Xiaomi Mi Mix Review: Concept Phone Turns Into Reality

Xiaomi took the world by storm when it introduced the Mi Mix concluding twelvemonth. While Xiaomi unveiled the smartphone as a concept phone, the company surprised everyone when information technology appear the pricing and availability of the device. Why the surprise? Well, because Mi Mix was the first almost bezel-less smartphone from a well known manufacturer. Sure, there take been various bezel-less smartphones from different Chinese smartphone makers, like the Precipitous Aquos Crystal and Aquos Crystal 2, but Mi Mix has been arguably the first bezel-less smartphone for the masses. While the Xiaomi smartphone is only available in China in limited quantities, at that place are ways to get one in other countries (you lot tin can get i from GearBest at $619, at the fourth dimension of writing). Well, we got the Mi Mix recently and I have been using it every bit my daily driver for a couple of weeks now. And so, is Mi Mix's bezel-less design actually the future of smartphones? Well, let's get into the details and find out, shall we?

Xiaomi Mi Mix Specifications

Before we brainstorm, allow'south have a wait at the specs of the Xiaomi Mi Mix:

Dimensions	158.8 x 81.nine x 7.9 mm
Weight	209 grams
Display	six.4-inch IPS LCD Brandish (1080 x 2040 pixels)
Processor	Quad-core MSM8996 Snapdragon 821 processor, with Adreno 530 GPU
RAM	four/6 GB
Storage	128/256 GB
Cameras	16 MP f/2.0 rear camera, phase-detection autofocus, dual-tone LED flash and gyro-based EIS; v MP f/2.2 front end-facing Camera
Battery	iv,400 mAh, QuickCharge three.0
Android	MIUI 8 on top of Android 6.0 Marshmallow
Sensors	Fingerprint scanner, cantilevered piezoelectric actuator, ultrasound proximity, gyroscope, compass, accelerometer
Connectivity	Dual SIM, WiFi dual band 802.11 a/b/g/northward/ac, Bluetooth 4.ii, USB Type C, USB OTG, NFC
Price	~$619

On paper and from the looks of it, the Mi Mix seems like a perfect mix of innovative pattern and high-terminate specs just does that really convert into a great smartphone? Let'south discover out.

What's In The Box

The Mi Mix comes in a great looking box that features text written in golden accents, similar to the device. It'south very minimal and I certainly like it. Here are the box contents:

• The Xiaomi Mi Mix, manifestly!
• Leather case
• USB Type C cable
• Power Adapter
• SIM ejector tool
• Booklets

Design and Hardware

Xiaomi smartphones take e'er featured bully designs and build quality but the Mi Mix is arguably the most gorgeous looking smartphone from the Chinese manufacturer. When you first take out the device, you will detect the gorgeous dorsum. The ceramic rear features a mirror-like finish, which looks absolutely stunning. While it does look peachy, it is a huge fingerprint magnet and it's very very slippery. No wonder Xiaomi supplies the device with a case in the box. I'm however not complaining though, as the ceramic body, the mirror-similar finish, the "Mix Designed by Mi" engraving, wait very premium and it surely looks and feels similar a premium flagship.

The ceramic dorsum also features the 16 MP photographic camera, forth with the dual-tone LED flash. There'southward besides the fingerprint scanner. In the 256 GB version of the Mi Mix, all the elements on the back use Gold accents, which goes well the glossy ceramic finish.

On the forepart, yous volition be in awe of the gorgeous edge-to-edge display. Information technology looks futuristic, thanks to almost bezel-less display and a screen to body ratio of around 83.6%. Along with the non-existing bezel, the brandish is rounded on the edges, like to the LG G6 and the Milky way S8 and it does look cool. At that place'south also the front end-facing camera at the bottom (you won't similar it), along with the notification LED calorie-free. There's no proximity sensor or the earpiece and Xiaomi has integrated some haemorrhage border tech hither to make upwards for it. Instead of the earpiece, the device features a cantilevered piezoelectric actuator behind the display to produce sound. Also, there's an ultrasound proximity or a sonar sensor, another offset for smartphones. So yeah, information technology's packed with the latest technological advancements.

