Xiaomi never fails to create a buzz. The company which recently postponed the sales of the Mi3, to put focus on the Redmi 1S, has said the blockbuster handset is about to make a comeback.
The Xiaomi Mi3 didn’t just sell like hot cakes, it overshadowed all other smartphone manufacturers. The entry of the Chinese brand was a giant seismic shake for the populated mobile phone market.
Xiaomi plans to have a comeback flash sale for the MI3 around Diwali
The company has said that it plans to bring back its bestseller to the market close to the festival of Diwali. This was announced at the Global Mobile Internet Conference in Bangalore by Xiaomi India head of operations Manu Kumar.
Reportedly, Xiaomi is also working on a “priority pass” system which will directly send the device to the carts of folks who have tried ordering and failed previously. Flipkart is currently working on the execution of the priority pass. This plan can be used by e-tail giant for future sales too.
Xiaomi will also be bringing its latest flagship and the successor to the Mi3, the Mi4 somewhere around the end of the year. The sale of Xiaomi’s Mi3 saw immense number of registrations. Although most of them had to return disheartened as the limited handsets weren’t enough for all who waited with baited breath to buy the device.
Currently, Xiaomi has been holding flash sales for Redmi 1S on Flipkart. It has held five flash sales, and the maximum amount of time the phone was on offer was 5.2 seconds. Considering the previous cases, one can easily anticipate a massive stampede to get the device. Also, the news of the launch of Mi4 might dissuade some folks from getting the Mi3. But as the Mi4 is expected to be launched starting at Rs. 22,000, the Mi3 might still be a viable option for people looking for the most bang for their buck.
The Xiaomi Redmi 1S went on Sale for a price of Rs 5999, with a limited 40,000 phones for sale and the phone got the usual response. But is the phone worth the mega hype that it has created? Lets find out!
Overview
The Redmi 1S just like the Xiaomi phones in the past has built a burning desire in everyones hearts to own the phone, it comes with an impressive price tag and a good spec sheet. The performance on the phone is excellent and everything just seems to be too good to be true. The Redmi 1S will truly change the market perception for starting – lower end smartphones.
Hardware
[pullquote_left]Loaded with Hardware![/pullquote_left]
Powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 chipset the Redmi 1S has a Quad Core 1.6 GHz CPU the Adreno 305 GPU, 1 GB of RAM and 8 GB of inbuilt storage. The front of the Redmi 1S has a 4.7 inch 1280 x 720 p display a total of 312 ppi it’s protected by Asahi Dragontrail glass and is an IPS panel. Cameras comprise of an 8 MP snapper with a wide f2.2 aperture and a 1.6 MP front camera. The Main camera is capable of a 1920 x 1080p Full HD video capture.
The phone runs on a 2050 mAh battery pack, which is replaceable, has dual SIM card slots, one of which is a 3G (GSM-WCDMA) and one is 2G (GSM). The Redmi 1S also has a memory card slot to add a memory card upto 64GB.
Build quality and Design
The Redmi 1S is a pretty good looking phone, it’s not Moto G, but then it’s almost half the price. The replaceable back panels give you the ability to give the phone a personal look and feel. The phone is essentially made out of plastic, but in no way does it feel cheap or poorly built. The front has a Asahi Dragontrail glass, which many argue that it is equally good when compared to Gorilla Glass variants.
[pullquote_right]Buttons are not Backlit![/pullquote_right]
The buttons are nice and tactile, for volume and power. The touch buttons are responsive and easily reached, they however are not backlit, which is rather disappointing, and difficult in low light situations and at night. The phone has a good fit and feel in the hand, the edges are soft and the outsides curve to match the shape of your hand really well.
Performance and Gaming
We were surprised to see the performance from this sub Rs. 6000 handset. The UI is fast and responsive and you really cannot complain about the performance of this handset. Usually budget phones end up being turnoffs, however the Moto E changed that in the past and the Xiaomi Redmi 1S tops that by almost double.
With an average of 330 MB of Free RAM available at all times, the Redmi 1S also has a built in app kill switch that frees up the RAM for usage. Overall the phone is capable of delivering more than you can expect from a phone in this budget. Our Benchmark and Gaming video shows you exactly that below.
