We present to your attention a review of the smartphone Xiaomi Mi Max 3. A device from a series of phablets, a very large smartphone or a small tablet. In 2018, this model turned out to be the only new phablet on the market.
The gadget is available in Chinese and international versions. If you are going to buy Xiaomi Mi Max 3 - stay tuned. Now there is such a variant of this phone. Otherwise, you will have to additionally purchase an adapter for the charger.
The price of a smartphone from Xiaomi is traditionally pleasantly lower than for similar devices from other brands. At the same time, the technical characteristics and capabilities are in some ways superior to the products of competitors.
Compared to the previous model in this series, Mi Max 3 has an expanded 6.9-inch bezel-less OGS display. Although the overall dimensions of the case remained the same as that of Mi Max 2. The increase in usable screen area was achieved by reducing the side frames.
The 19: 9 aspect ratio provides comfortable viewing of widescreen movies. At the bottom, two stereo speakers deliver powerful and clear sound. The body has received rounding at the corners. This has improved ergonomics somewhat. Still, the device is too large for one hand. 
The body is metal. The side walls are made of plastic to improve network reception. The back of the device houses a dual photo camera and a touch sensor for fingerprint recognition. 
Price big smartphone Xiaomi Mi Max 3 in Moscow will be about 20,000 rubles. On Aliexpress you can order with a good discount, from 18,000 rubles. The case is not included in the package.
Specifications Xiaomi Mi Max 3
The specification of the device is consistent with the class of mini-tablets.
- Operating system Android 8.1.
- 8th nuclear processor Qualcomm Snapdragon 636. Local memory 128 GB. RAM 6 GB.
- Dual Nano SIM.
- There is a slot for a memory card up to 256 GB.
- The main camera is dual 12/5 MP.
- Front-camera 8MP.
- 3.5 mm headphone jack.
- Communication standards GSM 900/1800/1900, 3G, 4G LTE, VoLTE.
- Satellite navigation GPS / GLONASS.
- Battery 5500mAh.
The Russian user will be disappointed by the lack of an NFC system for making contactless payments. However, this drawback is inherent in most modern phablets.
The slot for the SIM card is combined with the place for inserting the SD card, which is not very convenient. At least you don't have to choose between memory expansion and a second phone number.
Accumulator battery significantly increased in capacity compared to the previous model Xiaomi Mi Max 2. Unfortunately, this did not have a positive effect on increasing the autonomy of the smartphone. 
User reviews suggest otherwise. Despite the large battery, the duration of continuous operation of the new phablet was reduced by two to three hours.
It can be assumed that the accelerated consumption of the charge is due to improvements in terms of electronics. Indeed, the Xiaomi Mi Max 3 smartphone demonstrates excellent performance. 
Games run fast and smooth. In multitasking mode, the system almost never freezes. The video plays smoothly, brightly and clearly.
A lot of letters and comments come with the question of when will I finally release a review of the Xiaomi Mi Max 3 smartphone, otherwise, they say, on November 11 on the nose, discounts and all that. Well, at least briefly write an impression, they say to know - to take or not to take. I answered and answered these letters and questions, and then I thought that it was necessary to make a note on this topic here and then refer to it.
The review will be on next Tuesday. In short - I really liked the smartphone. And so much so that now it works for me as the main smartphone and I can't even say whether I will return to Huawei P20 Pro or not.
I really like the hefty display, while the dimensions of the smartphone itself do not go beyond the permissible limits for me personally. I remember that I once tried to use an old 6.8 "smartphone - I didn't like it. This 18: 9 format is quite normal for me. And here you can remove the panel with control buttons altogether, because this is MIUI 10, and now it supports screen control gestures (as in the iPhone X, note where this case was first shown).
Its main advantages are a large screen, a nice and advanced shell (MIUI 10), completely bombic autonomy: he lives quietly with me for about three - three and a half days when fully loaded in "all-inclusive and everything is synchronized" mode. If it is not used too actively, then about 15-20 percent of the charge goes away per day.
In the full download mode ("on the road" mode), in the evening, about 65% remains in a situation where another smartphone with good autonomy (the same Huawei P20 Pro) would already show 10 percent.
The performance is quite enough, even heavy games are played at the maximum quality settings. The sound is quite decent for a smartphone, you can listen to music.
