Talk about selling like hot cakes: the Xiaomi Mi Mix sold out just 10 seconds into its first flash sale. And you thought the Mi Note 2 record of 50 seconds was impressive.
The 6.4-inch bezel-less Mi Mix turned out to be an instant hit for consumers. But while the edgeless display is certainly an attention grabber, the handheld's success can be partly attributed to the company's decision to go with a ceramic unibody over the aluminum alloys that most of the recent premium flagships use.
The Mi Mix Ceramic Casing
For the most part, the Mi Mix is made up of ceramics. This includes the frame, back panel and buttons.
According to Xiaomi, the Mi Mix's ceramic composition makes it scratch-resistant against common materials. It scored an 8.5 on Mohs scale of hardness, which means that only materials as hard as — or harder than — Corundum (which comes in the form of ruby and sapphire) and diamond, can scratch it.
"Years of careful usage will hardly leave signs of dents and discoloration," Xiaomi elaborates on the Mi Mix's ceramic composition, which, when coupled with a bigger edgeless display, may prove to be a better selling point than the Mi Note 2's curved display.
The only real caveat of the Mi Mix is that it only comes in black. However, the color options don't seem to bother most consumers.
The official numbers on how many units were sold for each of the two handhelds are yet to be announced. The only basis for gauging consumer interest for both phones is the amount of time it took for them to get sold out, a metric at which the Mi Mix beats the Mi Note 2.
Under The Ceramic Hood
Another reason the Mi Mix turned out to be a huge hit is that it sports Qualcomm's latest SoC, the Snapdragon 821, which is a quad-core with two of its cores clocked at 2.35 GHz while the other two are at 2.16 GHz. The Snapdragon 821 is packed with an Adreno 530 GPU.
The Mi Mix comes in two configurations: a regular one that has 4 GB of RAM with 128 GB of UFS 2.0 storage, and an exclusive edition that comes with 6 GB of RAM and 256 GB storage. Aside from bigger RAM and storage, the exclusive edition also has a fingertip sensor and rear camera rimmed with 18K gold.
Speaking of cameras, the Mi Mix sports a dual-LED flash, f / 2.0 16 MP PDAF rear shooter that is capable of shooting 4K and 1080p videos at 30 fps and 720p at 120fps. It also features touch focus, geo-tagging, HDR, face detection and panorama.
For the selfie camera, the Mi Mix comes with a humble 5-megapixel one, which can capture 1080p videos. According to Xiaomi, while it's under the screen, the camera rotates together with the phone when users want to take a picture.
To power the 6.4-inch 2,040 x 1,080 IPS display, Xiaomi didn't hold back with the battery. The Mi Mix packs a 4,400 mAh battery that can last up to 13 hours when gaming and 256 hours while in sleep mode. With the Snapdragon 821 processor, the Mi Mix can be quickly recharged with Qualcomm's fast-charging technology using the USB Type-C port.
As for connectivity, the Mi Mix supports Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0 and LTE, and offers a dual-SIM setup. There's no microSD card slot for memory expansions.
Out of the box, both Mi Mix configurations will sport the MIUI 8.0, which is based on the Android 6.0 Marshmallow operating system. The regular configuration, 4 GB RAM/128 GB storage, comes with a $639 price tag while the special edition with its 6 GB RAM/256 GB storage and 18K gold is more than $100 pricier, at $749.
However, the Xiaomi Mi Mix's availability for the United States and other countries is still in question. The phablet is only currently available in China with no word on releases for other countries. Moreover, a Xiaomi executive previously came out say that a Mi Mix launch outside of China does not make sense.
While preorders can be placed Xiaomi's online store, all users really get is a notification window saying that the company will send an email once the device becomes available for the specified shipping address.
