The initial impressions by PHC was indeed on older firmware: 1.0.22. I read somewhere that they were sending an updated unit to PHC to do a full review 
Hopefully, soon!
But yeah, I agree that the brightness is awesome for such a small device and let"s hope the contrast is improved with the new firmware 
Why would they need to send a new unit to test it on newer firmware?
It might be because the sample they sent already includes a beta 26 with options to modify colors, etc… or because they wanted to ensure the sample is correctly calibrated.
That’s my concern. I honesty am not much interested in knowing if PHC sample is perfectly calibrated, especially after they sent him a hand revised one, I’d rather prefer a random sample (possibly mine) to be reasonably well calibrated.
Yep, my concern as well. If they sent a fully calibrated unit to the reviewer, it is not a representation of an uncalibrated retail unit.
@Philips_Support_P Do you know if the PHC reviewer already has the updated review unit? And what was the reason for sending an updated unit instead of simply sending the firmware update? 
Thanks for the information!
The sample sent to PassionHomeCinema doesn’t have any special calibration, it’s the same what everyone else received. One difference is that we preloaded the manual color adjustment app, which was removed from 1.0.25. We don’t have many ‘extra’ units to ship around since backer shipments take priority.
@Philips_Support_N what’s the update on his review?
Gregory got the projector and is testing it right now. Results will be published at end of the week.
https://www.passionhomecinema.fr/blog/index.php/31/12/2019/test-philips-picopix-max-v-1-0-22-premieres-mesures/#comment-26405
I asked if Gregory (PHC professional reviewer) had some first impressions of the V1.0.25 update:
Les couleurs sont un peu mieux ajustées, la netteté est trop poussée. Les réglages RVB ne sont toujours pas la, apparemment ce sera pour une future mise à jour.
For people who do not understand french:
We’ll have to wait for the full review later this week for more detailed information.
Thanks, added to main post 
Conclusions:
The Good
The small size of the device,
Multiple connection possibilities,
The enduring battery in streaming mode
The airmouse remote,
The input lag.
The Bad
The contrast,
Loss of focus,
Incomplete menus,
Out-of-box colorimetry to be corrected
For me personally, the biggest dissapointment is the contrast which is really low. But the main conclusion is still a positive one but you have to keep in mind the portability when judging the device.
@Philips_Support_P the review mentions that battery life is only around 1h20 when using hdmi input. That does not make sense to me since the smart part of the ppm is essentially turned off. If anything, battery life should be longer. What am I missing here?
Thanks!
battery life : between 1:10 and 1:25 in HDMI why ??? it was announced 3 hours
Can you improve that ?
Are there other reviews ?
You have sent the projector to others bloggers ?
I think it is a very expensive pico projector, the real question is :
Is it worth its price? (1080 € TTC in France)
I haven’t tried using the battery while using HDMI but I will try it to test.
So far in my tests, I can get 4:15 hrs in energy saver mode and 2:45-3 hrs in normal mode when using internal system. I actually assume using HDMI should be less power hungry since all processing are done outside the projector.
Wasn’t Gregory supposed to receive the profile tweaking application?
Apparently, he did not use it or maybe wasn’t aware?
I’ve asked Gregory who made the review for passionhomecinema.fr if the projector worth its price and he answered me :
“il est beaucoup trop cher.” that mean : “it is much too expensive”
I agree!!
It should cost about €500 + VAT not €899 + VAT
This is definitely not the typical case. I’ve run longer than that. I’m doing a power saver battery run with HDMI right now, will edit this post with a time when it dies.
However, I’m pretty certain the “smart” Android part is still somewhat awake when in HDMI/USBC input mode. It’s just not being output to the projection engine.
Edit: it shut off without warning at 4h40m
I did the same test today and reached around 5 hr (extrapolated based on 2 hr of testing). I’m in contact with Gregory, hope to find the root cause of the low play time he got.
Hi Prashant, is there a way to improve the contrast from what Gregory tested? E g. Via software update or through tuning
I tested the battery life just now and would like to share my results.
Firmware is latest .25. Energy Saving mode. Projected onto a 10-inch wall (which I don’t think matters). Sound volume is zero (because I was secretly testing in my office). Playing 1080p MP4 movie files loaded on Sandisk Ultra 128GB microSD card using internal VLC app.
PPMax suddenly shutdown after playing for about 3h50m.
I would say that’s pretty good considering that published specifications only stated 3 hours.