Xiaomi Mi 3 Review: A Smartphone That's Bound To Make You Love it

Rating:

4.0/5

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PROS

• Impressive Build
• Refreshing UI
• Value for Money Smartphone

CONS

• Lacks microSD support
• No 4G
• Only 16GB Internal Memory

Xiaomi Mi 3 Review: Processor and Benchmark

This is the part that interested us the most (apart from the whole MIUI thing). Apparently, Xiaomi has somehow managed to cram in whatever you would find in a flagship from the last year into a handset that essentially falls in the budget category.

The specs list for the Mi 3 handset shows a Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 SoC with four Krait 400 CPU cores running at 2.3GHz and an Adreno 330 GPU. While we are still wondering how that's even possible and praising the Chinese for their vision, the basic word here is that we have quite a powerful handset on our hands.

On a similar note, while we have heard a few complain about how each of these specs are a bit lesser than most of the top tier smartphones, but you have to understand the differences are mostly inconsequential when you start using it one a day to day level.

But then again, there are advantages of a phone arriving with as popular a GPU as the Xiaomi Mi3's Adreno 330. And the popularity is present since the GPU comes as an extra benefit for all the top graphical games that you might want to play on the handset.

Not being too technical here, but with a GPU as such, expect extra graphical effect you don't get from a lesser GPU. There're also more reflections, more lighting effects that make the handset seem like a top end phone running a top end game.

Gaming is usually excellent on the Xiaomi Mi3 too. The device's large, sharp, vibrant screen is as if it has only been made for gaming, with no real complaint in terms of performance.

However, there are limitations to everything. And the only real "limitation" that you might see is in terms of internal storage. For some reason or the other, the Mi 3 lacks an external microSD slot. And with so much power and performance at your disposal, it's a real shame that you can't increase the memory.

The phone offers storage that's limited to 16GB (around 13GB of it is user-accessible). Xiaomi does sell a 64GB model internationally as well, but it was not offered in India at launch time. However, we have a hope that the 64GB model will soon come around. And if the company maintains its current pricing policies, we are expecting similar popularity for the model.