64GB Xiaomi Mi Pad 2 sells out in under a minute

Last month, the Xiaomi Mi Pad 2 was unveiled. The 7.9-inch slate was originally offered with 16GB of native storage, powered by Android. This model is priced at 999 Chinese Yuan, or $156 USD. This morning, at 10 am sharp in China, Xiaomi released the 64GB variant of the tablet which is offered with Android, or Windows 10 inside. Both models are priced at 1299 Chinese Yuan, or $203 USD.

If you weren't quick enough to score a 64GB Mi Pad 2, the bad news is that the tablet is now sold out in that configuration. It took less than a minute for all of the inventory to be sold in a flash sale. There were a few complaints made to the company's Tablet page on Weibo, but there isn't much that can be done except to wait for the company to churn out more units.

In case you haven't had time to study the specs, the Xiaomi Mi Pad 2 keeps the 7.9-inch screen employed on the original Mi Pad, and even the 1536 x 2048 resolution is the same. Instead of the Tegra K1, which powered the OG model, the sequel has the Intel Atom X5-Z8500 chipset under the hood, with a quad-core 2.2GHz CPU. 2GB of RAM is inside along with 64GB of native storage. An 8MP camera is on back featuring an f/2.0 aperture, and the 5MP front-facing camera handles selfies and video chats. A 6190mAh battery powers the unit, and the slate features a Type-C USB port. Fast charging allows you to top off the battery quickly.

The quick sellout of the 64GB Mi Pad 2 will surely lead to the old glass half full/half empty game. Some will say that exceptional demand led to the quick sell out, while others will say that Xiaomi didn't produce enough units. Regardless of the reason behind it, the headlines say that the 64GB version of the Mi Pad 2 is sold out and that will look good for the company, which has uncharacteristically stumbled around a bit this year.

The 64GB Xiaomi Mi Pad 2 launched today, and sold out in less than a minute

Xiaomi Mi 3, Mi 4 and Mi Note to Soon get Updated with Android 6.0 Marshmallow

Xiaomi will be soon releasing the Android 6.0 Marshmallow updates for a few of its devices including Xiaomi Mi 4, Mi Note and Mi 3. According to the MIUI operations manager, the update seems to be in the final stages of testing and will see the light soon.

This was an update that many were waiting for with bated breath and with this update Xiaomi will join a handful of other phone manufacturers who have already updated their phones with the Marshmallow. The update seems to have in fact reached the update validation stage which means that it might start seeding pronto.

Many Xiaomi users were dejected when the company still stuck to the age old Android KitKat 4.4 even after releasing the MIUI 7 ROM, but Xiaomi contradicted the apprehension saying that the base version of the OS wouldn’t matter as the features in MIUI 7 would be same. This is indeed a legit argument but it sort of loses its steam as some of the apps from the Playstore run only on the Android Lollipop and newer versions.

Now it seems that the phones will be directly updated to the Android Marshmallow. The update is currently in Beta stage, post which it will hit the developer version and finally it will shape up as a stable OTA update, the entire process will take some time. We still aren’t sure if the update is coming for international users as well, or just the Chinese users for now.

We would suggest the novice users to wait for the stable version as the Beta is susceptible to bugs and other malfunctions which might ultimately affect your phones functionality. On the other hand if you won’t mind getting your hands dirty and experiment along with the device, the beta update is for you. We shall be posting more details as and when they become. Stay tuned.

Samsung Galaxy S7 To Get Pressure Sensitive Screen, Faster Charging Port, Says WSJ

In the cut-throat battle for smartphone buyers in increasingly saturated global marketsit’s become a game of clones for device makers.

To wit: Samsung is set to take a leaf out of Apple’s playbook for the next iteration of its flagship Galaxy smartphone. According to the WSJ — quoting “people familiar with the matter” — the Galaxy S7 will have a pressure sensitive display when it launches next spring.

This follows Apple rolling out its own pressure sensitive 3D Touch tech on the iPhone 6S, its current flagship, this fall. The tech brings an additional interaction layer to the iPhone, allowing users to press down harder to preview and view content — i.e. without having to tap multiple times.

Apple’s new, more sensitive touchscreen tech didn’t emerge out of a vacuum; rather Cupertino tested a similar tech on its Apple Watch wearable first, although the smartphone incarnation of the technology is billed as more sophisticated (hence having a fancier moniker; 3D Touch vs Force Touch).

