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  • Today we'll be taking apart the Blackview Max 1 – the $400 Android smartphone with

  • a builtin 720p laser projector.

  • The smartphone can broadcast whatever is on your phone screen onto a wall or ceiling.

  • Phones are getting pretty cool.

  • Turns out Samsung had an Android projector phone that came out about 7 years ago called

  • the Galaxy Beam, so the technology isn't entirely new, but it is improving.

  • Today we're going to see what it looks like from the inside.

  • Let's get started.

  • [Intro]

  • Taking apart the Blackview Max 1 is pretty straightforward.

  • Glass backed smartphones are kind of all built the same.

  • Heat softens the adhesive surrounding the back glass, and then my handy dandy razor

  • blade can slip it's way between the glass and the metal frame.

  • It's a tight fit.

  • Is there a safer way to do this?

  • Probably.

  • Once the adhesive is cut all the way around the outside, I can lift the back glass up

  • and away from the frame, exposing what very well could be the most boring looking clear

  • phone of all time.

  • I'll lift up the NCF pad and then pull away the black tape over the black plastics, revealing

  • 17 normal Phillips head screws surrounding the singular black plastic chunk.

  • Before the large plastic panel can be removed, strangely enough, we have to take off the

  • camera lens.

  • This singular camera protector is made from glass and machined aluminum and is also covering

  • up the fingerprint scanner and dual tone LED flash ribbonsboth of which need to be

  • peeled off the back panel before it can be lifted up and pulled away from the phone.

  • Which then gets us our first look inside.

  • We can see the large silver laser projector box up at the top.

  • I'll take that out in a second.

  • The main rear camera is a 16 megapixel with no optical image stabilization.

  • I'll unplug the battery and the rear NFC pad and lucky for us, even without any magic pull

  • tabs, the whole battery can come out of the frame pretty easily.

  • Nice of Blackview to make it removable.

  • It is a 4680milliamp hour and can supposedly run that top projector for about 5 hours.

  • I'll unclip the bottom extension ribbon and two more ribbons up at the top, each unsnapping

  • like little Legos.

  • And then I'll pull out three more screws.

  • The top motherboard can pull away after that, revealing two motherboards.

  • We've seen a lot of manufacturers do this sandwich motherboard thing lately.

  • Apple and Asus are also using this stacked motherboard design to save space.

  • Now we can get a closer look at the internal projector module for the Max 1.

  • This little guy contains 3 different colored lasers, all working in tandem to project pictures

  • and video at the top of the phone.

  • Personally, I think it looks best in the 45 to 50 inch range in a completely dark room

  • of course.

  • Projectors will never quite be as bright as a TV.

  • Blackview has said it can project up to a 200 inch screen size, but as we saw in my

  • durability test, it gets kind of faded after 50.

  • The metal housing is completely sealed shut.

  • I'll still take it apart at the end of the video, so sit tight.

  • The bottom of the board has a few more screws, and the side button ribbons that communicate

  • with a latch style connector, and I'll also take out the dual SIM and SD card tray.

  • After removing one more ribbon cable down at the base of the motherboard, the second

  • motherboard can be lifted up and out of the frame.

  • It has a few ribbon connectors on the back side which makes the teardown and reassembly

  • much more complicated, but I doubt many people will be attempting this particular repair

  • since the Max 1 isn't a mainstream phone, and probably won't have any replacement parts

  • available.

  • The dual front cameras are back here: a 16 megapixel with its .3 megapixel sidekick used

  • for depth sensing.

  • The earpiece, strangely enough, is soldered to the main board.

  • Usually it is detachable and the circular vibrator is also soldered on.

  • The rear camera has it's own latch style connector.

  • The bottom charging port board is very securely glued into place.

  • It's got the normal USB-C connector and instead of gold contact pads for the loudspeaker to

  • rest on, it has two massive gold contact pins.

  • Those pins rest up against the contact points on the back plastic housing for the loudspeaker.

  • It's kind of an interesting design.

  • You know that usually when I take apart phones, I like to keep the phones in working condition

  • when I put them back together.

  • Lately I haven't succeeded very often, but that's mostly because the internal components

  • of recent flagships are so unique and so cool.

  • I have to completely destroy the phone to get a good look at them.

  • I was torn with this projector phone...should I take apart the laser?

  • Should I not take apart the laser?

  • Well the phone kind of decided my course of action all by itself.

  • See when I put the phone back together expecting it to turn on, all I got was a super dim logo

  • on the screen and nothing else.

  • Just a sleepy Blackview Max 1 that wouldn't wake up entirely.

  • And so since he wouldn't wake up, I'll take the slightly darker approach and just put

  • it to sleep entirely.

  • I do not recommend applying this motivational approach to small children or grandparents.

  • I pulled the projector module from the internal phone guts, and since it very specifically

  • saiddo not remove the coveron the top, we're gonna remove the cover on the top.

  • Peeling back the thin metal covering reveals some super interesting stuff.

  • Blackview says this laser projector is combined with micro-electromechanical technology which

  • uses 3 different colored loser beams shining together to form images.

  • We can see the three different colored lasers over here on the sideeach one shining

  • directly forward.

  • The beam then gets redirected into a glass prism and then angled outward out the top

  • of the phone.

  • I imagine this black box over here in the side is the brains of the operation.

  • This controls the auto focus, the angle of the screen, and the location and brightness

  • of the individual laser beams.

  • It takes some seriously intelligent people to think this stuff up.

  • The fine-tuned engineering sitting in this very small machined aluminum box is some next

  • level stuff.

  • The technology has been around for a few years already, but it's improving, and I'm excited

  • to see it again in a smartphone.

  • The more things a smartphone can do, the more useful it becomes as a tool.

  • And I'm a fan of features.

  • If you had to pick between a projector inside your phone or a fold-able smartphone, which

  • would you choose?

  • Let me know down in the comments.

  • Hit that subscribe button if you haven't already.

  • I have some cool videos on the way.

  • And come hang out with me on Instagram and Twitter.

  • Thanks a ton for watching, and I'll see you around.

Today we'll be taking apart the Blackview Max 1 – the $400 Android smartphone with

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