MWC 2016: Xiaomi Media Preview Live Blog

Additional: Will go on sale (in China most likely) next week.

 

04:32AM EST - OK, looks like a wrap. Devices are outside, so we'll have a look.

04:28AM EST - The chinese prices below include 17% tax

04:27AM EST - The cheapest model uses the 1.8 GHz bin of the 820

04:27AM EST - Pricing is $354 for the high end 'Mi 5 Pro' version with top end storage and high CPU bin

04:22AM EST - Up to 4 people

04:21AM EST - Real time video effects

04:19AM EST - screen in screen video calls while doing other things

04:18AM EST - Real time Beautify on video calls

04:18AM EST - New app: MI Video Call

04:18AM EST - MIUI 7 powered by Android 6.0

04:17AM EST - Comes with MIUI 7 with 5 themes as default

04:17AM EST - 10 mins of charge gives 2.6hr video, 2.7hr navigation or 7.5hr reading

04:17AM EST - Charges 80%-90% in an hour

04:16AM EST - 200mV increments, 20% faster than QC 2.0

04:15AM EST - Does card virtualization for payments or things like bus cards

04:15AM EST - Partnership with NXP

04:15AM EST - Full-Feature NFC

04:15AM EST - It's done in hardware via DSP

04:14AM EST - Video with Sunlight Display demos

04:14AM EST - Similar to Samsung's auto brightness

04:14AM EST - 'Sunlight display' dynamically adjusts contrast for each pixel in real time

04:13AM EST - Didn't mention APL for 600

04:13AM EST - 600 nits max brightness

04:12AM EST - 17% more power efficient LEDs

04:12AM EST - Mi 5 uses 16 low power, higher brightness LEDs

04:11AM EST - 'Typical displays are 350-500 nit, 72% sRGB and 12-14 LED backlights'

04:11AM EST - that would be helpful for writing reviews on the move...!

04:11AM EST - Reading mode to reduce blues

04:10AM EST - 1400:1 ratio, as low as 1 nit, NTSC up to 95%

04:10AM EST - 'ours is ultra-thin'

04:09AM EST - 'There are no bezel free phones'

04:09AM EST - 'Borderless display?'

04:09AM EST - Sapphire glass lens, 6-element

04:08AM EST - 4MP with 2 micron pixels and a Beautify mode

04:08AM EST - Front camera has same as Mi Note

04:08AM EST - 4K video, color enhancement and low light enhancement

04:07AM EST - Mi 5 uses Qualcomm Spectra ISP

04:07AM EST - about color accuracy

04:07AM EST - cleaner light separation

04:07AM EST - DTI prevents light leaking to other pixels

04:06AM EST - 16MP, PDAF auto focus, DTI (deep trench isolation)

04:06AM EST - Same sensor as the Mate 8

04:06AM EST - Sony IMX298 sensor

04:06AM EST - The shake table was moving 1cm in each direction at about 30 Hz

04:05AM EST - Of course, it's cherry picked examples, but it looks rather good

04:05AM EST - on a shaking table

04:05AM EST - Video showing it against the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus

04:03AM EST - that's rotational and translational correction

04:03AM EST - Mi 5 has 4-axis OIS

04:03AM EST - Typical config for OIS is large device and 2-axis

04:02AM EST - 'Taken OIS to a new level'

04:02AM EST - Has OIS

04:00AM EST - f2.0

03:59AM EST - Just to clarify, the ceramic design is an option over the glass design, most likely due to cost

03:58AM EST - 3000 mAh battery, 685 Wh/L density

03:57AM EST - 14g lighter than iPhone 6s

03:57AM EST - +/- 1-2 g

03:57AM EST - 129g total weight

03:57AM EST - 5.15 inch, feels like a 5-inch

03:57AM EST - Dimensions: 69.2 x 144.55 x 7.25 mm

03:56AM EST - 'looks just right'

03:56AM EST - Speaker and camera are centered at the top

03:55AM EST - Thinner home button than the Samsung

03:55AM EST - 'We wanted a balanced design and a camera that is tucked in as well as flat'

03:54AM EST - 'Two years to design for Mi 5'

03:54AM EST - 'A shorter forehead moves the camera down on the rear'

03:53AM EST - 'Front fingerprint sensors have difficulty in implementation - slim profile and screen to body ratio can be affected'

03:51AM EST - 3D ceramic is 75% more expensive than glass

03:51AM EST - Texture of marble without the weight

03:50AM EST - Rear texture in the ceramic is micro-crystalline nano-ceramic zirconia

03:50AM EST - Steel is 4, Diamond is 10

03:50AM EST - Up to 8 on the Mohs scale

03:50AM EST - '3D Ceramic body' as an option

03:49AM EST - 5.15 inch display

03:49AM EST - Mi 5 is completely curved

03:48AM EST - Mi 5 improves this

03:48AM EST - Mi Note had OIS camera that was flush and 6.95mm thick

03:47AM EST - 'It's not a coincidence it looks like Mi Note'

03:47AM EST - The gold back has like a cross hatch texture

03:45AM EST - Holding up a pair of Mi 5 devices

03:45AM EST - speakers on bottom

03:45AM EST - ok so rear is curved, front is not

03:45AM EST - USB Type-C

03:44AM EST - Those bezels look very thin

03:44AM EST - comes in black, white and gold

03:44AM EST - 'Very thin'

03:43AM EST - First XIaomi device with a home button and fingerprint sensor on the front

03:43AM EST - Camera with dual LED flash

03:42AM EST - Mi 5 inherits design from Mi Note

03:42AM EST - ?