The Mi Mix frame is too made of ceramic, including the button, and then everything feels just seamless. The power/lock and the volume rockers are on the right side, while the left side features the SIM tray. The top packs in the three.5 mm jack (thankfully!) and the bottom features the USB Type C port and the speaker.

Thanks to the less bezels on the smartphone, the device measures 158.8 x 81.9 x seven.9 mm, which is very shut to the dimensions of the iPhone 7 Plus (158.ii 10 77.ix ten 7.3 mm) and Pixel XL (154.vii 10 75.seven 10 eight.5 mm). However, the latter two smartphones feature 5.5-inch displays, while the Mi Mix packs in a 6.four-inch display. Hither's how it compares to the Lenovo Phab two Pro, which features a vi.4-inch brandish likewise:

Cheers to the amazing screen to body ratio, y'all go a decently compact phone with manner more screen estate. It'southward not all good, as the smartphone tin be a little tough to hold, cheers to the glace back. Overall, the Xiaomi Mi Mix is a affair of beauty and it'due south every tech geek's dream come true. If you plan on getting the Mi Mix, it will garner you lot a lot of attending.

Display

The Xiaomi Mi Mix comes with a gorgeous 6.4-inch IPS LCD display with a resolution of1080 ten 2040 pixels, which makes up for a pixel density of 362 ppi. The extra pixels do upshot in a weird aspect ratio of 17:9 and at times, videos play with blackness confined, but I don't mind it much. Well, because it looks stunning! Thanks to border-to-border design, the display looks great, peculiarly at the top because in that location's literally no bezels. While all the talks are nearly the slim bezels, the brandish unit of measurement by Sharp is great. The display offers dandy blacks, which is generally an attribute of AMOLED displays and while the resolution does non seem flagship-form, specially for 6.iv-inch display, yous will like it.

Firstly, the color reproduction and accuracy is great along with clarity. The saturation is patently increased and that results in more pleasing colors. Xiaomi lets you change the contrast and the colour saturation in the MIUI settings, so you can customize things the way you like.

Too, thanks to the PenTile arrangement in the console, the pixels aren't visible, no matter how much you try. When it comes to the sunlight legibility, the display is kind of average, which was expected, because information technology offers 500 nits of brightness at max settings. And so, everything seems pretty good, right? Well, the only caveat that I plant with the Mi Mix display is the way the auto brightness works. Honestly, the auto brightness sensor in the Mi Mix only did not work for me. It goes dark in sunlight and brightens up in the dark. I'm not sure if that's a software trouble or a hardware 1 but I turned off machine brightness afterward the first couple of days of using the Mix.

Well, the Mi Mix's bezel-less (almost) brandish is undoubtedly great and information technology'due south the all-time thing nigh the smartphone. Certain, in that location's the auto brightness problem but I won't consider it a deal breaker, considering how stunning the display is.

User Interface

Equally with all Xiaomi devices, the Mi Mix comes with MIUI. The China variants of the Mix come with the MIUI China ROM but the Mix I'm using features the MIUI Global ROM. The Mix comes with MIUI eight, based on Android 6.0 Marshmallow. While Marshmallow is a pretty old Android version, considering Android O has been announced, it does not actually make a difference, considering MIUI is a skin that totally masks Google's stock Android experience. Earlier we talk about MIUI, permit me tell you lot that I'chiliad a stock Android guy and fifty-fifty and so, I kind of like MIUI, except a few things. I just hate the fact that the MIUI does not accept an app drawer. For someone like me, who installs a ton of apps, the home screen becomes besides cluttered to utilise. Forth with that, the notification center in MIUI is a mixed pocketbook for me. While I like the various toggles available, I don't like the fact that you cannot expand whatsoever notifications for more info.

Another major modify in MIUI from stock Android is the multitasking interface, which looks very like to the interface on iOS and Windows Mobile. Information technology'due south decent enough but I miss the ability to switch between apps quickly, like in Nougat. Other than that, MIUI brings its own native apps like phone, contacts, messaging, calendar, browser etc. They work fine and whether you like them or not depends on you. I did not take whatsoever issues with them.

