A large-scale new product launch held by Xiaomi of China for two consecutive days. On the second day, various smart home products such as stationary air conditioners and high-performance humidifiers, including the foldable machine “Mi MIX FOLD”, which is the first commercially available smartphone made by the company, and electric vehicles (EV) It was a lot of things, such as giving notice of entry.
One of the announcements that the fans who went to the venue cheered was the two models of the new notebook PCs “Mi Notebook Pro 15” and “Mi Notebook Pro 14”.
The Mi Notebook Pro is the highest-ranking series of notebook PCs made by the same company, and as is clear from the main body design, it is positioned as a direct competitor to the Apple MacBook Pro. The former is positioned at about 1.8 kg on a 15-inch / aspect ratio 16:10 screen, and the latter is positioned at about 1.5 kg on a 14-inch / aspect ratio 16:10 screen. At first glance, it looks like a mobile notebook, but it’s actually heavier than that.
Both models were announced for China, and since the company’s PC is not currently sold in Japan, it is not relevant to Japanese users in that sense, but it can be noticed conceptually and technically. There is a point.
The reason is that it is likely to be the driving force behind the “organic EL shift” of notebook PCs and higher refresh rates other than gaming PCs.
Details will be described later,The Pro 15 is equipped with an organic EL screen with a resolution of 3456 x 2160 and an aspect ratio of 16:10 at a price starting from about 109,700 yen. Pro 14 also uses an LCD screen with 2560 x 1600 resolution / 16:10 / maximum 120Hz for about 89,450 yen.
Both series are configured with so-called Office (Microsoft Office Home and Student pre-installed).
In other words, these two models are likely to significantly lower the threshold of expensive organic EL and high-speed LCDs, which have been rarely adopted in notebook PCs so far-and are likely to affect rival makers. ..
Xiaomi smartphones these days have come to strongly appeal the usability and image quality of the display panel, but these two models are also competing with notebook PCs (although they are occurring, but not as active as smartphones). It may cause you to wake up.
The price of Pro 15 starts from RMB 6499 with a basic configuration of Core i5-11300H / GPU built-in / RAM 16GB / SSD 512GB. If you simply convert it to Japanese yen, it will be about 109,700 yen. And it should be noted that the organic EL panel will be installed even in this basic configuration.
Also, I would like to pay attention to the fact that the price difference is small, at 7999 RMB (about 135,000 yen) even in the highest configuration. However, there is a reason for this, and the actual configuration is Core i7-11370H / GeForce MX450 / RAM 16GB / SSD 512GB. In other words, the specifications that cause price differences in general notebook PCs such as RAM and SSD do not change, and the only enhancements are the CPU grade and the installation of a single GPU.
The price of Pro 14 is 5299 RMB (about 89,450 yen) in the basic configuration and 6999 RMB (about 118,140 yen) in the top configuration. The configuration of CPU, RAM, SSD is the same as Pro 15.
And the hidden point is that it is equipped with 16GB of RAM common to all Pro 15/14 grades. Even in this class of models, there is no 8GB configuration as well as a 4GB RAM configuration that comes out if you are not careful (however, it is regrettable that there is no 32GB configuration these days).
Furthermore, the CPU is equipped with the latest “Tiger Lake-H35” series among Intel’s 11th generation Core i. While the TDP value (a measure of heat generation and power consumption) is as high as 35W (28-35W to be exact), the processing speed is faster than the Tiger Lake UP3 with TDP 15-28W used in general mobile notebook PCs. It is a model.
In addition, GeForce MX450 is also installed as a single GPU in each higher configuration, further improving the graphics speed. In the first place, the built-in GPU of Tiger Lake-H35 is still high-speed Iris Xe graphics as a built-in CPU, but it is further strengthened by installing MX450.
However, the GPU is not for games because it has a difficult performance for the latest generation FPS games (especially Pro 14 is often mistaken for a 120Hz screen).
On the other hand, the type of installed memory is likely to be behind in terms of performance. Both Pro 15/14 are equipped with DDR4-3200 equivalent to 3200MHz. Since it is slower than LPDDR4X-4266 (equivalent to 4266MHz) which is common in Tiger Lake-equipped PCs, it seems to be disadvantageous compared to rival machines in terms of graphics speed with built-in GPU.
By the way, regarding the screen specifications of Pro 15 that are attracting attention, in a good sense, the numbers are lined up like high-end smartphones.
First of all, the fluorescent material (which practically indicates the generation of organic EL panels) is Samsung Display (SDI) E4 generation. Therefore, the Xiaomi side calls it “E4 OLED”. This corresponds to the latest generation of organic EL panels sold outside by SDI.
In addition, regarding the overall display quality centered on HDR, it passes the “DisplayHDR 500 True Black” certification specified by VESA. The maximum brightness, which is important for HDR video sources, is also as high as 600 nits.
The color gamut covers 100% of DCI-P3, and the color difference (color accuracy) is within Delta E ≈ 1, which is very excellent for a notebook PC. Furthermore, it is appealing that color calibration (color calibration) is performed for each unit at the time of shipment.
And the resolution is 3456 x 2160 and the aspect ratio is 16:10. The long side is not enough for 4K, but the short side has the same resolution as 4K ….
The maximum contrast is 1 million to 1 like organic EL, and the maximum brightness is 600 nits, which is also a high level for a notebook PC. Of course, the design is a four-sided narrow bezel, and the width of the left and right bezels is 3.6 mm. The screen occupancy rate is still very high, reaching 93%.
On the other hand, the color gamut of the Pro 14 LCD is 100% sRGB, the standard brightness is 300 nits, and the maximum contrast is 1000: 1, which is average. However, the refresh rate is up to 120Hz, the resolution is 2560 × 1600, the aspect ratio is 16:10, and the color difference is within delta E ≈ 1.5, which are quite excellent values.
Also, in terms of narrow bezel design, the left and right bezels are 4.3 mm and the screen occupancy is 88%, which is not as good as Pro 15, but it is quite excellent.
Other performance is also higher than the level of recent notebook PCs, and the battery capacity is 66Wh for Pro 15 and 56Wh for Pro 14, which are large even if you look at the level of recent times. The main body material is a unibody structure using aircraft grade aluminum alloy, which can be called the industry standard.
For security, it is equipped with a fingerprint authentication sensor that doubles as a power button, and the expansion terminal is equipped with a Thunderbolt 4 x 1 unit, a USB Type-C x 2 unit, and a 3.5 mm headset jack. It supports Wi-Fi 6 as well as wireless LAN.
Furthermore, the attached AC adapter seems to be Xiaomi in a good sense, and it is a model with specifications that are over-engineered for the main body, corresponding to the 100W output that is the upper limit of USB PD. This is a consideration so that it can be reused not only with the main unit but also with other USB PD devices.
In addition, Intel has acquired Evo platform certification. Consideration is also given to usability, which is important for everyday notebook PCs, such as returning to sleep at the same time as opening the lid and running on a battery for a long time.
As you can see, the Mi Notebook Pro 15/14 is a product that Xiaomi has put a lot of effort into creating a trend in laptop displays and prices. The exterior design gives a basic impression in many ways, but it is a model that seems to change the impression in a good way if you open it and look at the screen.
Regarding Pro 15, we are announcing the addition of a model equipped with AMD’s Ryzen 5000 H series scheduled for early May. This is a TDP 45W, which is even higher than the Tiger Lake-H35, but it has a large number of CPU cores and is highly evaluated as being worth more in terms of processing speed.
This is likely to attract more attention from heavy users, and I’m looking forward to it.
The launch in Japan is undecided, but to see the recent offensive on smartphones, I definitely want you to launch this as well.
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