One of the main questions is the camera. Compared to the Mi Max 2, where the camera was very, very mediocre, here the camera was nicely finished. She is now on a solid four. For household and blogging applications, it is quite enough. In poor lighting conditions, it removes decently. (The Mi Max 2 was really bad.) The video quality is not amazing (but it is also quite tolerable), however, FullHD has a fully working stabilizer, and this is the most important thing!
Yes, the important point is that there is no NFC here. The Chinese use QR codes for payment, so they don't really need NFC - they don't put this chip on. So who is critical - keep in mind. I am completely uncritical, I do not use NFC.
Well, and, importantly, the official global firmware for this smartphone has already been released, it is being installed in the global version, so no dancing with a tambourine - everything should work out of the box.
I looked at the price there now. Here is a verified seller with a European version. Price from $ 261.
We look at the price dynamics of a given seller.
We look at the dynamics. Everything seems to be fair, the lowest price. The only thing is that the color here is only black, you cannot choose.
At the beginning of its journey, Xiaomi released one smartphone a year, in recent years the company has a dozen models for every taste and wallet. But what Xiaomi did not have until recently was a phablet in the classical sense, i.e. smartphone with a screen diagonal of 6.5-7 inches. But this was a consumer demand in the company's home market - in China. In this review, we take a look at the Mi Max - a huge tablet-like smartphone that still fits in trouser pockets. We express our gratitude to the store LstoreMobile for the smartphone provided for review!
Packaging and equipment
The device is sold in a white box with no pictures. The packaging looks very simple both outside and inside, it was clearly saved on it and, it seems to me, was done right. In addition to a smartphone, the delivery set includes: a power adapter, a cable, a brief instruction and a paper clip.
Appearance and ergonomics
Xiaomi is one of the few that has a well-defined solid corporate identity, the company pays special attention to how the device looks like, how the user interface and shell functionality looks, and how it all fits together. Xiaomi Mi Max looks neat and pretty, there are no serious flaws in the design. In appearance smartphone features flagship and, but unlike them, the body of the novelty is made mainly of aluminum, not glass. The screen is covered by a 2.5D glass panel with high quality.
And here there are two points, firstly, in all three color options, the glass substrate is white, and secondly, the panel does not fit into the body in any way - it was simply stuck in front. As for the screen itself, by today's standards, it has very wide bezels on the sides - a total of about 8 mm. Moreover, if the screen is turned off, this is not visible, about 3-4 mm falls on the black false frame.
Despite the simply huge screen diagonal, Mi Max is still a smartphone and, unlike, for example, you can use it with one hand, albeit with difficulty. This is facilitated, among other things, by the presence of a one-handed operation mode in the system, which is activated by sliding your finger from the Home touch button to the left to the Multitasking button, or to the right to the Back button. In this mode, the image is reduced to the equivalent of a 4 "screen (or a choice of 3.5 and 4.5"). The device has a fingerprint scanner located on the back of the case, it works accurately and very quickly, in my memory it is one of the fastest fingerprint sensors.
Screen
The main attraction of the novelty is a huge 6.44-inch screen with a resolution of 1920 * 1080 pixels. Such a diagonal allows you to comfortably consume content and communicate on the network, while at the same time the device still fits in the pocket of most trousers, although it is not convenient to carry it there at all.
In terms of other parameters, the screen is not top, but a solid middling one. The screen remains readable in the bright sun, there is a double-tap wake-up function and auto-contrast.
Hardware platform and performance
The smartphone is positioned as a mid-budget and the hardware filling in it is appropriate. In the junior modification of Mi Max, a very successful Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 is installed, which has proven itself even in, and which has moderate power consumption on the one hand and quite high performance, especially single-core, on the other hand. Older modification, in addition to having 4 GB random access memory and 128 GB constant, is distinguished by another chipset, namely the Snapdragon 652. The latter has four Cortex-A72 cores against two in the 650-th "snap", there are no other differences.
The processor's performance is sufficient for solving any tasks, from everyday tasks: telephone function, social networks, messengers and simple applications; to resource-demanding: heavy games and viewing heavy pages in the browser. Under long-term serious load, the body of the smartphone heats up slightly and the processor practically does not drop frequencies.
