Having conquered the smartphone market, Xiaomi is all set to disrupt the lucrative television market with the Mi TV 4 series in India.
Xiaomi's 55-inch Mi TV 4 is the world's slimmest smart TV to date. It measures just 4.99mm, thinner than an average smartphone. It has all the latest features including HDR10 content support, which no online service provider is offering in India right now, but this apparently makes the device future-ready.
Display:
Xiaomi Mi TV 4 comes with a 55-inch 4K (3840x2160p) LED display having 60Hz refresh rate, 8ms response time,178-degree viewing angle and as said before, it supports HDR10 content.
Furthermore, Xiaomi, in a bid to create the almost-zero-gap screen, has used Corning Iris Glass light guide plate, which is three times more expensive and five times harder than plastic light guide plates usually found in most other TVs.
User-interface:
Like the Redmi and Mi-series smartphones, which run Android-based MIUI, Mi TV 4A is powered by AOSP (Android Open Source Project)-based PatchWall assistant. It is a layer on top of the Android TV OS, which relies on deep-learning AI (Artificial Intelligence) technology to give content-based recommendations.
The company adds that it is completely redesigned from the ground up for the Indian market.
PatchWall is also the first Smart TV OS in the world to intelligently connect to set-top boxes, allowing users to switch to any channel or specific TV show with just one click. It is powered by a 64-bit 1.8GHz Amlogic Cortex A53 quad-core processor with a 750MHz Mali-T830 GPU, 2GB RAM and 8GB eMMC storage.
Xiaomi Mi TV 4 comes with a remarkable Mi Remote with a simple design having just 11 buttons. Guess what, PatchWall makes the Mi Remote work as an STB (set-top box) controller and also lets it control any HDMI device that supports CEC (Consumer Electronics Control).
Xiaomi has also partnered more than 15 different content partners such as Sony Liv, Hotstar, Voot and Hungama across 12 Indic languages, resulting in a huge video content library with 500,000 hours of content to watch, of which 80 percent is free.
Furthermore, Xiaomi Mi TV is compatible with more than 3,500 STB services in India.
With all this content available, the company brings the universal search option for users to make it easy to find content to watch, along with personalized recommendations that gets better over time, as more users watch their Mi LED TV 4.
There's also support for 13 system languages including Indic languages such as Hindi, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali and 7 others out of the box.
However, Xiaomi Mi TV neither has an app store of its own, like the one it has in China, nor the Google Play store. But, we have to understand that some Android APKs can be side-loaded to the Mi TV 4, which we don't recommend, as it requires a person having sound knowledge of custom software installation procedures.
Also, Xiaomi TV doesn't support Amazon Prime Video and Netflix. Even when the TV supports Amazon Fire TV, it can't retrieve Prime Video content. Hope Xiaomi brings the support for aforementioned services, soon.
It has to be noted that Xiaomi will be adding support for more content service providers to the Mi TV 4 via OTA update.
Audio:
Xiaomi Mi TV 4 boasts dual-speaker (2 x 8 watts) setup with Dolby and DTS audio system. If you are not satisfied with the loudspeaker, connect portable Bluetooth speakers to create a surround-sound-like effect.
Connectivity:
Xiaomi Mi TV 4 features three HDMI ports (including an ARC port), and two USB ports (3.0+2.0), as well as an Ethernet port along with Dual-Band Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 4.0 to connect wireless headphones or other Bluetooth devices.
After-sale service:
Xiaomi has confirmed that those who buy the Mi TV 4 series from its proprietary mi.com and the Mi Home store are assured of free shipment and installation service within 24 hours after the delivery. It comes with a standard one-year warranty of the whole TV and two years for the LED panel.
Also, if the TV develops any issues, the company will take care of the service, but only for those who bought it on the Xiaomi website and Mi Homes.
For those who purchase the Mi TV 4 from Flipkart, the e-commerce site will take care of installation and service.
Final thoughts:
Overall, Xiaomi Mi TV 4 series, like the Redmi and Mi series smartphone cousins, is shaping up to be a great value-for-money gadget. With such amazing hardware, many are puzzled how Xiaomi can sell it with the dirt-cheap Rs 39,999 price-tag.
This is sure to give sleepless nights to reigning leader Samsung, which by the way also lost the smartphone leader's throne to Xiaomi recently.
Xiaomi Mi TV 4 is slated to go on sale on Flipkart, Mi.com and Mi Homes from February 22 in India.
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