Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector review & price

In the evaluation of the Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector, are Netflix and YouTube supported on Android TV apps? Plug and play your preferred USB 2.0 and HDMI devices, such as laptops, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and more. A brilliant 500-ANSI-lumen image with 720p resolution is projected with DLP IntelliBright technology, providing astounding video quality. Know more in Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector review.

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Pros & Cons – Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector

Pros

Portable and small
Battery life of 3.5 hours maximum
Auto-keystone and focus
The AirPlay interface
Tripod connector

Cons

Need external speaker

Specs – Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector

Dual 10W speakers, speaker
Quad-Core A7 CPU, 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz Dual Frequency
12, 500mAh/3.85V battery
Bluetooth version 4.0 in Dual Mode with A2DP
Fan: <32dB
DRIVE-IN: 19V, 3A
-In Command: Actual Buttons
HDMI version 1.4 USB version 2.0
Nebula Connect is a dedicated app for iOS and Android.
Throw Ratio: 100 inches at 8.73 feet, 80 inches at 6.99 feet, 60 inches at 5.22 feet, and 40 inches at 3.48 feet
100% Offset
0.3″ DLP display technology
1280 x 720 native resolution (HD)
Light output: 500 ANSI lm
30,000 Hours for the lamp
Focus Modification: Automated
Keystone It should read: Horizontal and vertical 40°

Compare Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector vs Nebula Capsule II

	Nebula Capsule II	Nebula Mars II	Nebula Mars II Pro
Color Selection	Black	Black	Black
Projection Technology	DLP	DLP	DLP
Brightness	200 ANSI lm	300 ANSI lm	500 ANSI lm
Resolution	1280×720 (16:9, HD)	1280×720 (16:9, HD)	1280×720 (16:9, HD)
Projection Size	20-100 in	30-150 in	30-150 in
Operating System	Android TV 9.0	Android 7.1	Android 7.1
Speaker	1× 8W (270°)	2× 10W	2× 10W
Video Playtime	2.5 hours	4 hours	3 hours
Connectivity	HDMI, USB, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and Chromecast	HDMI, USB, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and Screen Mirroring	HDMI, USB, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and Screen Mirroring
Focus	Automatic (1 second)	Automatic (1 second)	Automatic

Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector review

Build

It is tub-shaped, matte-black on top and steely grey on the sides, and includes a cloth strap for carrying. It resembles a handbasket somewhat.

Design

The Anker Nebula Mars II projector has edges that are neatly curled off, giving it the appearance of a somewhat squished cube. The Mars II Pro is bigger, measuring 5.4 by 4.8 by 7 inches (HWD) and weighs 3.9 pounds. The lens is covered with a protective cover while not in use. The projector and the DLP-based light engine for the Mars II Pro, which uses an LED light source, turn on when the cover is removed.

Connectors

The Mars II Pro simply includes the bare minimum of connectivity options: a USB port for playing flash drive videos, a headphone jack for connecting additional speakers in case you want to connect a game console, and one HDMI port for connecting other devices like gaming consoles.

Support for Apple’s AirPlay 2 technology, which enables wireless music and video streaming from an iPhone, iPad, and Mac, makes up for the relative lack of ports. Even Bluetooth is supported by the Mars II Pro, allowing you to utilise the projector as a portable speaker and stream music to it.

HDMI inputs: 1
USB port: 1
Audio input and output: 3.5mm output
Digital audio output: None
Wi-Fi: 802.11a/b/g/n
Remote: Not backlit

Display

The Mars II Pro has to be roughly nine feet away from the screen to produce a 100-inch image. Up to a maximum of 150 inches, you can receive an additional ten inches of screen size for every foot or so the projector is away from the surface it is projecting on. However, we discovered that the sweet spot for size and projection clarity lies between 80 and 100 inches, with performance optimum as close to pitch-black darkness as you can get.

Brightness

It has a 300 ANSI lumen output. The Mars II Pro’s greatest useful size was determined to be roughly 80 inches in total darkness and to be about 48 inches when ambient light was present.