The 3D Touch advantage represents a pretty marginal hardware gap right now vs Android devices, with relatively few iOS apps having had chance to make especially interesting use of the tech. Even so Samsung clearly can’t rest on its laurels.

Indeed, we’ve seen the exact same hardware feature catch-up race played out when Apple added a fingerprint reader to the iPhone 5S, back in September 2013 — with Samsung going on to put a fingerprint scanner on its flagship device thefollowing spring.

Albeit, on the software side, Apple is frequently accused of appropriating features from Android and adding them years later to iOS. See: Game of clones.

The WSJ’s sources also reckon Samsung will be adding a new high-speed charging USB Type-C port to the forthcoming flagship line, set to be added to both the Samsung Galaxy S7 and the S7 Edge (aka Samsung’s curved screen variant). This port will apparently support delivering a full day’s charge in under 30 minutes — or even significantly less. So even faster than the current fast-charging feature offered by Samsung devices such as the S6.

If true that’s a pretty significant addition. Apple just launched a $99 battery case — a not-so-tacit admission that people struggle with smartphone battery life as it stands. The S7 offering a very fast charge could therefore be a very popular feature — and one which steals a march on current iPhone hardware.

The S7 is also set to include an improved camera optimized for low light photography and with hardware that is flush with the back of the phone, rather than a lens that bulges out, according to the WSJ’s sources. Camera tweaks are pretty much a given with smartphone flagships since they are most people’s daily shooter nowadays, and photo sharing continues to be massively popular.

Other possible additions for the S7 line include a retina scanner, and the return of an external memory card slot (in the S7, not the S7 Edge), according to the newspaper’s sources. Samsung ditched the micro SD card slot when it redesigned the flagships last year — a decision that earned it plenty of blowback from the Android community, as did its decision to ditch removable batteries. So again adding a faster charging feature may help throw those disgruntled folk a bone.

The S7 is slated to launch in the U.S. in mid March, with its unveiling, like last year, due around the Mobile World Congress tradeshow — at the end of February.

We’ve reached out to Samsung for comment and will update this article with any response. The company recently reshuffled the leader of its mobile division — the first significant management change since Lee Jae Yong assumed the vice chairmanship of Samsung Group from his father last year.

In recent times Samsung’s mobile business has struggled to compete with Apple at the high end while also being squeezed on profits by fierce competition at the lower end from the likes of China’s Xiaomi.

Xiaomi’s 15.6” Notebook To Cost Less Due To Older CPU & GPU

Xiaomi is, first and foremost, a smartphone manufacturer. This company tends to dabble in pretty much anything tech-related, and they will release their first notebook soon. Inventec has already confirmed that they’re working on (one of) the company’s notebook, and that the device is expected to arrive in April next year. Well, Inventec is working on one of the company’s notebooks, but three different ones have been mentioned, the 12.5, 13.3 and 15.6-inch models. Inventec is working on the 12.5-inch model, while Compal is rumored to be working on the 13.3-inch variant. The 15.6-inch notebook is the most interesting one here, read on.


The specifications of the 15.6-inch Xiaomi notebook have surfaced a while back, and according to that report, the device will sport a 15.6-inch 1080p (1920 x 1080) display, 8GB of RAM and will be powered by Intel’s Core i7 4th-generation SoC. Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 760M GPU is said to be included in this package as well, and Linux will reportedly going to come pre-installed here. On top of all this, the notebook is rumored to cost 2,999 Yuan ($466), which doesn’t seem all that expensive for this notebook. In order to keep the price at bay, Xiaomi is going to use the Core i7 SoC from the fourth-gen Haswell series, while the current sixth-gen Skylake chips probably are not going to be included in any variant of Xiaomi’s notebook. The Nvidia GeForce GTX 760M GPU is also not the newest graphics card, this GPU was released back in 2013.

Now, this notebook will be quite capable despite somewhat older components, the 4th-gen Core i7 SoC is still plenty powerful, and same can be said about the aforementioned GPU. Xiaomi simply had to do this in order to keep the price of this notebook down, which is always one of their main priorities. It is also rumored that Linux will come pre-installed here because Xiaomi wanted to avoid Windows because of licensing fees which would increase the price of the product. That’s pretty much it, keep in mind that this info is based on rumors, only the 12.5-inch variant of the device has been confirmed this far.