with the bad data, and Xgimi just thought that a cheaper, smaller, but much larger capacity battery would fit the Halo more... I just find it incredibly perplexing that not just one, but TWO companies' electronic and battery engineers have skipped over this obvious thing. I'm not even an electronic engineer by degree, and the moment I saw the 3-cell battery pack, it was straight obvious that it can't be almost 60Wh - unless it's some new battery technology, but that would be advertised to hell on the packaging. I just hope we get an explanation soon.
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@fonix232 it's 4-6 battery packs. Anyway, I'll get back to you soon after the verification, please be patient.
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@fonix232
I think it is needed to disassembly the projector and disconnect the battery from it to make sure the capacity of it. I would use a high performance resistor and a current meter and a stopper. There is a only way the get proper specification of capacity of the battery.
My device is almost one year old so the warranty will be reached its over, I should do this procedure after it.
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@SurixTM that's why I asked @Ari to have one of the Halo battery packs in their manufacturing line opened. The cells would need to be imprinted with either the actual specs, or the chemistry and capacity indicators at least.
@Ari the FCC images clearly show that the Halo has a 3-cell battery, not 4-6. And as someone who has worked for companies designing hardware that had to pass FCC certification... They will ask you to re-certify if you do as little as change the casing colour. A battery pack change would assuredly require a re-certification. Seeing how you haven't submitted anything that is public since July, and before that, it's the first and only Halo application.
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@Ari it's been over 5 days. I'd like to see some results about the battery. It shouldn't be so hard to open up a production unit in your office, and open up the battery packaging to see the actual cells.
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@fonix232
They won't admit the battery cheating I think.
I saw your effort with registering in facebook in order to get answer on your accusations. (I won't be there again!)
Jรณzsi, do you really believe to manage to ban this product from US and EU markets because of they just lied about the battery capacity? I do not think the world is ready for this. This is Chinese product as we all knew it, and they have all of the permission to sell their product. Anyway Halo has high level quality despite of this it made (and not just assembled) in China.
Exactly what do you want or expect to get for your statements? Confess? I understand your concern but don't know what you want to reach....
You can make sure that I stand at your side, I checked your logics again and surely know this battery has lower capacity as they said.
...and please do not expect SLA level support from a 10 employees company....
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Hi guys, thanks for your patience and all feedback about Halo projector.
We'll get back to you within this week.
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Dear XGIMI users:
Good day.
First of all, Iโd like to thank you, for the enduring support from loyal customers, all the feedback since the launch of Mogo series & Halo have and will continue to help us create a better product.
XGIMI is aiming to provide the customers the great experience and we have invested heavily in R&D and design. Until now, we have received 31 international awards in innovation and design.Recently we have received some questions regarding the battery capacity of Halo. Firstly We appreciate your great interest and attention to our products.
Based on our testing report and actual using scenarios, our battery can provide play time above 2 hours at normal use. We also stretched the test for customized modes under extreme scenarios,
you can refer to the following table for more details.
PS: please note the battery life of your projector might differ from the test results, as everyone will be using the projector in different conditions.The confusion may come from the comparison with the power dissipation of power banks or handsets, which is a common way to claim battery capacity for portable projectors in the market-- 11V VS 4.2V/3.6V
Please find some examples on Amazon.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07PX8PN5S/ref=emc_b_5_i
https://www.amazon.com/Anker-Portable-Projector-Speakers-Autofocus/dp/B07BXDW18Z/ref=psdc_300334_t3_B07PX8PN5S
Battery: 12, 500mAh / 3.85VHowever, we don't take it as our excuse for the confusion. Going forward, we will focus in playtime and change the description of battery capacity soon. We are grateful for sincere feedback from loyal customers to make a better product.
Best regards,
XGIMI team
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@SurixTM what I'd expect from them is pretty straightforward: admit the mistake, and update the specs on Amazon, etc.
Falsifying battery capacity can be a major reason for a (temporary) product ban. Regulations exist for a reason, namely so that companies can't just write whatever they want on the packaging. You can't sell a power bank that is 5000mAh as if it was 20000mAh (no matter how you twist the math). Thereby you also can't sell a projector that has an at best 9000mAh battery pack (at 3.6/4.2V as per it is customary to indicate) as a 17000mAh one.
