A new render of the Xiaomi Mi 5 reveals the company's first smartphone will have a physical home button, confirming that the upcoming flagship won't come with Qualcomm's UltraSonic Fingerprint Scanner.
An image of the handset has been making rounds on the Internet, and it shows how the phone might look like, but the new render that surfaced gives a better look of the smartphone's front.
According to analyst Pan Jiutang, Qualcomm's scanner is still unstable to be used. That's why the smartphone maker opted for a traditional reader instead, which could be positioned below the new home button.
In comparison, ultrasonic scanner variants are deemed to be better because they do not need buttons or sensors to function, not to mention that they can be placed under a device's screen. Also, fragments of dirt won't affect their performance, whereas traditional ones might stop working properly because of foreign particles.
The Xiaomi Mi 5 is reportedly going to sport a 5.2-inch display with a 1,440 x 2,560 resolution and support Force Touch or 3D Touch pressure sensitive technology. It's expected to have Qualcomm's Snapdragon 820 SoC under the hood.
In terms of memory, the smartphone will have 4 GB worth of RAM and 64 GB of internal storage. As for the OS, it's expected to have Android 6.0 Marshmallow out of the box.
The recently emerged render of the Xiaomi Mi 5 comes with a tentative premiere date of Jan. 21, which is about the same time that the Snapdragon 820 officially rolls out. Also, it's believed that the device's release date will be sometime the following month.
What this entails is that we might be able to see what the flagship can really bring to the table in a few weeks' time and get our hands on it after a few more weeks.
Two versions of the Xiaomi Mi 5 will hit the shelves, where one is roughly $311 and a bigger Xiaomi Mi 5 Plus will cost around $389.