Cellular and interfaces
The Xiaomi Mi Max modem supports LTE networks of the seventh category, and the downstream speed in theory can reach 300 Mb / s. The 7th lane, which is the most widespread on the territory of Russia, is supported, and with it: the 3rd and 38th. The device has two equal slots for SIM-cards, one of them is combined with a slot for memory cards.
Already standard set wireless interfaces, including Wi-Fi ac and Bluetooth 4.2, supplemented by an IR port. The latter can be used to control home appliances, for this a special application is preinstalled on the smartphone. The wired interface complies with the USB 2.0 standard, and the connector is a regular micro.
Battery and autonomy
Obviously, the larger the screen, the larger the case, and in the large case there is room for a large battery. The battery capacity of the Mi Max is 4850 mAh. The smartphone does not support fast charging and charges from 0% to 100% in 3 hours and 10 minutes (from 0% to 75% in 110 minutes).
Tests for the duration of work in typical operating modes have shown that in any modes, except for heavy games, the autonomy is limited by the power consumption of the screen. The music in the Mi Max headphones can be played for up to 80 hours at maximum volume.
Note. Testing is carried out in the appropriate modes according to the following method: - listening to music in headphones at maximum volume with the screen off; - viewing 1080p video from the device memory at 50% brightness of the backlight and maximum sound volume in the headphones; - active browsing (constant opening of new tabs, active scrolling of pages, etc.) via Wi-Fi at 50% brightness of the backlight; - 3D games (Real Racing 3) with 50% backlight brightness.
Cameras, photo and video quality
The main camera module in Mi Max seems to be the same as in, the 16-megapixel sensor is covered with a lens with an aperture of F2.0 and an equivalent focal length of about 27 mm, hybrid autofocus: phase + contrast. The system camera has a manual mode in which you can adjust: white balance, focus, shutter speed and ISO.
The camera performance in good lighting conditions has remained the same compared to the Redmi Note 3 Pro. The camera takes photos with good color reproduction and medium sharpness and dynamic range. The main scourge of the module was and remains excessive digital noise, which is clearly visible even in photographs taken during the day in clear weather. CLICKABLE! Left pictures of Xiaomi Mi Max, right -:
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In HDR mode, the photo is lightened, at the same time there is a slight oversaturation in colors. In this case, shadows often fall into black, and lights into white, i.e. only the middle of the spectrum is compressed. CLICKABLE! On the left are HDR shots from Xiaomi Mi Max, on the right - HDR from Apple iPhone 6s Plus:
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The Mi Max camera copes well with low and / or artificial lighting conditions. Oddly enough, the noise does not become much more, but nevertheless the noise reduction cuts the details decently. CLICKABLE! Left pictures Xiaomi Mi Max, right - Apple iPhone 6s Plus:
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I was pleasantly surprised by the presence of an adequately working panoramic shooting mode. Xiaomi didn’t trick and simply copied the interface of the panoramic shooting mode from iOS. Photos come out correctly exposed and well glued. But the 13 megapixel resolution seems to be insufficient. CLICKABLE! Above panorama of Xiaomi Mi Max, below - Apple iPhone 6s Plus:
The front camera is five megapixel. It is equipped with an F2.0 lens with an equivalent focal length of 24mm and can record videos in FullHD resolution. CLICKABLE!
The smartphone writes video in a maximum resolution of 3840 * 2160 pixels at 30 fps and with stereo sound. There is a timelapse shooting mode and a quadruple slow-motion shooting mode in HD resolution at 30 fps, in both cases the sound is not recorded. The quality of the picture dances from time to time, but almost always it is characterized by low dynamic range, excessive contrast, oversharp and dirt. However, everything is as usual.
Xiaomi Mi MAX 3 and his full overview... I have in my hands a global version in black, the impressions of which I will share with you today. And the impressions were spoiled by the fact that for the first time I ran into a marriage in a Xiaomi smartphone. Yes, this is the first smart from this brand in my practice, which has a flaw out of the box. But first things first.
EQUIPMENT
The box contains a minimum set:
- charger block with support fast charging,
- USB-C cable,
- key for the tray.
DESIGN
There is not much to tell about design here. Externally, Mi MAX 3 is enlarged.
