Entertainment
Xiaomi Redmi 5 Pro: Hard to beat this value-for-money smartphone (Tech Review)
By Krishna SinhaChaudhury
New Delhi, Feb 21 (IANS) After shaking up the highly competitive Indian smartphone market, especially in the last two quarters of 2017, Chinese handset maker Xiaomi has kick-started the new year with two devices — Redmi Note 5 and Redmi Note 5 Pro.
While Redmi Note 5 is essentially a successor to last year’s immensely-popular Redmi Note 4, the “Pro” version is a more powerful device which is the world’s first to debut Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 636 chipset.
Redmi Note 5 Pro is also the first Xiaomi smartphone to come with the “Face Unlock” feature.
Both the smartphones have big shoes to fill as last year’s Redmi Note 4 became quite a game changer for Xiaomi, which sold over 9.6 million Note 4 devices last year.
Let us see what Note 5 Pro (4GB RAM and 64GB onboard storage variant which costs Rs 13,999) has to offer.
Weighing 181 grams, the device definitely is not light-weight, and it is sturdy enough to handle a few drops.
The front of the device is similar to its smaller sibling Redmi Note 5, with prominent curved corners on display with 18:9 aspect ratio for immersive video and gaming experience.
The slim bezels also makes the device sport a 5.99-inch full-HD+ display and occupy a smaller footprint when in the palm.
The display of Note 5 Pro was bright and punchy with good sunlight legibility.
A 20MP selfie camera with an aperture of f/2.2, selfie light flash, face-recognition feature and other sensors and earpiece are placed above the display, while on-screen navigation buttons sit below.
The front camera did a good job of clicking selfies with enough detail in daylight conditions. The selfie light it uses is essentially diffused white light, which also helped capture selfies in very low-light conditions.
The metal rear with matte finish makes it look like the Redmi Note 4. The slightly curved back metal body is done in typical Xiaomi style.
The fingerprint sensor was comfortable to use while holding the phone and authentication was fast.
The design language of the rear camera, with 12MP+5MP sensors, has been borrowed from the Apple iPhone X.
The primary camera is pretty capable and we shot some stunning images with the device in daylight conditions. The dual camera is one of the biggest USPs of this smartphone.
A hefty 4,000mAh battery fuels Redmi Note 5 Pro that easily lasted us almost two days, with moderate to slightly heavy usage, including browsing videos and running multiple social media apps.
The 4GB RAM variant did not show signs of warming albeit for a few gaming instances.
What does not work?
The primary camera’s performance was good although we found the portrait shots were less neat than what we saw with the Xiaomi Mi A1 (Rs 14,999).
It is disappointing to see Xiaomi ship Redmi Note 5 Pro with Android 7 Nougat Operating System (OS) while the latest Android “Oreo” OS is in high demand.
The phone’s ultra-wide display makes it a bit difficult to handle with one hand.
The rear camera module’s visible protrusion makes the device wobbly when placed on a flat surface.
The device also lacks a USB Type-C charging port.
Conclusion: The good battery performance and improved cameras give Redmi 5 Pro an edge over its rivals such as Honor 9i in the market. The smartphone is for the people who are looking for a high-performance device with ample battery life.
(Krishna SinhaChaudhury can be contacted at [email protected])
–IANS
ksc/na/sac
International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.
Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.
The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.
Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile
The primary data samples analysed by Casino Days reveal that mobile connections dominate the market in South Asia and are responsible for a whopping 96.6% of gaming sessions, while computers and tablets have negligible shares of 2.9% and 0.5% respectively.
The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.
“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.
Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings
Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).
Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.
The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.
Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.
Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities
The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.
On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.
Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.
“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.
The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.
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