Xiaomi’s POCO sub-brand smartphone is here at last. You might recall reading it here in these columns that Xiaomi wants to get out of the ‘cheap phone’ tag that it had gained over the years and to take on the biggies, it had plans to launch an entirely new brand POCO. Well, its here. POCO F1 has been officially launched in India and goes on sale beginning August 29.
The Xiaomi POCO F1 comes with a 6.18-inch Full HD+ display with the protection for the screen being provided by Corning Gorilla Glass 5. The aspect ratio has been kept at 18.7:9. The phone’s rear panel is made out of polycarbonate giving the user a better grip when held in the hand though the surface is soft to touch.
Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 845 SoC would be the processor fitted on the new Xiaomi POCO F1. The graphics display is anchored by the Adreno 630 GPU. Xiaomi is deliberately positioning this new phone as the one more suited for playing games on it with the company claiming that its phone’s graphics display is 30% faster than Samsung’s Exynos 9810 processor.
There will be two RAM variants; 6GB and 8GB. Similarly, the internal storage is also kept at 64GB and 256GB. A microSD card can take the storage up by another 512GB. The Android Oreo version 8.1 would be the OS and Xiaomi has indicated that the phone would be updated to the Android P before the year is out. Xiaomi has not forgotten to add its in-house UI but tweaked it to suit this model, calling it ‘MIUI for POCO’.
The battery on this phone is 4000mAh and Xiaomi claims it can last 31 hours of talk time and 8 hours of gaming. The battery can be charged faster with the QuickCharge 3.0 featured in the device.
The other feature that Xiaomi has introduced in the POCO F1 to push its game-friendly nature is a liquid cooling technology that keeps the processor cooler even while playing games. They claim it is three times more effective in cooling the CPU.
Following the recent trend of having a more powerful front camera for selfies, the Xiaomi POCO F1 sports a 20MP front sensor while in the rear, there’s a dual camera setup with a 12MP sensor and a 5MP sensor teaming up to provide imaging capabilities ably supported by AI technology. There’s an infra-red camera and flood illuminator for face recognition and phone unlocking. Communications capability is complete with all components needed.
On the pricing, the 6GB/64GB Xiaomi POCO F1 would be sold in India at Rs 20,999, the 6GB/128GB at Rs 23,999 and the 8GB/254GB POCO F1 will cost Rs 28,999. There is a fourth ‘rugged’ variant Armour, which will be sold at Rs 29,999. There are some inaugural offers to be availed.
The Xiaomi POCO F1 comes in three colours; Graphite Black, Steel Blue and Rosso Red.