Resolution

Its native resolution is a robust 720p (1,280 by 720 pixels), matching the Anker Nebula Capsule II, surpassing the 480p (854 by 480 pixels) of the Anker Nebula Apollo and the Kodak Luma 350, but falling short of the 1080p of the Acer C250i (1,920 by 1,080 pixels). The autofocus on the Mars II Pro can sometimes take up to five seconds to activate, but once it did, the focus was sharp.

Keystone

To further speed up the process, there is automated focusing and keystone correction, so all you have to do is aim the Nebula Mars 2 towards a wall and it takes care of the rest. However, we advise disabling automatic keystone correction and performing it manually. As usual, it effectively degrades the quality of the raw image.

Battery life

A huge 12,500mAh rechargeable battery is already included with the Mars II Pro. According to Anker, this is sufficient for up to three hours of movie playback.

Audio

The in-built speakers are also good. They produce a remarkable amount of sound and are remarkably loud thanks to two 10W drivers and custom-designed bass radiators from Anker. Given that the projector can also be used as a standalone Bluetooth speaker and can play music for roughly 30 hours on a single charge, this feature is quite useful.

You must hold down the Bluetooth button down for approximately five seconds until the phrase “Entering Bluetooth Speaker Mode” appears. The speaker can then be connected to a phone or tablet to broadcast music to it.

Control

A four-arrow joystick with an OK button in the centre, Bluetooth, backspace, and plus and minus volume control buttons are all located on a panel on top of the projector. The number of controls on a portable remote is slightly more extensive. The Nebula Connect app for iOS or Android allows you to control the projector remotely from a mobile device.

Streaming

Over a Wi-Fi connection, you can run preloaded Android apps, download fresh ones from the App Store, and change a number of settings just like on a smartphone. The home screen also has buttons for Settings, Network, App Manager, File Manager, and HDMI in addition to links to the App Store, Amazon Prime Video, YouTube, and Netflix download buttons. You can run files from File Manager or the 8GB internal memory of the projector or from a USB thumb drive.

How to setup Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector?

Place Mars II Pro in front of the projection surface on a solid, level foundation. The projection surface should be flat and white for the best effects. There must be a minimum of 1 metre (39.4 inches) and a maximum of 3 metres between the projector and the projection surface (118 inches).

To activate the remote control batteries for the first time, remove the plastic battery insulation tab. A new battery should be inserted, matching the polarity (+/-) stated, and then the battery compartment should be closed. To change a battery, slide off the battery compartment backplate.

The built-in battery must be fully charged before the first use. The built-in battery will be charged and the LED indications will turn on when you connect the projector to the outlet with the power adapter and power cord that are included.

The projector will then turn on automatically after you slide the lens cover down. You can also use the remote control to turn on the projector when it is in standby mode. A suitable wall or projection surface should be in the projector’s field of view. To manually adjust the focus, hold down the on the remote control while moving the projector slightly to activate autofocus. To set up the device for the first time, adhere to the on-screen directions.

Nebula App

We advise you to download the dedicated Nebula App, Nebula Connect, so that you can effortlessly control the projector. With this programme, you can use a mouse on the screen to control the projector while typing on the keyboard of your smartphone.

Download the Nebula Connect app from Google Play or the App Store for iOS devices (Android devices).
Your smartphone must have Bluetooth enabled in order to connect to [Nebula].
To complete the connection configuration, launch the Nebula Connect app and adhere to the on-screen instructions.

Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector customer review

Great backyard projector
We bought this to do backyard movies and television. We live in a garden home neighborhood, which means we’re close to our neighbors and their lights and have plenty of streetlights and other light pollution. Even with all that, once the sun sets, this projector does a fabulous job. We often have the fire pit going or the lights on in the gazebo, and there’s still a great clear picture. The only time you really need a truly dark environment is with shows or movies that have a very dark ambience– for some episodes of the Mandalorian, for example, we needed to kill the gazebo lights to see it well. Finding Nemo did not need such considerations. We do typically run the projector in the brighter mode since we have the ability to run power to it in our backyard. We have tested it on battery power and got about 2 hours of viewing. Even on battery power, there’s plenty of brightness in the picture if you’re using it after dark.
I highly recommend setting up all your accounts in the projector ahead of time. It makes it SO much easier to deal with logging into all the accounts and typing in your passwords if you’re just shining it on the wall in your living room the night before movie night instead of trying to set everything up while everyone stares at you! Some of those apps are a pain to navigate, and there’s a bit of a learning curve to using the remote and/or phone app. You get used to it, but it takes a minute.
Our setup:
We project onto a projector screen (just the 100″ Amazon Basic one)– we attached projector screen mounting brackets with to our house under the eaves and attached a set of carabiners rated for 75 pounds (extreme overkill) on each end of the projector screen. My husband can pull the screen out from the storage closet and clip the it onto the hooks in the mounting brackets in less than a minute. We have a set of ground anchors near the wall, and we use two bungee cords (I used a pair of pliers to widen the hooks a bit) so that they loop around the bottom ends of the projector screen and then connect to the anchors. They’re long enough that they only have a tiny bit of tension on the screen– just enough to keep the screen from blowing, twisting, and kinking if there’s a breeze.
When we’re not using the screen, we disconnect the bungees and roll it up, where it’s safely tucked away under the eaves. We leave it up during good weather but can easily unhook it and put it away if rain threatens.
We paired our projector with a cheap tripod from Walmart and a couple orange traffic cones from Home Depot so that the kids don’t run into the tripod in the dark. Like some others have commented, the tripod mounting hole is a little shallow, so it can make the projector feel unstable on a tripod mount. Thanks to those commenters, I anticipated having the same problem and was armed with supplies to solve it. We bought a couple neoprene washers from Home Depot and placed them between the projector and the tripod mount. That made it a snug fit and eliminated any wobble. We leave the tripod mount attached all the time and just store the whole unit in its bag. (It does NOT come with any kind of storage bag, by the way– we ordered the Anker one off Amazon because I disliked having to put it back in the cardboard box each time we used it.)
We often sit back a good ways from the projector, and while the built-in sound is fine for me, my husband is kind of hard of hearing. We pair the projector via Bluetooth with an Anker Soundcore Flare 2 speaker we already owned and sit the speaker right next to us. They play together fabulously. There’s no sound lag at all, at least none I can discern. We did discover that it helps to turn the speaker on a few seconds before turning the projector on. They pair quicker and more easily when the speaker is turned on first. And as we already have an actual bluetooth speaker, we’ve never really tried to use our projector as a bluetooth speaker. The Soundcore Flare 2 is a lot cheaper and more durable if my kids get a little too crazy with their elementary dance parties.
We’ve had this thing for going on three months and love it. I did a lot of research and agonized over which portable projector to buy, and I’m really happy with the choice I made for my family. If that changes, I’ll update this review, but I don’t suspect I’ll need to.
By Misty C. at Nebula

Alternate of Nebula by Anker Mars II Pro 500 ANSI Lumen portable projector

AAXA P6X

The top projector is excellent, but when money is tight, I prefer the AAXA P6X. In addition to being less expensive than the Anker up top, it also has a better display and longer battery life. This handheld projector is small enough to fit in my hand and contains a sizable 15,000 mAh battery. You can connect and power a streaming stick using a USB port and an HDMI input. The AAXA lacks built-in applications, hence the stick connection is crucial.

Despite having a slightly lower contrast ratio than the Anker Mars II Pro, light output is excellent for its size and affordability. It is around 50% more powerful. The small projector’s internal battery should last approximately 90 minutes in its brightest level and an astonishing 240 minutes in Eco mode. If you’re also running a streaming stick, the battery life may be a little shorter. There is a headphone jack that you can use to connect a portable speaker despite the subpar internal speaker.