Xiaomi RedMi Note 3 Launches In India

The Redmi Note 3 boasts of a couple of “firsts” for the company: we compare it to it’s predecessor.

Xiaomi, the Chinese mega brand launched the Xiaomi Redmi Note 3, its first product of 2016 today. Aimed at the Indian market, this phablet seems to be quite an upgrade from the Redmi Note 2.

The Redmi Note 3 boasts of a couple of “firsts” for the company: an all-metal device construct and a much awaited fingerprint sensor.

The Redmi Note 3 comes in two variants — the 16 GB storage with 2 GB RAM version is priced at INR 9,999 and the other, a 32 GB storage and 3 GB RAM variant is priced at INR 11,999. The price tag on the devices establishes them as budget smartphones, however given Xiaomi’s history, expect the phones to bring a lot of goodies despite the austere prices.

The Redmi Note 3 comes with a 5.5 inches, full-HD IPS display, making the phone just big enough to be comfortable for single-hand use. It runs on a six-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 processor and uses Redmi’s own custom interface on top of the Android 5.0 Lollipop operating system.

Major talking points (you should read our detailed write up for the device for more information) include:

• All-metal sandblasted textured unibody that has just the right amount of curves to be grippy, yet contoured;
• Fingerprint scanner
• Whopping 4050 MAh battery, fast charging (50% capacity in an hour),
• Supports Voice Over LTE
• Dual SIM with the second SIM slot also playing the role of an SD card slot

It sports a 5 megapixel front camera and has a 15 megapixel rear camera, with Face Detection Autofocus (PDAF) and a two-tone flash, which is good for a device in this range as most devices in the range are offering a 12 megapixel camera with an LED flash. The camera with an aperture of f/2.0 might not perform under low-light conditions. The phone has a full metal body with rounded edges and sports a round fingerprint scanner on the rear of the phone, just below the camera predictable in terms of the scanner placement.

In comparison to the Note 2, there has been an upgrade in almost everything, from the camera, the battery to the screen resolution, and of course the processor. The phone also brings some useful features, one being a reading mode. The feature allows the display to shift to a yellow hue (reducing the blue light) for nighttime use, a feature introduced recently in the Apple ecosystem via iOS 9.3. It has child lock feature which allows you to hide apps while selecting ones to be visible in addition to the app locks that can then be opened by the user fingerprint in addition to be able to create hidden folders on the phone.

The device had made a global debut in November last year. Its international review has been favourable; given that it’s a budget phone, some, however, of course, disagree. With competitors such as Huawei Honor 6, Lenovo K4 Note and the LeEco Le 1s (a new entrant in the Indian market space), the phone will be looking at major competition. In terms of competition from major brands like Samsung, Motorola, LG and Microsoft, the phone has a lot of ground covered since it is offering a more than they do, in the said price range, however specifically for the Indian market, the comparatively newer “Chinese brand” that Xiaomi is, might bring credibility and trust issues of its own, based solely on perception.

On the looks of it, the device seems like it has got it all, and seems to have upgraded drastically from the Note 2, however, it might face some hiccups. The phone runs on MIUI 7 based on Android 5.0 Lollipop, so when will gets the Android 6.0 Marshmallow update, or the equivalent remains unknown and this might make a few people curl their lips, since devices have started to seed Android 6.0 Marshmallow. Here is the moment to consider, most devices that have moved onto Android 6.0 Marshmallow are device in the upper price bracket.

Another hiccup for the phone could be its processor, the Snapdragon 650. Qualcomm has itself had a rough last year with Snapdragon 810 and Snapdragon 615, suffering at the flagship as well as the mid-segment end of the market . The Snapdragon 650 is relatively untested and might make people a little apprehensive, the review, however, so far, has been good.

With the good reviews from the International market, and with features it has to offer at a budget price, with Xiaomi’s device construct credibility, the phone is expected to do well in the market. The phone is available on Amazon India from March 9th for purchase against a pre-order, and then will also be available on Snapdeal, Flipkart and offline partners going forward.

Originally published at Chip-Monks.