The Gaming is pretty good too, even though really graphic intensive games will not work on full graphics, the phone is able to handle gaming pretty decently and without duress. You will get good viewing angles, good touch response, and great gaming feedback. Audio from the speakers is a bit low but acceptable.
Camera
As far as the Camera is concerned, you will be surprised to see what this phone can achieve. You get the exact same UI from the Mi3 for the Camera app and an excellent 8 MP sensor that does Full HD video, where most struggle to even do video in the first place at this price. Composition of the shot is quick and autofocus is snappy, colours are a bit dull – and contrast is pretty acceptable. We like additional options like filters, HDR and delayed shots all of which works well and intuitively. You also get quick face detection and a zero lag shutter; mighty impressive.
Great Macro
Good Focus
Low Light Sample
Twilight Sample
Dark Sample
Android and MIUI
[pullquote_left]MIUI is fantastic![/pullquote_left]
Even though you get an older version of Android, I don’t see people complaining anytime soon. The phone is really fast and responsive and thanks to the awesome MIUI overlay, there are additional functions and shortcuts that one can really learn to appreciate.
LockScreen
Dialer
Messaging
Browser
Notification Panel
Toggles
FM RADIO
Software Info
Lite Mode
Lite Mode Quick Dialer
Lite Mode Apps List
The version of MIUI is also fairly old, however, there is an imminent update promised for the Redmi 1S to MIUI v6 by the end of the year. You get Google Now style weather updates and notifications, iOS style app layout and folders, and lots of skinning options. All of this with very little load on the RAM and the CPU department, ensuring smooth sailing throughout.
Even though competition is currently offering Android KitKat and more soon, Redmi 1S has the capabilities of holding its own, mostly thanks to the enabled hardware. The future update is expected to free up some RAM on the phone making performance much better, giving you an average of 420 plus MB of free RAM vs the current average of 320-340.
The Phone also has a lite-mode which was initially intended for senior citizens, but however in the indian edition is been designed to give an easier usage experience to the first time user.
Phone and Battery
Phone networks ar good, but not great. We feel that there is a low network reception indoors with the Redmi 1S when compared to other devices. Outdoors however is great and we have no complaints with audio quality on the incoming or outgoing while on a call.
Battery life is not the best, on an average the phone will run out before end of day, and if you are a heavy user, expect to carry a charger/ powerbank at all times. Xiaomi is also planning to sell additional spare batteries and external battery chargers.
With the existing battery expect 5-6 hours of real talk time, or a mix of internet usage and apps with 3-4 hours of talk time.
Conclusion
While the Redmi 1S is going to have the same issues like the Mi3, i.e. the lack of available units to sell, service centre issues, Flipkart selling woes, and what not. The Redmi 1S still makes for one hell of a device for one hell of a price, that you can’t beat right now. The hardware is equivalent to devices almost twice the price and performance even better.
[pullquote_right]You simply can’t beat this Phone![/pullquote_right]
The phone is good looking, well built and supported with respect to the OS and UI, with the added advantage of cheap accessories and quick updates one really can’t complain. For the price you will not find a better device, even if you add another 50$.
Another sale and another disappearing act. Xiaomi brought out the Redmi 1S for sale today, and as expected they flew off the virtual shelf within a couple of seconds. And when we say a couple, we mean a couple because, in the third second, the phone went out of stock. This sale will do nothing to calm the folks who missed out on the Mi3, as well as the Redmi 1S sale today. At the risk of sounding pompous, we’d like you to know that we used our tips and they helped us score a Redmi. If you didn’t manage to get your hands on one today, do bookmark the link for next time.
Xiaomi brought a bigger stock when compared to its previous sale standards. The 40,000 devices it brought had 2,50,000 claimants according to Flipkart, but the number is estimated to be around 1,00,000 people. The massive demand for the product saw the device getting sold off instantly. Flipkart has used delayed payment method for the past couple of sales that gave it some breathing space in executing orders. It also helped Flipkart prevent a website crash as had happened on some occasion.
Redmi 1S has the best features in its price bracket. The phone features a 4.7-inch 1280 x 720 (HD) IPS display and is powered by a 1.6 GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processor with Cortex-A7 core with 1 GB RAM. It has 8 GB of internal memory that is expandable up to 64 GB.
