Xiaomi Mi TV Q1 75” Review: Mini Home Theatre In Desperate Times

How Big Is A 75-inch TV?

It's big enough to offer a cinematic experience from the comfort of your living room. The Smart TV measures 1673.5 x 368.9 x 1029.9mm and weighs 33.3kg including the base stand. To put things in perspective, a 75-inch frame can house four 32-inch panels and two 55-inch TVs, it's that big. You should only buy a TV this big if your living room's wall or the cabinet table can accommodate the sheer size of the panel. More importantly, the sitting distance should be far enough (at least 7 to 11 feet) to offer a comfortable viewing experience. Otherwise, the big screen will give your eyes more stress than the cinematic viewing experience.

 

Xiaomi Mi TV Q1 75” Design And Aesthetics

The Mi TV Q1 75-inches is essentially an extension of the recently launched 55-inch Mi QLED TV. The 75-inch TV has the same design structure and overall aesthetics, but it is twice the size of the 55-inch QLED TV. The TV has an impressive 97% screen-to-body ratio, thanks to almost zero bezels on the top and either side; however, the bottom bezel is substantially thicker and flaunts the Mi branding at the center. The bottom bezel also has a microphone to allow for far-field voice commands.

These are diamond-cut aluminum frames with a sandblasted coating that gives the TV a premium look and feel. Overall, the Mi TV Q1 75" looks premium and has a solid build quality, two things we expect from a TV priced at INR 1.2 lacs.

Ports And Connectivity

The back panel of the TV is made out of plastic with a 60-40 proportion of matte and carbon fiber finish. The plastic quality is decent and seems long-lasting. The required connectivity ports are given on the left side in the regular two-sided L-shaped formation. The Mi TV Q1 75" has three HDMI 2.1 ports with one port offering the eARC Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM) support. There are two USB 2.0 ports one Ethernet/LAN ports with 100Mbps speed, one Optical port, and one 3.5mm headphone jack.

For wireless transmissions, the 75-inch TV has 2.4GHz/5.0GHz Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac (2x2 MIMO) and Bluetooth 5.0 support.

Beautifully Crafted Metal table Top Stand

Since it's a premium QLED TV, Xiaomi offers a newly designed sleek-looking metal table-top stand to hold the 75-inch frame. The aluminum alloy stand is centrally aligned and has a full-length base rather than two individual legs that are very common on smaller-sized TVs. It's a rather welcome change, both from the design perspective and also to fulfill the structural requirements of a big 75-inch panel.

Moving on, you can also wall-mount the TV but you will need a good quality mount to hold the unit. Once again, the wall-mount stand isn't included in the package which is disappointing at this price point.

Xiaomi Mi TV Q1 75” Panel Specifications

The gigantic 75-inch QLED has a 4K UHD resolution (3840 x 2160), a high 120Hz refresh rate, and also supports motion smoothening (MEMC)- Reality Flow 120. The QLED panel offers a full array of local dimming (192 zones) and has a contrast ratio of 10,000:1. For color reproduction, the 75-inch panel has a color gamut support of 100% NTSC and 95% DCI-P3. Xiaomi has also covered all major viewing formats- Dolby Vision, HDR10+, HDR10, and HLG. Lastly, the 75-inch also features 'Vivid Picture Engine' to further enhance the color reproduction.

Xiaomi Mi TV Q1 75” Picture Quality

If I have to sum up the picture quality in one word- I would call it 'Excellent'; however, you have to feed the right content to make the most out of this massive panel. The sheer size is complemented by vivid picture quality creating an immersive viewing experience for 4K and HDR content. The blacks are deeper, viewing angles are great and colors pop out well on the massive 75-inch panel.

95% DCI-P3 Colour Gamut, Gamma Settings, 120Hz Refresh Rate

There is a myriad of color settings that you must explore to find the suitable picture quality matching your taste. I settled down for the following settings for my viewing preference- Color temperature- User, Motion Smoothening- smooth, Color Space- BT.2020/Native (for a slight punchy color tone), Gamma- standard or bright (depending upon the available lighting in the room), and Noise reduction set to low.

You should set the color space to sRGB if you prefer a more realistic and natural color output. Also, disable the MEMC or keep it on low if you don't like the soap opera effect. It is worth mentioning that MEMC is not very well implemented on the Mi TV Q1 75".

Immersive Picture/Video Experience

Moving on, the TV is smart enough to detect the content format and enables the HDR10+ on the supported apps. "How to Train Your Dragon 2" looked simply amazing on the 75-inch panel. And the visually stunning 'Tales from the Loop' on Prime TV was a sheer treat to watch on the big TV. And not to forget the new 'Invincible' series on Prime Videos, which also makes for a stunning watch on the massive panel.