An all-metal body, a protruding vertical camera, a scanner on the back, a hybrid SIM tray on the left, slightly loose power and volume buttons on the right, an audio jack, an infrared port and an additional microphone on the top, a USB-C port and holes for speakers and a spoken microphone on the bottom. Nothing new. Xiaomi in 2018 has already wiped this iPhone-like design to the holes.
On the front side, everything is all the more standard: a huge widescreen screen, over which a front camera, a front flash, sensors, a speaker and a one-color white indication LED are grouped.
It's huge. Dimensions: 176.15 x 87.4 x 7.99 mm and weight 221 g.
DISPLAY
The diagonal of the screen is 6.9 inches with a resolution of FullHD +. Pixels? If you do not purposefully look for them, peering at close range, then you will not see them. The stock of brightness is very large, you can see everything in the sun. There are no questions about the viewing angles. Of course, there is an oleophobic layer on the glass. IPS matrix Tianma and personally to me right after the first turn on it seemed that this display still lacks juiciness. No, the screen is not that faded, but at the same time there is a feeling that the contrast is not enough. Perhaps not everyone will agree with me, after all, I have not seen mass complaints about the display in Mi MAX 3 on the network.
HARDWARE PART
Here is exactly the same processor as in, as in - it's still the same Snapdragon 636. Memory: 4/64 GB and there is an older version 6/128.
For games, the smartphone is suitable, but with some reservations. In games with more or less complex graphics, you will have to be content with medium graphics settings or cut the maximum graphon, such as in tanks. PUBG at medium settings is quite playable, although it can freeze a little, but not critical. If you want maximum graphics and reference smoothness in games, there is for this, but it is more expensive and the screen is smaller there. With heating, everything is fine - the Snapdragon 636 has long proven that it is not a stove.
SOFTWARE PART
The Xiaomi Mi MAX 3 came to me with MIUI 9 on board, but a large 1.7 GB update is already available, which brought the 10th version of MIUI. Here it must be said that the first buyers of Mi MAX 3 faced a problem. On early firmware, this smartphone had communication problems - on the w3bsit3-dns.com forum, you can find many complaints about the regular dumps of SIM cards and the periodic lack of mobile Internet. And these same people note that the problem is gone with the updates. For my part, I can confirm that in this moment the smartphone keeps the connection stably, Mobile Internet works fine.
OTHER
Multimedia speakers. Yes, there are two of them: the main one at the bottom and the second sound source is ear speaker, but it is so weak that it has little effect on the overall sound picture. In general, the sound is typical for smartphones Xiaomi, that is, the smartphone sounds very, very good.
The sound through the headphones is good. I compare with my Redmi 6 Pro - Mi MAX 3 sounds more juicy.
Well, the rest of the functionality here is exactly the same as in most Xiaomi. Fast working fingerprint scanner, face recognition that can be turned on by going to the India region. Many dachiks, a compass, dual-band WiFi, a usable GPS / GLONASS, FM radio and, like a true Xiaomi, Mi MAX 3 does not have an NFC module. In general, no surprises.
CAMERAS
There was a little confusion with the cameras. After the presentation of the smartphone on many sites, the Sony IMX 363 sensor was indicated in the characteristics of the main camera. But I, and, as I understand it, other users have a camera with 12 + 5 MP sensors from Samsung and in hardware it is exactly the same camera as in Redmi Note 5 and Note 6 PRO.
What can you count on here? Good enough quality shots in normal lighting conditions. During the day, especially on the street, everything is fine. Pleasant color reproduction, decent detailing, smears are extremely rare. For those who like to experiment, there is an intelligent shooting mode. I tried to shoot at night - the result is not amazing, but also not frustrating, and if you put a Google camera here, the quality will be even better. I also made a control comparison under not very good lighting with Mi A2 and Redmi Note 6 Pro and got what I expected - Mi A2 is the leader here, it even has a slightly different color rendition and less noise. Well, the cameras MAX 3 and Note 6 PRO gave out the same quality, which is logical, given that their cameras are the same in characteristics.
Video. Here you can find FullHD 30 FPS, FullHD 60 FPS, 4K, and Slow Motion. Electronic stabilization is active only in FullHD mode - incl. at a shooting speed of 60 fps. In the video mode, everything is very good. Only 4K footage can be claimed. The fact that 4K stabilization does not work is okay, you can understand and forgive. But the quality of shooting itself is not the best here. artifacts periodically skip, the picture crumbles into pixels and jerks when shooting, especially when posting. In general, Xiaomi still needs to work on 4K, and this applies not only to the Mi MAX 3.