I bought my Halo partly because it has a built-in battery. I expect the capacity to be as indicated on the packaging, not some random measurements that were done in a lab for "play time".
@Ari there's no confusion, I ran the numbers down already.
Your packaging, as well as the battery's packaging, claims 59.454Wh.
- This is 17.000mAh at exactly 3.476V - which is not a standard voltage to measure capacity at, for batteries or power banks
- At 3.6V (nominal voltage of Li-ion batteries) we get 16.500mAh, which is kinda close, but not close enough to be considered a marginal error.
- At 4.2V, it's even less, 14155mAh
Then, the problem of battery cells. Again, the photos of the Halo interior clearly show it is a 3-cell pack, further confirmed by the voltage (~11Vnom), which is precisely 3x 3.6V (which is 10.8V, but we can take 11 if the cells in question have a slightly higher optimal maximum voltage).
So we are ought to believe that the combined capacity of the 3 cells is 17100mAh, which would put each cell at 5700mAh capacity - that is still over 50% higher than any actually verified 18650 cell on the market. Simply said, a 3.6V 5700mAh battery, in the shape shown on the interior photos, cannot exist.
And as I mentioned on Facebook, I did some measurements on the power usage of the Halo.
Brightness: Max
Image mode: Game
Power usage is ~52W with display on, ~14W display off
Brightness: Max
Image mode: Bright
Power usage is ~50W with display on, ~13W display off
Brightness: Power save
Image mode: Game
Power usage is ~18W with display on, ~14W display off
Brightness: Power save
Image mode: Bright
Power usage is ~16W with display on, ~12W display off
Brightness: Night
Image mode: Game
Power usage is ~40W with display on, ~14 display off
Brightness: Night
Image mode: Bright
Power usage is ~38W with display on, ~12W display off
Brightness: Office
Image mode: Game
Power usage is ~70W with display on, ~13W display off
Brightness: Office
Image mode: Bright
Power usage is ~70W with display on, ~13W display off
Brightness: Video
Image mode: Game
Power usage is ~57W with display on, 13W display off
Brightness: Video
Image mode: Bright
Power usage is ~55W with display on, ~13W display off
Brightness mode "Max" is my custom setup that sets every colour channel to 100% as well as the actual brightness.
Brightness mode "Night" is also a custom setup with 50% brightness, and colours tuned to be more realistic (R: 40% G: 40%, B: 50%)
I've taken multiple measurements in each mode, to make sure everything is correct and I didn't run into some sneaky drip charging of sorts.I also tried video playback with max and half volume - the difference was almost negligible, 2-3W at most on max volume with local hardware decoding h.264 1080p stream from a local server.
Conclusion:
- The board (with Android TV running, connected to WiF and the Bluetooth remote), depending on mode, eats around 12-15W
- The projector assembly, depending on brightness, can eat up to 55W on its own (in Office mode). How Office mode can be more power hungry than my custom Max mode, I don't understand - maybe Ari has an explanation?
In power save mode, the projector assembly eats between 15-25W - When running from battery power, like most devices, the Halo most likely goes into a more power-saving mode (not display, but hardware!), such as lowering the fan speed, reducing the CPU frequency and not bumping it up to maximum unless needed, which would result in the board power usage going down to around 5-7W.
- When running from battery power, the projector brightness is reduced, but not as much as the "Power save" mode. I'm guessing a ~20-30% reduction in brightness, which should lower power usage by as much as 50%, thereby giving an approx. power usage of 7W + 20W ~ 30W
- Speaker volume (weirdly) does not affect power usage
This equals the rough estimate of 2 hours playback on battery power, as the battery would be almost 60Wh.
Generally, I think the current OS is badly optimised, and the projector assembly handling as well. The Anker Nebula Mars 2 Pro, for example, has a 48.642Wh battery (4 cell 18650 at 3350mAh capacity), and slightly worse brightness (500 ANSI lumen on battery vs. the 600 ANSI lumen of the Halo), and although it uses a different CPU (based on the specs, a Qualcomm Snapdragon 205), the board's power usage is negligible. So how can the Anker manage 3 hours out of that <50Wh battery, when our 60Wh one can barely push out 2 hours?
