Nix Spectro 2 Spectrophotometer - Professional and Portable Color Measurement for Print, Packaging, Paint, Coatings and More

As a sign professional, this has never given a correct result.

Product: Nix Spectro 2tl;dr: Recommended for lab grade accuracy scanning of reflective surfaces.Overview:In the box… is a box. 😊 Actually, it’s a good quality carry case. This is an excellent sign, products that are good quality also deserve a safe storage solution.Opening the carry case reveals the measuring device, a few accessories (a carry pouch, charge cable, etc.) and two critical items: the inspection and accuracy certification, and the reference tile.I have some audio industry lab experience, and one of the signs of a high grade unit is it can be calibrated to a NIST traceable standard, and it has a self-test or verification process to ensure it is meeting spec. This device meets that criteria for accuracy.But is it indeed “correct”? As a pro photographer, I also own calibration cards for my camera (and a colorimeter for my display monitor). I used my readily available DataColor SpyderCheckr as a test card. The SpyderCheckr has a variety of carefully created color patches with both D50 and D65 RGB color values provided. Based on my limited testing so far, the Nix Spectro 2 is indeed quite accurate, scanning within a couple of digits of the theoretical standard values. As a sanity test, it also matched up well with the readings my my low cost Datacolor ColorReader EZ provided.My primary intended use case is to “tune” my Windows color inkjet and laser printers to yield more accurate print colors from Lightroom and Photoshop via tweaked ICC color profiles.I was hoping for a turnkey app, but the creating & editing of ICC color profiles appears to be a more opaque process than expected. I will follow up on this review as I get more into that topic.Pro’s:- This is an easy to use, accurate, rugged, lab grade Spectrophotometer that has good consistency from scan to scan.- Includes a self test and a reference tile to ensure continued accuracy.- Use of the USB C style charging connector means no flipping the USB A plug over 3 times to plug it in for charging.Con’s:- The software support is a little rough yet. For example, I use a white point of 6500K, or D65 in my workflow. The Nix toolkit app doesn’t remember my preference for that setting so I have to remember to go into the utility menu and reset it each time.- The device lacks a “quickstart” card that reminds you to charge the device, install the app, pair/connect, check the app settings, and (critically) run the “white tile normalization” before using the device for real work. I initially got some divergent values before I ran the cal process.- The price is not out of line for a quality lab standard for the serious user, but it will preclude use by the average hobbyist. I see Nix also has a few lower cost units, I would look at those if this unit is too pricey for your application.Summary:A quality, solid unit. Sets up easily, yields consistent accurate results.

The Nix Spectro 2 is a really high quality test instrument that's perfect for a broad cross section of color-conscious industries. If you're an interior designer who wants to match paint samples, a design professional who needs accurate color reproduction from printed samples, or a manufacturing engineer who wants to make sure a dye lot matches your standards, this tool works well for that purpose.I really like the hardware itself. Shaped like a diamond, the Spectro 2 is comfortable to hold and can be easily repositioned for taking multiple consecutive samples. It comes in a Pelican-style case with precise cutouts for the sensor and all its accessories, and everything has a satisfying feeling that suggests it's built to last. A full calibration certificate is included, and Nix offers recalibration services as well.The included app is fairly simplistic, but is pretty straightforward to use; it pairs reliably with the device, and taking readings is pretty easy. Essentially, the Nix Spectro 2 works like a really accurate real-world eyedropper tool for color.You can map to an included library of paint samples very easily, and an extensive variety of paint manufacturers are provided for free. Note that you won't be able to use publishing color libraries like Pantone without paying an extra subscription charge. That's frustrating, but Pantone's X-Rite sells their own spectrophotometers and is notably restrictive about licensing their colors to the point where Adobe doesn't even offer them as a complimentary inclusion anymore, so this isn't entirely surprising; at least the option is available if it's something you need, and the monthly price isn't any worse than the pricing in Creative Suite.If you're hoping to use this for creating a color calibration profile for a monitor or printer, it's not really designed for that. I invested a fair amount of time in trying to figure out a way to print a known sample on my printer, use the Nix to read those swatches, and then create a color management profile that corrects for the error - but that doesn't seem possible in any sort of automatic way. If I was an expert in making manual color profiles, I might be able to hand craft a profile, but it's certainly not a core feature of any of the included software.More disappointingly, the Nix Spectro 2 can only read samples illuminated with its own internal light source. That means that it can't be used to read colors off of a monitor, and it also can't be used to read LEDs or other light sources like interior lamps. (I confirmed this with support, who took a bit of time to reply but who were friendly and clear when addressing my question, confirming the device is unable to provide accurate readings for any illuminated objects.) That was a real disappointment for me, because I was hoping to use this for manufacturing quality control to calibrate light output from a set of LEDs where the color response curve has no basis in reality. It's on me for making assumptions, but I would have been better off for that purpose with a somewhat more expensive spectrophotometer from X-Rite, which ships with calibration software and the ability to read displays. Another reviewer said that this product can work for monitor calibration, and as far as I can tell, that's incorrect information.The policies surrounding support and SDK access for the device are disappointing and the primary reason I deducted a star. Warranty coverage is limited to a year and only is provided to the original purchaser, so coverage does not transfer with the device - quality test equipment is a long-term investment, and limiting support in this way is very customer-unfriendly.More to the point, the lack of a publicly available SDK really limits the use for QC purposes. If you want to integrate the Nix into a factory production workflow, you have to reach out to the company and beg for access to the SDK through a marketing consultation - they don't publish it publicly, and while pricing isn't listed on the site, it's heavily implied that it's an expensive proposition. Even if they decide to grant you free access, that would be limited to only ten devices without additional charges. For a device costing well into the four-figures, my fundamental expectation is that clear documentation and tools are available to access the data from my hardware purchase so I can actually use my test equipment: the SDK should absolutely be published in a public location like Github and the protocol the device uses for communication should be documented in an open manner. There's no reason to limit devices used - buying the hardware should be all the license needed to get to the data you're measuring.If the included app were more full-featured and flexible, this might not be a big deal, but it seems primarily designed for basic color acquisition - so achieving most industrial QC workflows would require SDK access.The Spectro 2 is gorgeous hardware and appears to be extremely accurate. I just wish it was more flexible, both in the types of objects it's capable of reading and in how it's supported and interfaced with. But if your use case is a fairly straightforward one, like matching paints or manually verifying production samples are within a tolerance, I think you'll be quite happy with your purchase.