But you are waiting for me to talk about marriage. In general, I decided to test the front camera and nothing worked for me ... The front camera just doesn't work. I keep getting an error when trying to switch to the front camera. Of course the first thought is a glitch. But neither rebooting, nor resetting to factory settings, nor installing other camera applications helps - a constant mistake. Naturally, I started looking for similar cases on the network, but I did not find mass complaints about a non-working front-end. Among hundreds of pages discussing MAX 3 on the w3bsit3-dns.com forum, I met only 2 similar cases and I can assume that there was a small batch with a front camera marriage and I managed to run into it.
AUTONOMY
The battery here is huge - 5500 mAh. I performed the full discharge test when playing video twice - the first time on MIUI 9 and the smartphone worked for 13 hours and 30 minutes. The second time, for the sake of interest, I ran a similar test after updating to MIUI 10 and got a result of 14 hours 15 minutes. Yes, 10 is more energy efficient. Well, in general, this is certainly a long-lived smartphone, although it is inferior in autonomy to Mi MAX 2.
Fast charging showed the following figures: in 30 minutes. the battery gained 34%, in 1 hour - 64%, in 1.5 hours - 87% and this is a good speed considering the battery capacity.
VERDICT
Yes, inside it is the same Redmi Note 5 with increased storage reserves, and outwardly it is Mi A2, but in a larger size. A kind of overgrown hybrid. But there is nothing wrong with that. Many fans of huge screens have liked the Mi MAX 3. Some people switch to it from the second MAX and such an upgrade makes sense if Mi MAX 2 does not suit with cameras, aspect ratio or performance. In general, the huge shaitan-trumpet turned out to be great. But not in this particular case. Yes, buying from China is always a small lottery, which, although not often, brings unpleasant surprises.
Or not. In truth, I still cannot decide. On the one hand, a 6.44-inch smartphone is a great help in consuming any kind of content (videos, toys, books, websites), and on the other hand, a huge shovel that strives to slip out of your hands at any time. Already by the second day of operation, I relatively smoothly typed text on Mi Max with one hand using Swype (I usually use it) and without third-party help controlled the Twitter feed, but the feeling of concern that I was about to drop it still did not leave me ... This smartphone leaves very mixed and even somewhat contradictory impressions, but let's talk about everything in order.
The text may contain and most likely does contain grammatical, spelling, punctuation and other types of errors, including semantic errors. I ask readers in every possible way to point out these errors and correct me through private messages.
▌Technical Specifications
| Screen: | 6.44-inch IPS display with FHD (1920x1080) resolution; Corning GG 4 protective coating; 2.5D shape (rounding at the edges); oleophobic coating |
| Body materials: | metal backdrop with plastic inserts at the top and bottom |
| CPU: | six-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 (two Cortex-A72 cores 1.8 GHz and four cores Cortex-A53 1.4 GHz) / eight-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 652 (four cores Cortex-A72 1.8 GHz and four cores Cortex-A53 1.4 GHz) |
| Graphics: | Adreno 510 (600 MHz) |
| Operating system: | MIUI 7 on Android base 6.0 |
| RAM: | 3/4 GB |
| User memory: | 32/64/128 GB + the ability to install a memory card up to 128 GB instead of nanoSIM |
| Camera: | 16 MP (f / 2.0 aperture), autofocus, LED flash; front camera 5 MP, also f / 2.0, viewing angle 85 ° |
| Network support: | GSM / EDGE (850/900/1800 / 1900MHz), CDMA 1X / CDMA2000: BC0, WCDMA (850/900/1900 / 2100MHz), TD-SCDMA, FDD-LTE (Band 1/3/7), TDD-LTE (Band 38/39/40/41), two card slots (micro-SIM + nano-SIM, one radio module) |
| Wireless technologies: | Wi-Fi 802.11 a / b / g / n / ac (dual band: 2.4 and 5 GHz), Bluetooth 4.2, GPS / GLONASS / BDS, support for A-GPS, FM radio |
| Sensors: | fingerprint scanner, accelerometer, gyroscope, digital compass, distance and illumination |
| Additionally: | USB 2.0 microUSB port with USB-OTG support, fast charging using Quick Charge 3.0 technology, infrared port, 3.5 mm headset |
| Battery: | 4850 mAh, non-removable |
| Contents of delivery: | PSU (5 V, 2 A), USB cable, manual |
| Dimensions: | 173.1 x 88.3 x 7.5 mm |
| Weight: | 203 grams |
| Cost (official) | |
| Cost (real): | / / dollars |
Initially, Xiaomi announced 3 versions of the smartphone, which, in addition to the price tag and the amount of user memory, differed in a more productive platform in the two older versions and 4 GB of RAM in the top model for 1999 yuan ($ 300 at the time of publication). Later, the most budget-friendly version of the smartphone with 2 GB of RAM and 16 GB of user memory for ~ 190 dollars appeared on the virtual counters of Chinese trading platforms. For the test I got the younger version from the previously announced Max line, i.e. smartphone with Snapdragon 650 on board, 32 GB of user memory and 3 GB of RAM.