Forth with the aforementioned changes, MIUI lets y'all customize well-nigh everything and if you are someone who loves to tinker, you are going to love it. Simply a look at the Settings page of MIUI volition give you an thought of the all-encompassing customization that the Android ROM offers. For instance, on the brandish front, there's double tap screen to wake, a absurd reading fashion (reduces blue light), lock screen customizations, and more.

MIUI also brings some great boosted features, similar a native app locker, a Child Fashion, which lets you hide some apps and only brand some apps accessible for children. At that place's besides Quick Ball, available all the fourth dimension from the navigation bar. It's similar to iOS' Assistive Touch and brings shortcuts to screenshot, back, lock telephone, multitasking and more than. Yous can as well enable a gesture for it, select the shortcuts you want and more than. There'south also a ane-handed mode, which should come up particularly handy considering the huge display of Mi Mix.

At that place's also the "Second Space" feature that is something I actually similar. Second Space is similar multiple user accounts in stock Android but a lot improve. With Second Space, you can create a separate infinite and you tin motility files, apps, data, and more from i space to the other. Yous can even bank check notifications from the 2nd space, so if you lot are using Second Space to use multiple accounts of WhatsApp or whatever other messaging app, you will be able to bank check notifications for both of your accounts. If you'd just similar to use multiple accounts of an app, you can also utilise the "Dual apps" characteristic, that lets y'all clone an app.

MIUI is undoubtedly a feature rich Android skin and different some other Android skins, information technology includes features that are really useful. So, there are ton of customization options that many Android users love. Then, yes, there'south a lot to like in MIUI. Apart from a few qualms, I really like what the MIUI offers.

Performance

Forth with the various technological advancements that the Mi Mix packs, information technology's powered by last yr's flagship processor, the Quad-core MSM8996 Snapdragon 821 processor, coupled with the Adreno 530 GPU. At that place'southward also 4 GB or 6 GB of RAM, depending on the 128 or 256 GB variants of the Mi Mix. We accept the 256 GB/vi GB version of the Mi Mix and in my extensive usage of the device, it performs how a flagship should. As I mentioned, I have been using the Mi Mix as my daily driver and I have faced no serious hiccups at all. MIUI did pop out "Settings has stopped" errors a couple of times but other than that, everything has been working swiftly. Everything'due south smooth even when I tried to put some pressure on the device with multiple extensive games.

As well, thank you to the massive amount of RAM, multitasking is a breeze on the Mi Mix. When it comes to gaming functioning, at that place were no stutter or frame drops at all. Apart from that, nigh phones with Qualcomm processors tend to have overheating problems but not the Mi Mix. Certain, the device does go a lilliputian warm when playing processor intensive games merely it does not get as well heated.

The real world performance of the Mi Mix iscertainly amazing and while I don't care nigh benchmarks, hither are a few results if you find them interesting:

Every bit you tin see, the Mix does pretty well hither likewise. While the scores are proficient when it comes to processor tests, the scores are pretty swell in the GPU tests.

So, if you manage to get the Mi Mix, y'all can balance assured that the device offers great performance and won't disappoint you lot, no matter what you throw at it.

Telephony and Audio Functioning

While the Mi Mix is a gorgeous and capable smartphone, it lacks when information technology comes to i of the most basic nevertheless important aspects of a telephone. I'thousand talking about the cantilevered piezoelectric actuator that replaces the earpiece. The audio produced by vibrations betwixt the display and ceramic is just non skillful enough. Sometimes the sound is loud plenty, while sometimes it merely isn't what you expect from a modern-day smartphone. In fact, when I started using the phone, I used to shuffle the phone a lot to see if I was holding information technology wrong. Well, I wasn't holding it incorrect, as no matter what I did, the sound merely wasn't loud enough. Other than that, I constantly saw network drops in my phone, which might be considering the phone is designed for the Chinese networks.

