Space, the final frontier. And also a bit of a hassle to get to! Instead, you can experience the wonders of a starry sky, without a telescope, in the comfort of your home with the Sega Toys Homestar Flux Planetarium.
The Homestar Flux Planetarium projects up to 60,000 stars onto your ceilings or walls via a powerful 5-watt warm white LED. If offers silent disc rotation, shooting star and is powered by USB.
This is one of the best-selling home planetariums you can buy, but what’s all the fuss about?
Packaging & Accessories
First impressions count and Sega Toys have done a brilliant job with the packaging. Not only does it look great with its outer design, it’s practical as well, letting you keep and reuse for storage should you need to pack the projector away at some point.
Included with the unit is a USB power cable and wall adapter. The wall adapter is optional, meaning you can power it from a portable power bank, you’re not restricted to a wall outlet like the Original Homestar.
There is also a manual (English, German and Chinese) as well as a sky map and two projections discs, one projects the Northern Hemisphere and the other projects the Northern Hemisphere with constellation lines.
Homestar Flux Tech Specs
- Projection distance: 120 cm to 290 cm / 47 in to 114 in (adjustable focus)
- Projection area: circle with a diameter of approximately 290 cm / 114 in
- Projector dimension: 16 cm × 16 cm × 15 cm, 620 g / 6.3 in × 6.3 in × 5.9 in, 1.36 lbs
- Projector dimension: 16 cm × 16 cm × 15 cm, 620 g / 6.3 in × 6.3 in × 5.9 in, 1.36 lbs
- Age recommendation: 6 years and up
- Warranty: Two-year
- Plug: USB and regional wall plugs
Design and controls
Looking a lot like its predecessor, the Homestar Flux has a spherical shape with satin black finish. It sits on a frame that allows you to easily adjust the direction of projection, you can project directly up on to the ceiling or angle it to the side to project onto walls.
The top holds the advanced multilevel glass lenses and smooth focus dial. You’ll use the dial on first use and if you relocate the unit or change what it projects on to give a sharp projection. It’s easy to tell when unfocused as stars look fuzzy.
Projection discs are loaded via a removable tray which sits above a set of controls. You pull the tray open, pop a disc in and reinsert it before powering on the projector.
There are 4 controls:
- Timer: Automatically power offer after 15, 30 or 60 minutes
- Move: Rotate either clockwise or anticlockwise or turn off rotation
- Shouting star: Turn on or off
- Power: Turn on or off
The inclusion of a timer is brilliant as it allows you to use this as a night light, falling asleep under a view of the stars.
Projection
When you turn this on you’ll notice 2 things: 1) the 5-watt warm white LED bulb does a fantastic job and 2) it’s much quieter than you’d expect.
I’ve reviewed a lot of home projectors, ones used for playing games/watching movies etc, and the main complaint I have with all is how loud they are. I’ve never had that issue with the Flux, it’s whisper quiet, even when rotating the disc.
The star field looks fantastic, with tens of thousands of points appearing on your ceiling as if you were outside in an area free of light polition looking up at the sky.
Put some music on and set it to rotate and you have a really beautiful way to relax under the night sky, no matter what the weather is like outside.
To add a little more life to the projection you can turn on the shooting star. This makes a brief appearance ever few minutes and then disappears. The shooting star is beautiful, subtle and doesn’t distract from the main projection, so is well worth turning on.
For those of you looking to increase your understanding of the night sky the Northern Hemisphere with constellation lines can help, it offers the same view but layers over visible lines so you can easily see different constellations and learn where they are in the night sky.
The technology in this puts out a strong and clear projection, I’ve found it works best on a flat surface without anything else, such as TVs, giving off light pollution.
Additional Projection Discs
Being the latest model in the established Homestar range has its advantages, unlike most low cost projectors the Homestar Flux has access to additional sky discs developed by the Japanese inventor and entrepreneur Takayuki Ohira:
- Southern Hemisphere
- Curved Andromeda Galaxy
- Earth and moon by day
- Earth and moon at night
- Comets
- Universe with galaxies
- Starry night with four seasons
- Earth in space
- Moon phases
- Solar system
- Aurora Australis
>Comparing Sega Toys Homestar Flux Planetarium and NEBULA by Anker Mars II Pro: Which Is Better for Home Entertainment?
When it comes to home entertainment, the Sega Toys Homestar Flux Planetarium and NEBULA by Anker Mars II Pro are both impressive options. However, the NEBULA by Anker Mars II Pro stands out for its advanced features and high-quality projection, making it the better choice for immersive and captivating experiences.
Alternatives
There are a lot of lower cost alternatives available via the usual online shops, but they tend not to focus on a realistic view of the night sky and instead just project dots for stars.
The only real alternative at a lower price is the Sega Toys Original Planetarium projector, which uses the same discs but must be plugged into a power outlet and has a dimmer bulb.
| Original | Flux | |
| Projection distance | 150cm to 230 cm | 120cm to 290cm |
| Projection area | 270 cm | 290cm |
| Projection dimentions | 16 x 16 x 15cm | 16 x 16 x 15 cm |
| Bulb strength | 3-watt | 5-white white LED |
| Power | Wall outlet | USB |
4 responses to “Sega Toys Homestar Flux Planetarium Review”
Very helpful demo clip, I’m looking at purchasing a unit like these. While the orig is not bright enough, I did prefer its depiction on the night sky (much more as we would see it with the naked eye). Now I’d like to find a unit that gives a better natural view of the night sky and is as bright as the Flux.
Both seemed to project in B/W (is that so or is this just as we see it on the demo?) I tend to prefer a deep blue sky with white or pale blue stars (is there perhaps a way of creating this effect with any adjustment controls on either of these two interesting units??) Many Thanks for any info you can supply.
Another most helpful demo clip, this one convinces me of the improved quality of the Flux. Is this the model that allows (or has the shooting star effect?) or have I confused this with another unit? Thanks for any added info you can supply.
The units just have a bulb in, the disc determines what colours are projected. You’d need to check out the available discs to see if any meet your requirements.
Both the original and Flux have shooting star effect.