Audiovisual UX Connectivity This is the Smartprix review of the Mi TV 5X. Our evaluation unit is the 55-inch model. Navigate this review Design | Audiovisual | UX | Connectivity | Verdict | Buy or not? The chassis is made of good quality plastic and is designed to look prim and proper. If you wish to mount the Mi TV 5X on a wall, you’ll have to purchase the equipment for it separately. I had it seated on a table, and the inverted V stands do a fine job of holding the TV in post. It’s only when you jolt that the thing would budge.

The monitor (with non-detachable power cord)Table Top Stands (2) with Screws (4)Remote (Batteries not included)Installation and User Manual

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Anyways, from a side view, you’d appreciate how neat and svelte its physique is. Also since the bezels are slim on all sides (save for the chin) and are metallic grey in color, the entire fascia looks elegant. On the bottom bezel, there is a bright Xiaomi logo. And beneath it, there are LED indicators and physical toggles for turning on/off the TV as well as Google Assistant’s hands-free mode. You can also control Google with a button on the remote. And coming to this narrow plastic cuboid, it has the bare minimum number of buttons. There is a power key, the aforementioned assistant trigger, a navigational ring, a Patchwall, an Android TV home key, Netflix, Prime Video, volume rockers, and the Mi branding. At first, you’d be bummed to find the absence of a mute button, a YouTube hotkey, and perhaps even an input source key. But there are some shortcuts like you can double-tap the volume down to mute or long-press the Mi button to enable quick settings like Picture, Sound, Input, and TV Lock. There is a small problem with this implementation which we will get into in a later section. By the back, there is a large lustrous Xiaomi logo flanked by the ports on the right and the charging cord on the left. The latter is non-detachable which is a bit meh. This 55-inch IPS LCD panel is equipped with Vivid Picture Engine 2 and rocks a 10-bit color depth within a range of 94% DCI-P3 color gamut. It is of 4K resolution with support for HDR standards like Dolby Vision, HDR10, and HDR10+. The petite bezels result in a screen-to-body ratio of 96.6-percent. The 178° of viewing angles were agreeable too. It is sufficiently bright in regular use and comes with an adaptive brightness option in the settings. It is direct LED backlighting. My naked eyes are pleased with both SDR and HDR content on it. Web series like Squid Games (2021, Netflix) and Kota Factory S02 (2021, Netflix) were exquisite on this screen. The dark scenes in Jack Ryan S02 (2018, Prime Video) and the chase sequences in Mad Max Fury Road (2015, Prime Video) were perceivable. I chose to keep Motion Smoothning on while watching Ready Player One (2018, Prime Video) but switched it off on the Star Trek trilogy (2009-16, Prime Video) due to the infamous soap-opera effect. Now, I’m not a movie mode fanatic, rather I would use it as I feel right for the content I am watching. So, yes, you can switch between the various picture presets like Standard, Movie, Sports, and Vivid via the ‘long-press the Mi button’ shortcut. But, that quits the video and you have to resume the video again. A minor, but an inconvenience nonetheless. Now, sticking to the script this panel has got a 60Hz refresh rate and you can play at 4K60 quality. Thanks to the presence of three HDMI 2.1 sockets, you can connect your PC or console and play on the big screen. Well, you can get by, if not comfortable, doing coding and browsing sesh. Other fancy HDMI 2.1 perks in the mix are ALLM (Auto Low Latency Mode) and eARC (Enhanced Audio Return Channel). The former prioritizes frames over graphics by switching to the Game Mode. The latter, which is btw available only on the second HDMI 2.1 port, lets you control audio from both the TV and soundbar via the Mi TV 5X remote. Convenient! Backed by Dolby Atmos and DTS HD the sound from the 40W speakers is good as you’d have guessed. While playing music on Spotify or the likes, the volume can get plenty loud. But, I felt the bass wasn’t very deep. As for movies, I was fine with 40-percent and in some content, maxed at about 60 percent volume. Again in certain content, my ears were struggling to pick the dialogues. If you dig within the sound settings, you will get an option to enable Dialogue Enhancer. On to the other aspects. Xiaomi has given Android TV version 10 with its in-house Patchwall UI as an optional launcher. You can set the latter as the default home screen. I did because it is more appealing in look and offers a better-organized content library, universal search, kids mode with Parental Lock, 75+ live channels, Mi Home (IoT control), and other features. If you have subscriptions on multiple OTT platforms, it will curate lists and present smart recommendations based on language, recency of release, the cast, and other parameters. Nifty! Else, it would seem unsolicited apps and adverts vying to grab your attention. Speaking of the cast, there is Chromecast and AirPlay support. The quality over a 3rd party solution like AirScreen was acceptable. But without that, Chromecast was laggy. Of course, the quality and latency of the stream would rely on your WiFi speed and stability. Another small addition but one that cinephiles would use is the new IMDb rating integration which appears under most titles. Initially, I had felt the TV was janky in areas like boot times and app opening/switching animations. For instance, it takes around 40 seconds to cold boot and for all icons on the home screen to load. I reset it thinking it might make a difference but nothing game-changing happened. Anyways, over time, things started to feel normal and second nature. At the core of all these, things are powered by a quad-core A55 CPU, coupled with Mali G52 MP22 GPU, 2GB of RAM, and 16GB storage. Even on the connectivity front, the port selection is adequate. MI TV 5X has got 3 HDMI 2.1 ports out of which one supports eARC. Then there are 2x USB A (2.0), 1x LAN, 1x AV, 1x Optical x 1, 1x Antenna Tuner, and 1x 3.5mm audio jack. Xiaomi doesn’t bundle AV composite cable in the box. Wirelessly, the options are dual-band WiFi ac, Infrared, and Bluetooth 5.0. The latter lets you control TV from a distance and even when you do it from an off-angle. And with that we are at the end and it’s time to answer the question — Xiaomi does what it does best. That is to offer a competing product at a value for money price. This new 4K Mi TV from its 2021 lineup looks and feels updated with newer specs and features. This includes the Vivid Picture Engine 2 backed 4K HDR visuals, HDMI 2.1 ports (with 4K60 output, ALLM, and eARC), a fairly loud 40W speaker setup, Patchwall software treats, and more in a slim, sturdy, and attractive build. I don’t have much to quibble other than the cons mentioned below. So, if you are looking for a new 4K smart TV under Rs. 50,000, you can go with this. Compared to other alternatives, Xiaomi boasts a better brand cache and robust customer service network. And if you want to spend even less, note that for the other two variants of Mi TV 5X, you would have to cough up only ₹31,999 and ₹41,999 respectively. You can check them out at mi.com, Flipkart, Mi Home, Mi Studio, and Croma.

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