The phone features an 8 MP camera on the back and sports a 1.6 MP camera on the front. With all these specs, it is miles ahead of its competition. It is an obliterator of the segment. The phone is capable of taking on both the reigning champions from Motorola, the Moto E and Moto G.
Today’s sale also proved that Xiaomi is still a hot commodity, and people would still race to get the device. If you were one of the lucky ones who scored the device, congratulations to you and if you did not, don’t worry, just revise our tips and hit the “Buy Now” button hard when you see it the next time.
After the overwhelming success of the Mi3, Xiaomi is now ready to unleash the Xiaomi Redmi 1S in the Indian market. Today, the smartphone, priced at Rs. 5,999, will go on sale at 2pm. Lack of stock, unreliability of Flipkart and the overall disappointing sales of the Xiaomi Mi3 have taught us that we need to be armed and prepared to handle these strategic flash sales better.
Here are our tips and tricks to make sure you get your hands on a Xiaomi Redmi 1S today:
1. Pre Register
Possibly the most obvious tip, you need to have already pre registered to buy the phone. Pre registrations are now closed, so hopefully, you’ve checked this box. Otherwise, remember to set a reminder to be better prepared for next Tuesday.
2. Know the Time
The Xiaomi Redmi 1S will go on sale at precisely 2:00 pm IST on 2nd September, so try and reach the buying page at least an hour earlier, even though it seems like an overkill.
3. Multiple Device logins
Try being online from multiple devices, preferably on different internet connections; in order to have different I.P. addresses accessing the site, this will improve your chances and bring you one step closer to buying a Xiaomi Redmi 1S.
4. Flipkart App
The Flipkart app uses a separate server and has a higher chance of “not failing” at the time of sale. If you want to buy a Xiaomi Redmi, the app might prove to be easier, “might” being the key word.
5. Super Refresh Times 40,000
When the sale starts, most people are struggling to open the webpage, ctrl+R / f5 (refresh)/ Cmd+R (mac), is your best friend. Hit it till you get a page to buy a Xiaomi Redmi 1S. Other people have reported opening several tabs being helpful.
6. Cart it!
If you do get a page loaded, add that phone to the cart like there is no tomorrow, once you have the handset in your cart, your chances have just gone up from 1 in a million to 50:50 in order to buy a Xiaomi Redmi 1S.
7. Patience
Once you have it in your cart, attempt payment by refreshing several times, in most cases you won’t be able to make payments due to overloads on the server so keep trying. Here the app helps too.
Also, if the website fails completely, there is a very high chance that the phone is in your cart when Flipkart comes back online, that’s the perfect moment for you to buy a Xiaomi Redmi 1S.
Once you do get through to the payment section and make your payments in whatever the mode you select, pat yourself on the back sir, you my friend are a lucky owner of the coveted Xiaomi Redmi 1S!
Now, check out our unboxing of the Xiaomi Redmi 1S below.
Xiaomi Redmi 1S is going on an early sale today exclusively for Flipkart First subscribers. Starting at 2PM, first 2000 subscribers, who registered to buy the handset, can get their hands on the device ahead of the first flash sale for registered users on Tuesday.
It is said that Flipkart will add the smartphone automatically to the cart of the first two thousand Flipkart first customers who registered for the handset’s flash sale on Tuesday. And the E-commerce website will inform the lucky subscribers through emails about their eligibility for early access.
Due to the limited stocks available, Flipkart has also announced that it will limit orders to one phone per registered email id. “Since stocks would be limited, we recommend you to login & buy immediately 2pm onwards. To ensure that all our customers can get their hands on Redmi 1S, we are limiting orders to one phone per registered email id.” Flipkart mailed the registered users.
Xiaomi is continuing the trend of Tuesday flash sale which was started with the launch of Xiaomi Mi3. The company has claimed that more than 1,00,000 users have applied for Redmi 1S sale. Xiaomi also referred as ‘Apple of China’ has been criticised for the limited availability of the Mi3 smartphone. It is yet to be seen how Flipkart and Xiaomi handle the Redmi 1S flash sales.