When information technology comes to the speakers, the bottom-facing speakers on the Mi Mix are pretty good. Considering it's just a single speaker, I had my doubts, simply information technology offered ample sound and that also with decent clarity. Plus, Xiaomi offers various headphone audio settings in MIUI. There'southward an Equalizer, Hd Sound audio, Mi Sound Enhancer and more.

Bombardment Functioning

The Mi Mix comes with a non-removable four,400 mAh battery and support for Quick Charge 3.0. It as well comes bundled with a charger that is compatible with QC 3.0. While Xiaomi claims that the charger tin accuse the phone to around 80% in half an 60 minutes, I found it inconsistent. At times, I could just get around 40-50% accuse in one-half an hour, while some times, I got 50% charge in half an hour.

When information technology comes to how well the battery performs, well, it'due south pretty decent but there are some bug. In my usage, the bombardment drained a lot on standby. For instance, I went to sleep at around midnight and the phone's battery was at around sixty% and in the morning at around 10 AM, it was at effectually xxx%. The standby battery drain was a chip inconsistent though. At times, it concur up pretty well, while some times it merely drains. Other than the standby problem, the bombardment holds upwards pretty well but it's not exactly boggling.

In my usage, where I watched a lot of YouTube videos, made a few calls, texted a lot, browsed my social feed and web pages, the sync was always on, with both mobile data and WiFi turned on all the time, the Mi Mix lasted for around 19 hours. This is pretty good, considering I used the smartphone heavily only I really hope Xiaomi fixes the standby bleed problem. Well, overall, the battery performance of the Mi Mix is expert plenty, because non everyone with a Mix is facing the standby problem. The device should hands last you lot a twenty-four hour period on moderate to heavy usage and more, if you are someone who does not utilise your phone that much.

Cameras

Let's talk about the rear camera start. The Xiaomi Mi Mix packs in a 16 MP f/2.0 camera, with stage-detection autofocus, dual-tone LED flash and a gyro-based EIS. When information technology comes to the camera interface, it's a pretty standard affair, if yous have used MIUI in the by.

There are toggles for flash, HDR, along with a button to access the various filters. At that place are also a lot of absurd modes, like Beautify, Audio, HHT, Straighten, Manual, Groupshot, Titl-Shift etc. I especially similar the Manual mode, which lets you control the white balance, focus, exposure and ISO. Other than that, you tin can caput to the camera settings to find various options, like confront detection, age & gender detection, machine-exposure settings, set volume button as shutter key, focus mode, heighten depression light photos automatically etc. Like everything MIUI, the camera app as well packs in ton of options to play with.

Now, coming to how the rear photographic camera fares. In a nutshell, it's pretty average. While the photographic camera captures photos with good details, accurate colors and great dynamic range, in that location is a piddling noise in some of the shots. Sure, the photos taken in good light are pretty decent but if you wait closely, even they feature a scrap noise, which is disappointing. Other than the noise, the Mix captures decent photos,  and the HDR works very well. Nonetheless, the Mi Mix's OmniVision photographic camera sensors lacks when it comes to low light and night shots. The photos taken in low light are strictly average. Thank you to software processing, the photos taken in low light practise expect a little brilliant simply they lack the sharpness you get from flagship smartphones.

Here are some photos that we took from the Mi Mix:

When it comes to video capture, the Mix has the power to shoot 4K videos at 30 fps, while the sound is captured in stereo. The videos captures by the Mix are pretty good. The details are there, just like the stills and while the processing by the camera does oversharpens things at times, the video quality is still decent plenty. On the sound front, the Mix does a decent task of capturing it.

Moving on to the selfie photographic camera, which is a five MP f/2.two unit. The major problem with the selfie camera is its weird location, that is at the bottom, which makes up for an bad-mannered angle that is not good plenty for selfies. So, if you want to use selfie camera on the Mix, yous will have to rotate your phone every time and the camera app is set to rotate even if you have screen rotation turned off. This is quite a hassle really because fifty-fifty though I'chiliad not really a selfie person, e'er since I've started using the Mix, I have been using the front end facing photographic camera fifty-fifty more infrequently. Well, this is ane of the trade-offs you'll have to make for a bezel-less smartphone. On the quality of shots taken by the forepart-facing camera, they are okay-ish to below average and not actually close to the flagship standards.