▌ How big is he!
The length of the smartphone is just over 17 centimeters. Right now, take a ruler in your hands and see how much it really is. For comparison, the dimensions of several popular smartphone models:
At the same time, Mi Max manages to more or less adequately lie in the hand. During operation, I either supported it with my little finger when working with the keyboard, or kept it closer to the middle of the case while flipping through the social tapes. networks. In most other situations, it was necessary to resort to the help of the second hand.
When typing, Swype comes in handy. even if you have not reached any extreme letter, it is very likely that AutoFit will insert it by itself. Therefore, there were no special problems with typing with one hand, with the exception of a slight jitter about the likelihood of dropping the smartphone when intercepting it. The programmed one-handed control mode somehow did not take root for me.
The appearance of the smartphone in the best traditions of Xiaomi: metal rear panel with plastic inserts at the ends, under which the antennas of the radio modules are located. There are three color variations to choose from: gray, silver and gold, which I got for the test. The backing on the front panel remains white in any case. It looks nice, but there are a few complaints about the design. Firstly, in the torsion test, the components of the smartphone noticeably loose. Fortunately, this fact does not affect the daily operation of the smartphone, but it is probably due to the thickness of the case, which is only 7.5 mm.
Secondly, the camera module protrudes outside the body. Yes, such a solution has already been repeatedly encountered in many smartphones, but Xiaomi designers made a fatal mistake by sinking the protruding rim against the glass. Thus, when the smartphone comes into contact with flat surfaces, the entire "blow" in the upper part falls on the glass covering the camera. After two weeks of use, the following picture can be observed:
Perhaps the sapphire crystal used in the notorious iPhones (covering the camera) would have saved the day, but who would put it in a $ 250 smartphone?
I can only say good things about the rear-panel fingerprint scanner, except for the fact that I'm not a fan of this arrangement. The speed of the sensor even in the most budgetary representatives of the Redmi line is simply excellent, and the number of recognition errors is minimal. In addition, I like the shape, size of the scanner and its location in a noticeable depression, which they cannot boast of.
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There is only one multimedia speaker at the bottom end, and a spoken microphone is hidden behind the second grill. The quality of speech transmission raises no objections, but the dynamics lacks volume and low frequencies... The use of MicroUSB instead of USB Type-C, as it were, hints at a certain budget of the device, since the company is gradually introducing a new interface connector into older series smartphones.
The function keys on the right side do not play and have a noticeable tactile response. Above unchanged: audio output and IR transmitter. The tray on the left side is combined: micro-SIM and a choice of nano-SIM or microSD.
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Considering that we have a multimedia device, saving on the display would look like blasphemy on the part of Xiaomi. However, this did not happen, the Mi Max has an excellent IPS matrix in all respects with a brightness adjustment range from 2 to 631 cd / m2 and a contrast ratio of 936 to 1. The display is readable in the sun and does not blind your eyes in the dark. The only but - a weak oleophobic coating in comparison with the one I have been on the test recently.
Many reviewers complained about the black bezels framing the display, but for all the time I used it, I still did not understand what was wrong with that. They are absolutely not striking in the eyes, and with a dark screen saver they look great at all, illusory expanding the space occupied by the display. But how many people, so many opinions.