Redmi 1S priced at Rs. 5,999 will be competing with likes of Asus Zenphone A450 and Moto E, which are also exclusively sold on Flipkart. The Xiaomi Redmi 1s comes with 2 Micro Sim to Regular Sim adapters in the box for the dual sim device. The phone will run one card on 3G GSM while one on 2G GSM. The Redmi 1S is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 Chipset running at 1.6 GHz on Quad Cores and the Adreno 305 GPU. It accepts micro SD cards unto 32 GB and comes with an inbuilt storage of 8 GB and has 1 GB RAM.
Check out our unboxing and of Xiaomi Redmi 1S below.
Flipkart is becoming ‘the’ place online for smartphone manufacturers to reach out to consumers. The strategy gathered steam when the king of comeback, Motorola, introduced their products on the website. Its Moto line of products went out of stock when they went on sale, indicating the huge demand online. This encouraged others to try out the route and we have seen companies like Xiaomi gaining huge popularity in India through Flipkart. Now another Chinese smartphone manufacturer, Oppo is going for an exclusive retail deal with Flipkart.
Oppo has some good products in its kitty.
Oppo has some amazing devices such as Find 7 which was the first phone with Quad HD (2K) display in India. The company is looking forward to generating an all India market for their devices. They currently have 10 devices in the Indian market and they can be found in a price range of Rs. 8990 to Rs. 37,990. The phones in the Oppo stable in India are Oppo N1, R1, Find 5 Mini, Neo, Yoyo, Joy, Neo 3, Find 7a and the the recently released N1 Mini.
The company’s CEO, Mr. Tom Lu had this to say about the deal: “We have been striving to come closer to our customers and become a part of the society. With more and more consumers going online, having a digital presence has become a must. Flipkart is definitely one of the most popular shopping platforms with a very loyal customer base and by partnering with them, we are sure Oppo’s smartphones will reach out to more customers. With our products, Indian customers will get a chance to experience the best in innovation, the way many customers have enjoyed globally.”
Oppo certainly has some good products in its stable. The company hasn’t actually been able to create a buzz towards itself, even with an ad campaign that starred Hrithik Roshan. Considering the huge demand for quality high specs phones for fair prices on Flipkart, Oppo might be able to carve out a decent consumer base for its consumers.
Asus has become a darling of the Indian market since its release in India. It along with Xiaomi made it the summer for Chinese smartphone makers. Their high-spec-low-price business model is tailor-made for the Indian market.
The Asus Zenphone series have seen shortage of supply and they are either out of stock or available in limited numbers. Asus wants to correct that and they are bringing in a 20,000 phone inventory to Flipkart. Though the number of individual phone models haven’t been specified, it is a good big number of devices.
Most importantly today will become a Taiwan on China battle here as Xiaomi too is bringing 20,000 devices for a flash sale today the 19th of August. It will be fun to see if Asus is capable of stealing Xiaomi’s customers. The folks who are disappointed by the Xiaomi sale can see the Asus line-up as a good alternative.
The Customization and Color features of the ZenUI are unique and tasteful
The Asus Zenphones are powered by Intel Atom processors and come in 4, 5 and 6-inch display variants. The phones also come in multiple color variants and have a youth friendly design. The Zenphone 6 has a classy look which will be appreciated by corporate users too.
The Zenphones are dual SIM capable and can be used easily with gloved hands. These phones also run on Asus’s own UI called the ZenUI which has been appreciated for its unique design and customizability features.
Asus’s business model is more appreciable than that of Xiaomi. The company seems like it is interested in staying in the market for a long time. They have also said that it wants to sell its phone in the offline market thereby making there long term plan in India apparent. By bringing in products in accordance with the demand in the market, the company gets to retain as well bring in new customers. The Zenphone 4, 5 and 6 are priced at Rs. 5,999, Rs. 9,999 and Rs. 16,999 respectively.
Xiaomi was back with its big sale today bringing in about a 20,000 piece inventory for the folks who had pre-registered for the sale. The sale took place today, August 12 at 2.00 pm and the stocks flew out as soon as the sale started. Yesterday, we gave you tips on making sure you score yourself a Mi3. We tried our techniques and were amongst a fortunate few who got one.
As has been their model, the company had requested registrations from buyers interested in getting the phone. The registrations according to the company were in the 1,50,000 range. A single user could only buy one phone at a time, and the sale was on a first come first serve basis.