Adequate Brightness, Deep Blacks, And Excellent Contrast Levels

The 4K QLED panel produces bright pictures even in a well-lit space as the three-level Gamma settings come in handy. The panel offers adequate brightness, and deep blacks resulting in good contrast and impressive viewing angles, thanks to 192 zones of full array dynamic local dimming. That said, the good contrast ratio made it a treat to consume high-quality HDR content on Amazon Prime TV and Netflix; however, I did notice slight brightness fluctuations while watching HDR content on OTT apps. It is worth mentioning that the Mi QLED 55-inch missed on local dimming.

Moving on, the media streaming via the external drive also looked immersive. The darker scenes in some of the classics like Spider-Man, Lord of the Rings, etc. showed punchy colors and impressive details. The complex scenes (Flash Paradox) in the epic Justice League Snyder Cut looked mind-blowing. Also, the sheer size of the panel even made the 4:3 aspect ratio enjoyable.

Overall, the 75-inch 4K panel is a sheer treat to consume high-quality media content. Once you start watching something on the Xiaomi Mi TV Q1 75", it becomes extremely difficult to take your eyes off.

Xiaomi Mi TV Q1 75” Sound Quality

I am not entirely impressed with the sound quality of the Xiaomi Mi TV Q1 75". Despite featuring a pretty capable 30W (2 x 15W) stereo speaker setup with Dolby Audio support, the audio sounded a bit lackluster. I felt the need of attaching external sound support to make the most out of the big panel. While the sound produced is clean, it lacked depth and failed to create a truly cinematic experience, something a panel of this size demands. I had to connect my old yet reliable Bose speakers to create a theatre-like experience at home. One good thing about the sound delivery is peak volume adjustments. The TV intelligently controls the sound jumps and manages to keep the audio uniform.

Xiaomi Mi TV Q1 75” Hardware & Software Performance

The hardware-software performance is rather disappointing. The smart TV is powered by a MediaTek MT9611 quad-core CPU (Mali G52 MP2 GPU) and has 2GB RAM and 32GB eMMC storage. The smart TV runs on Android 10 and has Xiaomi's in-house PatchWall UI that offers content across all 25+ OTT apps across 16 languages. You can read more about the latest PatchWall in our Redmi 65-inch Smart TV review.

The UI navigation is sluggish and some apps seem to lack optimization. For instance, the Prime Videos app stopped playing the content every time I opened the picture settings from within the app via the dedicated 'Mi' button on the remote controller. The app also continued playing audio in the background despite shifting to other apps. Also, the smart TV lags big time when you try to multitask. App freezes and delayed response are a big issue on the Mi TV Qi 75.

Sluggish UI & Apps Lack Optimization

Even the most widely used apps such as YouTube and Prime Videos need optimization. I haven't experienced any such issues on Xiaomi's 32 and 55-inch TVs and even on the recently launched Redmi 65-inch TV. It seems the team at Xiaomi hasn't fully optimized the software for the big-screen since it's fairly new territory for the brand in the Indian market. I hope Xiaomi resolves these minor issues with future OTA updates.

Moving on, the smart TV supports hands-free voice commands but the feature seemed mostly gimmicky.. The built-in microphone mostly failed to recognize the voice to execute the commands. It can be a great feature for a big-screen entertainment hub but it is very poorly implemented on the 75-inch TV. The big screen TV also works with Alexa-powered devices. If you have an Echo smart speaker, you can directly talk to it and stream music or videos on the 75-inch panel.

Verdict

If you look at the big-screen QLED Smart TV market, the competition charges almost thrice and even four times what Xiaomi is asking for. The recently launched 65-inch Q90A Samsung Neo QLED is priced at Rs. 2,49,990 so you can expect the 75-inch variant to cost at least 3,75,000. Samsung's 2019 model- QA75Q80RAKXXL QLED is selling at a whopping Rs. 490,000. No doubt these options offer much better overall performance; the price-point makes all the difference.

Now you can either compromise on the size or the picture and audio quality. If the size is what matters most for you, the Mi TV Q1 75" is worth considering; however, the sluggish performance is quite disappointing What truly shines is the massive 4K panel, which is indeed capable of creating a true cinematic experience at the comfort of your living room. The audio performance could have been slightly better for the price but it is something you can overcome with a decent home audio setup.

I am expecting Xiaomi to address the performance issues with future OTA updates as the hardware-software optimization plays an equally important role for a good big-screen TV experience.

Overall, if a big 75-inch TV is what you are looking for, the Mi TV Q1 75" is worth considering. It is priced at INR 119,999 and will be available on Mi.com, Mi Home, and Flipkart.com starting 27th April, at 12 noon. You can avail of cashback offers up to INR 7,500 with HDFC debit and credit cards.