Xiaomi Mi4i: Midrange Smartphone

• Posted By Amritesh
• On May 17th, 2015
• Comments: one response

Xiaomi launched their mid range smartphone Mi4i last month in India. Xiaomi claims that this phone is made keeping in mind the preference of Indian users and thus the launch event was held in India.

The phone as of now is available exclusively through flashsale on online retail store Flipkart at a very reasonable price of Rs 12,999/-. The device does boasts of impressive specs on paper and will look to replicate the success enjoyed by other Xiaomi phones in the country. The phone uses the latest 64 bit chipset which is considered to be optimized to run the latest Android OS. The phone weighs only 130 gms and build quality is also decent considering the price.

The phone is marketed as a flagship device by Xiaomi but I have my reservations about it. The specs on this device look impressive but they can’t be compared to the ones featuring on flagship devices.

Let’s look at the reasons to buy this device:-

Latest Android OS: Mi4i comes with the latest Android 5.0 pre installed which is pretty decent considering it sports a mid range price tag. Moreover, Xiaomi is known to rollout regular updates and you can expect atleast one major Android update one this phone.

Impressive Hardware Specifications: Hardware specifications on this phone look impressive on paper and promises to provide you lag free experience on this device. The device will perform very well under moderate usage conditions.

Good Battery Backup: The phone sports a massive 3120 mah battery which will give you a very good battery life on this phone. For most users it will last you the entire day on single charge.

Good Camera Experience: The camera on this device is very good and captures quality images. You won’t find a better camera phone at this price or even after paying a lot more. The image captured on this phone has a lot more detail and look crispy. Even the front facing camera is good for capturing quality pictures.

4G LTE Support: The phone also comes with 4G LTE support on both the sims which again will let you enjoy 4G connectivity with either or both of your connections.

Reasons to Avoid this device:-

Serious Heating Issues with the Device: Like most of the devices based on Snapdragon 615 architect this device too has got serious heating issues. The does get heated up very quickly while gaming and even on normal usage for long duration you will find the phone heating up. This in my opinion is not good in the longer run for the device and will also hamper the end user experience.

Occasional Lag also Observed: While gaming or multitasking you will observe lags occasionally which may be due to the fact that it runs a heavy User Interface MIUI 6 over the Android Lollipop. But the phone will be able to carry out most of the tasks thrown at it.

After Sales Service: Xiaomi have their service support setup in most of the cities along with multiple outlets in major cities. However most of these service centers are outsourced to third party service providers which may not offer a very good after sales support.

No SD Card Support: The phone does not have an external SD card slot so users have to be contained with the 16GB of internal storage available on the phone. Out of the 16GB internal storage only about 12GB is available for the end user.

Overall Impression

In my opinion this is a very good device for Moderate users and people who love to take a lot of pictures on their mobile. But heavy users may not like the phone too much given the heating issues and occasional lag observed on the phone.

Although the phone does have some shortcomings but the price at which it has been launched does make it an attractive buy. The phone does have everything which end users want to have on his/her device.

Key Specifications are given below:-

Processor	1.1 Ghz Quad Core & 1.7 Ghz Quad Core A53Processor  (2nd Gen Snapdragon 615 Chipset )
Storage	16GB (No SD Card)
Operating System	Android Lollipop 5.0
Rear Camera	13 megapixel (With Dual Led Flash)/1080p
Front Camera	5 mp/720p
Ram	2 GB
GPU	Adreno 405
Battery	3120 Mah
Display	5’ inch (Concore Glass)
Type Sim	Micro Sim/Dual Sim/GSM 3G/4G LTE Support
Resolution	1920*1080(441 ppi)
Touchscreen Type	Capacitive
Dimension(mm)/Weight(gms)	138.1*69.6*7.8 /130