With such a wide gap between the demand and supply, the sale resembled a virtual knife fight and lot many folks had to go home without a phone in hand. Now, to give a fair chance to people trying their luck to give Xiaomi their hard earned money the next time, the registrations from this sale will not be carried forward. So if you were to be in line again for a Mi3, you have to re-register for the next sale that will start from 6.00 pm tonight.
Unlike the last sale when the Mi3 sale led Flipkart’s website to crash, the e-tailer seemed to have a better hang of things this time. The website performed optimally and as expected and it finished the sale without any issue, apart from the rivers of tears and expletives unleashed by folks who couldn’t get their Mi3. This time around we were able to get ourselves another Mi3 quite easily, though we did have to wait around for a bit before we could proceed to payment. Maybe this was Flipkart’s way of creating a breather space before executing orders. The website gave us time till 11.59 pm, 13th of August to execute our order, which is huge window.
Xiaomi’s strategy of limited product offering has made many folks angry. The company has made its name in the market with its exceptional products and should just clear out its inventory instead of pitting its consumers against each other keeping folks in uncertainty of getting a product. After successfully introducing their product, the company should follow Motorola’s path wholly and bring a bigger inventory for the next sale if it wants to prevent negative perceptions of itself in the Indian market.
The Xiaomi Mi3 has been a drop of evil for a lot of people, some have waited through the three sales patiently trying to get one of these chinese “wonder phones”. On August 12th 2014, at 2:00 pm the Xiaomi Mi3 will go on sale yet again, this time with a proported 20,000 handsets, says online shopping website Flipkart.
If you really want to buy a Xiaomi Mi3 this time around, here are a few tips to better your chances of scoring one of these budget bad boys.
1. Pre Register
Possibly the most obvious tip, you need to pre register to buy the phone, so go ahead and do it by : Clicking Here
2. Know the Time
The Xiaomi Mi3 will go on sale at precisely 2:00 pm IST on the 12th of August, so try and reach the buying page at least an hour earlier, even though it seems like overkill.
3. Multiple device logins
Try being online from multiple devices, preferably on different internet connections; in order to have different I.P. addresses accessing the site, this will improve your chances and bring to one step closer to buying a Xiaomi Mi3.
4. Flipkart App
The Flipkart app uses a separate server and has a higher chance of “not failing” at the time of sale. If you want to buy a Xiaomi Mi3 the app might prove to be easier, “might being the key word.
5. Super Refresh times 40,000
When the sale starts, most people are struggling to open the webpage, ctrl+R / f5 (refresh) is your best friend, hit it till you get a page to buy a Xiaomi Mi3. (cmd+R on a mac). Other people have reported opening several tabs being helpful.
6. Cart it!
If you do get a page loaded, add that phone to the cart like there is no tomorrow, once you have the handset in your cart, your chances have just gone up from 1 in a million to 50:50 in order to buy a Xiaomi Mi3.
7. Patience
Once you have it in your cart, attempt payment by refreshing several times, in most cases you won’t be able to make payments due to overloads on the server so keep trying.Here the app helps too.
Also, if the website fails completely, there is a very high chance that the phone is in your cart when Flipkart comes back online, thats the perfect moment for you to buy a Xiaomi Mi3.
Once you do get through to the payment section and make your payments in whatever the mode you select, pat yourself on the back sir, you my friend are a lucky owner of the coveted Xiaomi Mi3.
Chinese handset maker Xiaomi sold all its 15,000 Mi3 devices in its third flash sale online within a matter of seconds. The company made available 15,000 units of the Mi3 smartphone today, as against 1,50,000 registrations for the device. With these units, Xiaomi through Flipkart has sold 35,000 Mi3 smartphones till date in the country.
The Flipkart website crashed seconds after Xiaomi’s Mi3 went on sale today. At 2 pm, when sales began, the site showed a server related 502 error. A few minutes later it showed an out-of-stock message on the page promoting the device. The website had also crashed temporarily on July 22, minutes after the Mi3 first went on sale on Flipkart. In the second flash sale, on July 29 the Xiaomi sold out the entire stock in five seconds.
Today, it has been four hours and Flipkart is still dead..
Now, the Flipkart site says that registrations for the phone will restart at 6pm today with the next sale on August 12.