The protective coating of the display after 2 weeks of using the smartphone without a cover and films remained pristine, despite the fact that before me the smartphone had been tested in a different edition. The question about the origin of the coating remains open, since on the official Chinese website the model of this is not indicated, but on the Indian one about the use of Gorilla Glass 3. Some foreign ones even replicate information about Gorilla Glass 4.
▌ In a good way surprised by the gaming performance
The Snapdragon 650 chipset was originally conceived as a budget solution with the name Snapdragon 618, but was later promoted in rank and there is a logical explanation for that. The fact is that in terms of performance, it is in no way inferior and even slightly surpasses the Snapdragon 808, which other companies installed in their flagship smartphones last year.
The Snapdragon 650 SoC features four energy-efficient Cortex-A53 cores clocked at up to 1.4 GHz and two high-performance Cortex-A72 cores clocked at 1.8 GHz. Snapdragon 652, installed in the older versions of Xiaomi Mi Max, is complemented by two more high-performance cores, which, according to the test results, brings it closer to the top SoC of last year - Snapdragon 810.
The first image shows the overall performance of the SoC, and the second shows the performance of the GPU.
Additional tests in comparison with the devices that have previously been in my hands:
| Phone / Benchmark | ||||
| Xiaomi Mi Max (Snapdragon 650) | 17902 | 8,8 | 1544 / 3680 | 77959 |
| Xiaomi Mi Max Pro(Snapdragon 652) | - | - | 1521 / 4443 | 83272 |
| 14801 | 4 | 890 / 4836 | 55209 | |
| 8557 | 5,8 | 635 / 2825 | 34009 | |
| 19594 | 12 | 991 / 2990 | 47075 | |
| 19564 | 9,9 | 1241 / 3222 | 50610 | |
| Xiaomi Mi 5 (Snapdragon 820) | 29891 | 30 | 2319 / 5507 | 131142 |
Despite the comparable results of the graphics performance tests of the 808 (Adreno 418, 128 stream processors, 600 MHz) and 650 (Adreno 510, unknown number of stream processors, 600 MHz) chips, in practice the latter turned out to be victorious. For example, take WoT: Blitz... The ceiling for Xiaomi Mi 4c and 4s was medium graphics settings, and in order to achieve stable 60 frames per second, HD textures had to be turned off additionally. In my review of Mi 4c, I complained about the poor optimization of the game for this SoC, but after six months nothing has changed. Meanwhile, Snapdragon 650 allows you to launch tanks with maximum graphics settings, while fps is kept at 50-60 and sags by a maximum of 10 frames in scenes with a lot of action or in aiming mode.
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In a shooter Unkilled at maximum graphics settings, we have stable 40 frames per second without decreasing fps in action scenes. WWR(network battles of robots) limits the maximum number of fps to 30, and in scenes with high weapon activity, the rate of frames per second can drop to an unpleasant 18-20. In the latter case, it is the optimization problem that is evident, since the situation is similar on smartphones with Snapdragon 820.
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In all tested games, the processor load did not exceed 30%, and the maximum number of fps was limited by the performance of the graphics subsystem, which was fully loaded almost all the time. So, when choosing a smartphone, lovers of mobile gaming, I advise first of all to pay attention to the performance of the graphics subsystem, and not to the total number of points in popular synthetic tests.
Under continuous high load, the body of the smartphone did not heat up above 40 degrees. No noticeable throttling was noticed, which is also confirmed by the GFXBench stability test.
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At the start of the system, about 1500 MB (out of 3!) Of RAM is allocated for the needs of the user, and only 24.3 GB of the declared 32 GB is available for the user. To expand disk space by installing microSD up to 128 GB, you will have to sacrifice a second SIM card.
From the point of view of telephone functionality, the smartphone works well: the earpiece is loud and of high quality, the vibration signal is felt in the pockets of the trousers, both the first and the second SIM can work in the 3G / 4G network. FM radio works only with connected headphones, which act as an antenna.
▌Hemorrhoids with flashing cannot be avoided
Since the publication of the material, nothing has changed. The smartphone comes from Gearbest with partially localized firmware, which is characterized by increased consumption of RAM and low stability. For the monitored version of Xiaomi Mi Max, the official MIUI is available with full localization, Google services Play and support for OTA updates. The release for the older modifications is scheduled for August.
