The Chinese MacBook Killer - TEN HOUR BATTERY – Xiaomi Mi Notebook Pro
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2018-05-06
·
1,474 words · ~7 min read
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the xiaomi me notebook pro has been billed as
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some kind of much cheaper macbook killer
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but it doesn't run macOS
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and it's like a thousand dollars so
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by that line of thinking what Windows notebook with
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an aluminum shell isn't a cheaper macbook
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so then does it actually stand out from the
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crowd as a true competitor
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or is it just a look-alike knock-off
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well i'll get to that after i tell you what's not a knock-off today's sponsor
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LTT
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opening up the me notebook pro feels really good the aluminum backing is
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solid and so tastefully free of branding
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that even apple's light up logo feels a little tacky by comparison the hinge has
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a satisfying weight to it without requiring two hands to open it and this
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theme of clean style and quality construction is present
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throughout the entire device even extending to the i o i mean i'd have
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loved to see Thunderbolt 3 but this is still a solid mix of ports at this price
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point plus usb type c charging is nice
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to have the only part of it that even sort of
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breaks the illusion is the cheaper feeling bottom panel but in regular use
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this is not an issue at all what was an issue for me at least is
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that we imported this thing through gearbest.com
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and it was pre-configured to chinese
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so yeah no problem dennis can fix ah no
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he can't it actually comes with a single language
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chinese version of Windows like we tried
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to just deal with it like chrome and parts of some programs
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are still in english so it's not impossible to get by but
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to call the experience inconvenient would be a gross understatement so
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for me and my fellow guilos the only real option is to reinstate
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are you really gonna say quilo it's not technically insulting per se it's an
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insult to me but i mean yeah still
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for me and my fellow guilos out there the only real option is to reinstall
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Windows which in this case also meant obtaining a fresh license key
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with that sorted out though it was time to actually get to using the me notebook
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pro and good news here it is a powerful
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little machine quad-core hyper-threaded core i5 8250u
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eight gigs of RAM and get this an NVIDIA
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mx150 which is basically a mobile
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version of the gt 1030. i mean to be clear you don't expect to be playing
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modern aaa titles at full resolution but this is still heaps better than
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integrated graphics even for things like premiere or photoshop or older games
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and unlike some devices that we've tested
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dedicated graphics doesn't seem to have
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any negative impact at all on the system
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cooling was more than satisfactory with our CPU quietly reaching a mere 53
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degrees celsius under load with a small 2.1 gigahertz turbo
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and the battery life blew
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our minds the efficiency of this hardware
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including Intel's 8th gen u-series CPU
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gave the me notebook pro a staggering 10
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hour 4 minute result in our battery life
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work test that is a full 40 minutes longer than
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our previous champion the lg gram and it
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absolutely smashes other laptops that
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are well regarded for their battery life like the dell xps series microsoft
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surface lap book and the macbook pro running Windows
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but the most important aspect of any
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productivity oriented device is arguably the interface if the
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keyboard and trackpad are constantly annoying you
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nothing is going to save it fortunately however the me notebook pro
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actually gets these mostly right as well
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the keyboard has a good layout that commits no major sins and a reasonable
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switch travel distance but its keycaps are quite poorly
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stabilized so if you hit the keys off off-center they do feel really mushy
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which can affect accuracy so i'll give that a b minus
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as for the track pad despite its large size we experienced no issues with palm
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rejection the tactile feel when clicking is nice and satisfying
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and although out of the box it has quite a bit of sloppy feeling acceleration
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it's actually large enough that you can disable acceleration entirely for a
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great experience this one gets an a for
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a Windows device the macbook is still way ahead of the pack
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and that's true when it comes to screens as well but i really don't mean that as
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an insult to the me notebooks display it runs at a mere 1080p 60 hertz
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but it's bright with wide viewing angles
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thanks to its ips panel so as long as you don't mind the
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reflections that are an inherent part of the glass fronted screen experience you
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will like it one thing i might have changed is to add
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a touch screen option though this is something that i feel apple has really
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been missing out on and would give the me notebook pro a leg up
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the webcam is perfectly acceptable for skype calls and as for the harman
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speakers that boast dolby atmos certification well
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i've yet to have an overhead or surround
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atmos experience on a notebook but front positional audio was outstanding
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especially considering their downward firing positioning and
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while for stereo content they do distort a bit at full volume they get loud
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before they get there and they're surprisingly full sounding making the me
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notebook pro a fantastic portable netflix machine
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let's get back to that GPU now okay
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yeah it's not amazing in games but
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it is still a big upgrade from Intel's integrated solution rise of the tomb
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raider not a good time but it handled titles
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like rocket league skyrim and cs go
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handily so if you want to casually game after studying then it's got you covered
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there too opening up the me notebook pro we can
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see where the impressive battery life comes from from an impressive battery this thing is
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rated at 60 watt hours
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and since we're in here we'll take a look at upgradability 2.
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so adding another m.2 SSD would be easy
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peasy but unfortunately the RAM is soldered so if
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you're looking at one of these i would recommend buying as much RAM as you're
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going to need probably the 16 gig model unless you are a very light user
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bottom line then starting at 979 us on promo the me
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notebook pro is an impressive piece of hardware at a great price that's made
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even greater if you don't mind the chinese Windows that's included
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the inclusion of a dedicated graphics processor will give it a longer lifespan
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as GPU compute becomes more important for productivity and the solid
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construction should help it hold up physically as long as you'd want to use
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it the remarkable battery life though is what really makes it stand out against
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other macbook alternatives like the dell xps so
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well done xiaomi
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so thanks for watching guys if this video sucked you know what to do but if it was awesome get subscribed hit that
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like button or maybe consider checking out where to buy the stuff we featured
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at the link in the video description also linked in the description is our
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merch store which has cool shirts like this one and our community forum which
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you should totally join construction sorry