The price of Rs 13,999 pits Mi 3 against mid-segment devices such as the Moto G and BlackBerry’s new Z3 device. With the latest software and immaculate specifications at its price it will be interesting to observe whether Xiaomi can match the hype with a robust supply chain and service network.
Xiaomi has created a huge wave in the Indian smartphone market by bringing in a high-end handset at a low-end price. Xiaomi is the top smartphone manufacturer in China which went from zero to the fifth position in just four years. After creating a success story back home, they have launched their devices in the Indian market, which have stirred up a storm, even before the users could get a unit in their hands.
The first time, when Mi3 went on sale last week, it was sold out within 40 minutes of its availability. A reported 100,000 people registered for the phone before the day of sale on July 22. On the day of sale, Flipkart ran out of their entire inventory within a record 39 minutes and also managed to get the website to its knees.
The Xiaomi Mi 3 went on sale again via the website today at 2PM IST. However, same as the last time it sold reported 10,000 units within half an hour, 23 mins to be exact. The Flipkart page of the Xaiomi Mi3 thanked buyers for ‘tremendous response’ and also notified that next date for sale will be on 5 August while the registration for the next sale will start at 6PM IST today.
The Xiaomi Mi 3 runs a highly tweaked version of Android 4.4 KitKat, with MIUI version 5 on top. It comes with a 5-inch full-HD LCD display (1080×1920 pixels) offering a pixel density of 441ppi; a 2.3GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 (MSM8274AB) processor; 2GB of RAM; Adreno 330 GPU; 16GB of inbuilt storage; 13-megapixel rear camera; 2-megapixel camera, and 3050mAh battery.
Xiaomi also launched its latest flagship smartphone, called the Mi 4, at the company’s “The Journey of a Piece of Steel” launch event along with the Mi Band, a budget fitness tracker priced at just $13 (roughly Rs. 790).
The recent round of rumors are that Flipkart is gearing up to launch a range of tablets under its own private label, DigiFlip. The label already sells a number of accessories under the same label, including earphones, portable speakers, laptop accessories, etc. This move would be huge step for the company to set up a tight race against E-commerce giant and arch-rival Amazon, which already sells tablets, apart from e-book readers under its Kindle brand.
Apparently, Flipkart has tied up with MediaTek to build its tablets that have been acquired from manufacturers based out of China and Taiwan. While pricing and hardware specifications would be key to the success of these tablets, it also remains to be seen whether Flipkart can weave in its primary online retail offerings that include e-books among other categories and make the tablet as a tool to access its services.
Though, the company is tight-lipped about this new venture, it will be worth noticing how it differentiates itself in an already crowded tablet market space. In India, more than 4 million tablets were shipped last year making it one of the biggest tech segment in the market. The tablet market is right now ruled by likes of Samsung, Micromax and Apple.
Flipkart has been working continuously to gain more customers and sales. Few months back, Flipkart took over Myntra.com and online shopping store. If done right, Flipkart can easily take the throne and become the domestic Amazon.
The Motorola Moto X will go on sale starting 19 March 2014. Same as the Moto G, this phone will also be launched in partnership with Flipkart.
Flipkart mentioned in a tweet that Moto X will be available starting Wednesday, at a price of 23,999 INR. Flipkart further revealed that the Moto X smartphone will be available in five color options, while the wood back version will be available for 25,999 INR. This can further mean that this phone will not be available through the famous Moto Maker service by the company.
The Moto X features a 4.7 inch display with a resolution of 720 x 1280 pixels. The device is powered by a 1.7 GHz dual-core Qualcomm MSM8960Pro Snapdragon processor coupled with a 2 GB of RAM. The device comes with a 16 GB of inbuilt storage which is not expandable.
Moto X sports a 10 MP rear camera with a LED flashlight and a 2 MP secondary front-facing camera. The Moto X will be available in India starting tomorrow, but it is not clear if 16/32 GB variants will be available. The Moto X is expected to be available with Android 4.4.2 out of the box. Stay tuned for more information!
We’ll be selling 5 colour variants priced at Rs. 23999. The wood back versions will be priced at Rs. 25999. #MotoX#MotoOnFlipkart
at all times. Xiaomi is also planning to sell additional spare batteries and external battery chargers.
