Xiaomi Redmi Pro Full Review – Dual Lens on a Budget

It seems there’s no stopping the Chinese giant as yet another mid-range phablet, the Xiaomi Redmi Pro, found its way to Philippine shores to try and take a chunk off the market share. Aside from the dual lens, dual main camera setup of the Redmi Pro, what other features are worth looking at? We find this out on our in-depth review.

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Design and build

The very first thing you’ll notice is the obvious lack of a camera bump on the Redmi Pro’s flat back. It’s brushed aluminum that tapers off to the edge to meet the elevated front panel with subtle chamfering of the edges for extra grip. It’s all slightly slippery and cool to the touch with noticeable heft that veers away from making you think you’re holding a mid-ranged smartphone.

The uni-body brushed metal is a step away from the Redmis of old that utilized plastic that leads to dings and scratches from daily usage.

The elevated front panel is protected by a 2.5D scratch resistant glass covering the ambient light sensor, LED notification, and 5MP camera on top and the backlit capacitive keys flanking the fingerprint sensor embedded home button.

The volume rocker sits above the power button on the right panel and the hybrid dual nano-sim tray can be found on the opposite end.

The 3.5mm audio jack is housed above beside the IR blaster and its dual bottom firing speakers flanking the USB type C charging slot to round out the ports.

The fingerprint scanner works fast and quite accurate though not as fast as those that can be found on flagship devices. This can be achieved by pressing the home button from a locked screen. We got 8 out of 10 successful attempts through our testing which should give you a good idea of how accurate this is.

Display

Xiaomi opted to go with a 5.5inch QHD OLED display that produces bright and punchy colors with some struggles when being viewed under direct sunlight but still a good improvement over previous models of the Redmi.

Camera

An obvious interesting choice for the Redmi Pro is the main dual cameras setup at the back. The first or the main shooter is a Sony 13MP camera and the bottom one is a 5MP Samsung camera. The purpose of the second shooter is for depth of field that adds blur to parts of the image not being focused on. This can be achieved through Xiaomi’s proprietary camera app through a slider to give you some handle on focusing.

The dual camera setup is good in taking daylight shots focusing on natural colors leaning on blues and yellows for some scenarios.

HDR mode improved on the experience a little bit but the difference is very minimal. The Redmi struggles in low light shots, however, with red and green noises apparent in the final image output and the occasional blur.

Selfies are average on the 5MP front facing the camera with Xiaomi adding some post processing magic that smooths out the face resulting is an awkwardly taken selfie.

Videos max out at 1080p at 30fps with average overall performance especially with the lack of OIS that make videos stutter and shake.

Software and UI

While we’re at it, the MiUi is a hit or a miss depending on the user. The aesthetics agree with some converting from an iDevice and fails for Android fanatics with the absence of an app drawer. Some of the animations feel sluggish like the calling up power options, for example, but it comes down to personal taste and preference.

Performance and benchmark

Underneath all of the refreshed aesthetics is a Mediatek Decacore Helio X20, 3GB of RAM, 32GB of onboard storage with an option to expand for the base model that we received. We were told there will be 2 more versions that employ the Helio X25, 64GB of internal memory and 3GB of RAM and the Pro-Pro version with an extra GB of RAM, Helio X25 processor, and 128GB of storage.

Clocked in at 2.1ghz and 3GB of RAM our review unit whizzed through our daily task with ease. The Marshmallow skinned MiUi, however, ate up some of the RAM that slowed when demanding apps were queued and this is more apparent when multitasking is needed. It can, however, play NBA 2K16 set on max settings so that should give you a good benchmark in the playtime department.

Battery and charging

You’ll be glad to hear Xiaomi bumped up the battery to a whopping 4,000 mAh that can last you the whole day easily. The absence of quick charging will mean waiting a painful 1 hour 50 minutes for a full charge on its 2amp power brick.

Audio

Speakers were loud with a tiny bit of struggle on full blast and being placed at the bottom mean it will impede immersing yourself in full entertainment mode. All in all above average speakers on a mid-ranged smartphone.

Pricing and verdict

Expected to retail at P13,500 official price ($280 US) for the base model, Xiaomi placed their mid-ranged phablet at a competitive edge against others in the same tier.

All in all, a good choice for people looking into performing budget phones with some nifty tricks.

Pros and cons of Xiaomi Redmi Pro

+ Metal design
+ Solid battery life
+ Snappy performance
+ Affordable pricing
– Camera struggles at night
– Selfie cam is mediocre
– MI UI is dated

Xiaomi Redmi Pro Official price, Full specs, and Philippines Release date

• Display: 5.5-inch 1080p Full HD OLED, 401 ppi
• Design: Metal
• CPU: Mediatek Helio X20 or X25 deca-core processor, up to 2.5GHz
• GPU: Mali 780 graphics
• Memory: 3/4GB RAM, 32/64/128GB internal storage, 128GB max microSD card (hybrid)
• Camera: 13MP main + 5MP f2.0 for depth sensing, 1080p video, dual LED flash
• Selfie: 5MP front-facing
• Connectivity: 4G LTE, Dual-SIM hybrid, Bluetooth 4.1, GPS, WiFi ac
• Audio: Standard audio, mono speaker
• Port: USB type-C
• Security: Fingerprint sensor
• Battery: 4000mAh, non-removable
• OS: Android 6.0 Marshmallow, MIUI 8.0
• Colors: Gold, Silver, Gray
• Availability: July 2016 release date in the Philippines
• Price: P13,500 ($280) for 3GB + 32GB Helio X20 price in PH / $300+ USD for Helio X25, $350+ for 4GB + 128GB Helio X25 | Last two prices are estimated

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