03:42AM EST - So kind of like the S6 edge

03:42AM EST - Back is curved too

03:41AM EST - Mi 5 visuals, shows a curved edge

03:41AM EST - Video now

03:40AM EST - Speaking Mi 4 design

03:40AM EST - Now explaining the process of design

03:39AM EST - VoLTE gets preferential treatment

03:39AM EST - 'Best performance with VoLTE on each end'

03:39AM EST - 'Call clarity improved by 100%, 1-2s quicker call connections'

03:38AM EST - Voice over LTE

03:38AM EST - 'Using the peak bandwidth, that's 30s for a 1.8GB download'

03:37AM EST - That's 3x Carrier Aggregation and high-order modulation (256-QAM)

03:36AM EST - Cat 12 LTE supports 600 MB/s

03:36AM EST - i.e. LTE-Advanced

03:36AM EST - Mi 5 supports 4G+

03:36AM EST - UFS is based on SCSI

03:35AM EST - 450MB/s vs 250MB/s peak bandwidth on UFS vs eMMC

03:34AM EST - no longer using eMMC for flagships

03:34AM EST - UFS 2.0 high-speed flash

03:34AM EST - LPDDR4 at 1866 MHz

03:34AM EST - Hugo back on stage

03:33AM EST - 'Mi 5 is an amazing device'

03:33AM EST - '820 has been rearchitected, key IP blocks have been updated'

03:33AM EST - 'Latest and Best Experiences'

03:33AM EST - 'We have a shared vision of technology'

03:32AM EST - Derek Aberle, president of Qualcomm on stage

03:32AM EST - X12 LTE modem, Quick Charge 3.0, Hexagon 680 DSP

03:32AM EST - 50k Antutu GPU result, compared to 21k on S6 and 18.5k on Mate 8

03:31AM EST - Adreno 530 is +40% perf and +40% power efficiency

03:31AM EST - vs Snapdragon 810, it has 200% perf and 50% power

03:31AM EST - Apparently Snapdragon 820 is the best reviewed QC SoC for the past three generations

03:30AM EST - "Xiaomi is focused on innovation, or translated from Chinese as 'black magic'"

03:29AM EST - Apparently it's important in China...

03:28AM EST - 'Antutu score of 142084'. Wait, why are they quoting Antutu

03:28AM EST - So 100% faster than 810, GPU 40% faster, RAM 100% faster than LPDDR3, Flash 87% faster than eMMC 5.0

03:27AM EST - 4GB RAM, up to 128GB onboard storage

03:27AM EST - That's Qualcomm's custom Kryo cores

03:27AM EST - Snapdragon 820

03:27AM EST - 'Fast'

03:27AM EST - Hugo has been using it for a few months

03:26AM EST - So today is about the Mi 5

03:26AM EST - Mi 4 sold 16m phones worldwide

03:26AM EST - Now talking about 2016 Xiaomi flagship premiere

03:26AM EST - Basically a connected devices portfolio

03:25AM EST - Developed with Segway

03:25AM EST - Ninebot mini hoverboard as well, 22km travel on a charge up to 16km/h

03:25AM EST - Mi Bluetooth Speaker, Mi Smart Scale, Mi Air Purifier 2, Mi Bedside Lamp

03:24AM EST - Mi Power Banks is #1 power bank company in the world

03:24AM EST - E.g. Mi Band, Mi Headphones, Mi Power Banks and Yi Action Camera

03:24AM EST - 2015 was also an important year for the Xiaomi Ecosystem, a group of 50 companies to build lifestyle products with Xiaomi

03:23AM EST - 9 of 10 of the most active Android users on Tencent were Xiaomi devices

03:23AM EST - 'It's more important to track active users and revenue per user'

03:22AM EST - over 170 million MIUI users worldwide

03:22AM EST - 2015 was MIUI 7

03:22AM EST - 'Xiaomi wants to be the fastest to new software features when requested'

03:22AM EST - MIUI gets weekly software updates. 275 updates in 5.5 years

03:21AM EST - 'We support 347 different models from 96 brands'

03:21AM EST - '750 people working on it, larger than our hardware team'

03:21AM EST - Now talking MIUI, their interface

03:20AM EST - A big hit was Mi Pad 2: runs Win 10

03:20AM EST - Latest megahit is Redmi Note 3, only smartphone with Snapdragon 650

03:19AM EST - Mi Note Pro was one of the first devices with Snapdragon 810

03:19AM EST - Last year's flagship was Mi Note

03:18AM EST - #5 in the world

03:18AM EST - Xiaomi was #1 in China in 2015 at 15%, compared to 14.5% Huawei

03:18AM EST - To compare that to Huawei, who had 100-108m

03:18AM EST - 70m phones sold in 2015

03:18AM EST - Hugo Barra internally is known as 'Tiger Brother'

03:17AM EST - 'Xiaomi is still a startup in many ways'

03:17AM EST - 6th Birthday in a few weeks

03:17AM EST - Xiaomi founded April 6th 2010

03:17AM EST - MI logo stands for Mobile Internet

03:16AM EST - Event co-sponsored by Qualcomm

03:16AM EST - 'First time announcing a product on a global stage'

03:16AM EST - 'A historical day for Xiaomi, first media event in Europe'

03:15AM EST - Hugo Barra on a hoverboard

03:15AM EST - We're starting :)

03:12AM EST - Sorry, Hugo Barra is VP of International, and typically the spokesperson at these sort of events

03:06AM EST - We're expecting Xiaomi CEO, Hugo Barra, to take the stage for the announcements

03:05AM EST - I believe MWC 2016 is now officially the single event with the most Live Blogs we've ever done :)

03:05AM EST - Ian on text, Andrei on pictures

03:04AM EST - We're here, we've not slept enough, but the coffee is flowing and we're ready to go