Unfortunately, the presence of the official Global-firmware does not simplify the process of replacing the software in any way. The most adequate instructions for switching from custom Chinese MIUI to the official one are on the English-speaking forum. For testing purposes, I used (Russian) to install MIUI 8 Beta from multirom.me, but with this approach, you will lose the ability to update the firmware over the air, which is important for the beta version.
▌ Autonomy
The battery with a capacity of 4850 mA * h in a fairly intensive operation mode will last for 6-7 hours of screen operation or 2-3 days. Heavy use means intermittent GPS activity, Wi-Fi operation alternating with 3G, Bluetooth for pairing with Pebble watch. The brightness level of the screen is automatically adjusted. About 10-20 minutes a day falls on World of Tanks: Blitz, which I use as a benchmark for gaming performance. Calls are no more than 5-10 minutes a day, I don't use SMS either. Basically network connectivity, messengers, social. networking and surfing.
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The Mi Max comes with a regular 5V charger with 2A current, and a full charge from 0 to 100% takes about 3 hours and 45 minutes. In addition, the smartphone supports fast charging technology, which for some reason is not mentioned on the official Xiaomi website.
When trying to charge a smartphone from the complete charger LeEco Le Max 2 with support for QC 3.0 technology, the charging time of the smartphone was reduced by only 45 minutes, which means that the capabilities of the charger capable of delivering 24 W of energy for a long time are far from being 100% used. Unfortunately, I did not have a tester capable of working with QC 3.0 at hand, and the one that was available, according to the passport, is able to measure voltages in the range of 3-7 Volts.
▌Cameras at the level of the latest generation of smartphones in the Redmi line
And that's basically all that can be said about them. They shoot well during the day, and badly in the evening. The rear camera is represented by a 16-megapixel sensor covered with an f / 2.0 aperture lens. The front camera is 5 MP, the aperture is the same, and the viewing angle is 85 °. Examples of shots in different conditions: this link.
In MIUI 8, Xiaomi has messed up the camera app. The HDR-mode activation button, which was previously in place of the current "Modes" for some reason, was moved to the top of the screen, and even made a drop-down button. Those. If you, like me, want to use HDR periodically and on your own, you will have to resort to second hand to expand the drop-down menu and activate HDR. The flash activation was moved to the same place, and the filter selection key was put in its place.
The Chinese designers have a very strange vision of the user-friendly interface of the camera application.
▌Results
Xiaomi Mi Max is perhaps one of a kind productive with an adequate price tag. My short search did not find any serious competitors for this smartphone. The same Sony Xperia The Z Ultra is already quite outdated in terms of performance, and the camera in it initially did not shine with results, the Lenovo Phab Plus, with a comparable price tag, is also inferior in performance, and it certainly cannot be handled with one hand. LeTV One Max boasts a slightly more productive platform, but it is much inferior in terms of autonomy, and it is not clear what it has with the availability and software. The relatively fresh Sony Xperia C5 Ultra dual can also be attributed to competitors, but give money similar to Mi Max for the display? No, if you please.
As practice has shown, the difference between 5.7 and 6.44-inch smartphones is very noticeable after active use of the latter for 2 weeks. When I picked up a 5.7-inch, I first of all thought about a 5, well, 5.2-inch display and I'm afraid to imagine my feelings if right after Mi Max I got some device with a display up to 5 ". I was able to get used to such a diagonal and take advantage of its advantages, but not the fact that you will succeed, therefore, I recommend that you first familiarize yourself with the device live.
Finally, I do not recommend taking the version with 2 GB of RAM. Now there is so much RAM for MIUI, but you haven't been looking after a smartphone for a couple of months?
What we liked
- The cost
- Performance, particularly gaming
- Excellent autonomy
- Display with good dimming range
- smart fingerprint scanner, support for fast charging technology QC 3.0
What did not like
- Backlash in the torsion test that protrudes beyond the frame safety glass rear camera
- Difficulties with flashing, so necessary for the full use of the device
- Weak oleophobic coating
What would I like
- NFC support
- Separate memory card slot
- QC 3.0 Charger in the standard delivery set
▌Related Links
Twitter. On my website, I duplicate my own publications from all over the Internet, so too. Thanks for attention!