Connectivity

Like nearly Xiaomi smartphones, the Mi Mix features dual SIM support and both the SIM slots come up with LTE back up. However, if y'all are using 4G LTE on 1 SIM slot, you will not be able to utilise 4G LTE from the other SIM carte du jour. The phone features 11 LTE bands, and while the phone is aimed at China, I have been using it with my Vodafone and Reliance JIO SIM cards and it has worked flawlessly.

Other than that, the telephone featuresdual-band Wi-Fi a/b/g/due north/ac support, Wi-Fi Directly, Bluetooth iv.2, NFC, USB OTG back up and GPS with GLONASS and Beidou. Still, there'south no IR blaster, or FM Radio support. Overall, the Mi Mix's connectivity suit features almost everything that yous'd expect from a modern mean solar day smartphone.

Mi Mix: Concept Phone Turned Into Reality

When Xiaomi first unveiled the Mi Mix, I was in awe and chances are, yous were too, because we accept all wanted a bezel-less smartphone and honestly, I still love staring at the gorgeous design of the Mi Mix. Kudos to Xiaomi here, as the Mi Mix is a brave attempt. We all know Xiaomi as the company that brings decent smartphones and other products that are really great value for coin. Even so, the Mi Mix is a telephone that really makes me view the company with a lot more than respect. The Mi Mix is a bold attempt and I think they take succeeded in making a signal and while I appreciate the try, should you buy a Mi Mix? Well, if you ask me, the Mi Mix is nonetheless a concept phone and while it's a reality, it's still a bit abroad from being a finished production.

The bezel-less display and the ceramic design is pretty cool just there are critical trade-offs, like the poor sound quality from the cantilevered piezoelectric actuator (replacement for earpiece), which replaces the earpiece. In that location's too the weird placement of the front-facing camera, the bug with the auto-brightness. However, if yous can alive with these problems, the MI Mix is a smartphone that will not disappoint you. The performance is amazing, the speakers are skillful and the all-time thing is, it volition become you enough of attention.

While in that location are lot of great smartphones competing with the Mix, at the $600 price indicate, like the LG V20, Huawei Mate 9, Galaxy S7 Border, and Xiaomi'due south very own Mi 5s, they lack the aureola and the border-to-edge display of the Mix. So, if you live in a state exterior Red china and even so want to buy the Mix, you tin can get information technology from our friends at GearBest. At around $620 for the 256 GB/6 GB variant, the phone is groovy value for money.

Special Offer for Beebom Readers:- $609.99 with coupon lawmaking "MiMIXG" on GearBest.

Pros:

• Stunning Design
• Gorgeous Bezel-less (Almost) Brandish
• Fluid Operation
• Base Version Features 128 GB Storage
• Value For Money
• Good Sound Quality
• MIUI Features

Cons:

• Poor Earpiece Sound (cantilevered piezoelectric actuator)
• Average Camera
• The Placement of Front-Facing Camera
• Auto-Brightness Issues

Encounter ALSO: 12 Cool MIUI 8 Tips, Tricks and Hidden Features

Mi Mix Review: Is Bezel-Less The Future?

The Mi Mix is a great, futuristic smartphone but its bezel-less blueprint too brings a few merchandise-offs, which if you think almost it, are pretty critical, when it comes to everyday utilise. Then, do you think bezel-less smartphones are the future, or you think lesser bezels are the way to get, like Samsung did with the Galaxy S8. Well, let us know your thoughts on this and the Mi Mix in the comments section below.

REVIEW OVERVIEW
Design nine
Display 9
Cameras 7
Performance 9
Bombardment 7.5
Bone viii.5
Telephony & Audio 7
SUMMARY The Mi Mix is a great, futuristic smartphone simply its bezel-less design also brings a few merchandise-offs, which if you think virtually it, are pretty critical, when information technology comes to everyday use.	viii.i OVERALL SCORE

Source: https://beebom.com/xiaomi-mi-mix-review/

Posted by: adamsthord1943.blogspot.com

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