Xiaomi Launches Mi Notebook Air Windows 10 Laptop Featuring 1080p Display, Starts at $520 (engadget.com) 88
Speaking of Chinese electronics giants, Xiaomi on Wednesday announced it is entering the PC market. The company, which is often referred to as "Apple of China", announced its first-ever laptop line, the Mi Notebook Air, running on Windows 10. It comes in two sizes -- 13.3-inch and 12.5-inch -- with both models featuring a slim body, a 1080p display, a backlit keyboard, a USB Type-Charging port. The Notebook Air starts at roughly $520 and goes all the way up to $750. Starting with the smaller of two, the 12.5-inch model is only 12.9mm thick and weighs 1.07kg. It packs in Intel Core M3 CPU with no dedicated GPU, 4GB of RAM and 128GB of SSD. It is priced at $520. The 13.3-inch model, which is 14.8mm thick and weighs 1.28kg, packs in Intel Core i5-6200U Skylake-U processor, an Nvidia GeForce 940MX GPU, 8GB of DDR4 RAM, 256GB of SSD. It is powered by a 40Wh battery, which according to company's claim can last for up to 9.5 hours on a single charge, but can be charged from 0 to 50 percent in half an hour using the bundled USB-C charger. It is priced at $750. No word on when -- and if -- the laptop will be available outside China.
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E) Certainly not the Spanish government!
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That was unexpected...
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<resigned voice> nobody expects the spanish inquisition... </resigned voice>
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What government?
2 elections in 6 months and still in crisis.
Who is spying on me? (Score:5, Insightful)
Honestly, I'm far less about the Chinese spying on me than my government. I mean, what do the Chinese care about me, other than as a potential customer? My own government though - anything I might do or talk about that poses a legitimate threat to the powers that be is liable to get me labeled as a terrorist and sorely inconvenienced if not outright "disappeared".
And as the level of corruption in our governments become clear, the obligation upon us all to begin fighting back against the current oligarchies steadily increases. I doubt I'll be the one that comes up with a solution, but when my government is spying on me, I can only assume it's also spying on those who *are* coming up with solutions. And that it will spare no expense in making sure such solutions are destroyed before they even begin to gather the necessary momentum.
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This feature runs on the phone, built in to the telephone app, so to use it for spying your phone would already have to be compromised. In which case they can already turn your GPS on whenever they like anyway.
Generally speaking though there is no need for them to bother hacking your device. The phone company is legally required to track your phone at all times anyway.
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Did you post in the wrong article? We're talking about notebooks, not phones.
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Yep, I had the Android phone location thingy tab open. Oops.
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I mean, what do the Chinese care about me, other than as a potential customer?
As another node in their government-funded-and-operated botnet, so when they're ready to start World War III, they can use U.S.-based botnet nodes to attack internet-connected U.S. infrastructure, like the power grid, other utilities, U.S. military assets, etc. as well as using them as proxies to hack into U.S. military and government systems to steal information. But you personally? Nothing. The Chinese government, demonstrably, documentably doesn't really care that much about individual human lives. You'r
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Perhaps, but that's an issue completely unrelated to spying.
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What computer do you use and where was it made?
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Home built desktop, parts made all over the world with final assembly on my kitchen table... Unfortunately it runs Windows, so Redmond WA is monitoring me.
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As long as you don't go online, you should be fine.
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So you're saying the firmware in the hard drive, the DVD drive, on the video card, and in the mouse are all code you've not stepped through carefully? Not even the KEYBOARD microcontroller's firmware???
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To be fair, the Windows 10 on it is doing the most spying of all.
jesus christ (Score:1, Insightful)
It's too early in the day to parse that word salad of a headline.
Re:jesus christ (Score:4, Funny)
Nobody reads summaries anymore. Now we have to fit it all in the title.
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What's a Xiaomi and why does it cost $520?
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(company name) launches (product name) [missing "a"] Windows 10 laptop featuring [missing "a"] 1080p display, starts at $520.
So, two missing "a" and you can't parse a title? I've seen much worst right here on Slashdot, especially because of the english-style "word case" where common words with an uppercase first letter just confuses things even more.
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The same goes for Apple. They weren't the first company to come out with ultrathin laptops.
The real thing to trash millenials for is this "ownership culture" of theirs. The first person to spew something terribly obvious or cliche is automatically declared the owner of it.
Not trustworthy (Score:2, Informative)
This sounds kind of interesting until you you google the company's name and you come across posts like this one:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/general/security/xiaomi-firmware-multiple-backdoords-t2847069
I wouldn't trust that hardware.
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By the first sentence of the summary, at least one writes it.
I'll repeat it here just in case manishs sobers up and fixes it:
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Bit of an unfair generalization.
Plenty of Indians write like that too.
aka Macbook Pro? (Score:1)
This look extraordinarily similar to a Macbook Pro.
(And even more than the usual 'resemblance' that Xiaomi's products have for other manufacturer's products).
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This look extraordinarily similar to a Macbook Pro.
(And even more than the usual 'resemblance' that Xiaomi's products have for other manufacturer's products).
Yes. And that's a good thing. The basic shape of a continuous aluminium block is very effective. It doesn't break or fall apart. My MBP would be in the bin by now if it was from Lenovo or HP. It would have fallen apart.
If I wanted a Linux laptop, I suspect this would be it.
Fortune? (Score:1)
Re: Fortune? (Score:1)
No, that would be Forbes.
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A 1080p screen and inexpensive? That's great! But the screen is too damn tiny, the company doesn't have a proven track record (I wouldn't be surprised if lots failed from the heat or mechanical issues). I guess we'll keep buying Dells and stuff for a while longer.
Dell's don't fall apart? I've seen a few that did.
1080p is 1920x1080. A 13" retina display is 2560x1600. I have both (a work laptop and a personal MBP). There is no comparison. The retina display is simply better to work on.
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Yes, does it come with a magnifying glass? Will someone have the guts to make 1600x900 panels so the user can, you know, use the laptop?
Putting in panels that read "1080p" and "Full HD" pleases middle-aged men in suits (who will keep using their mac pro book or whatever) and idiot journalists.
But on a laptop, you'll run Win32, GTK2, Qt4, Fltk etc. applications or newer stuff that might not scale properly anyway.
1080p 12.5" is suitable for a tablet, or a small TV / special media player, not a laptop.
Linux? (Score:5, Insightful)
can you wipe windows and native-boot Linux on it? Not interested otherwise.
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and can they add a trackpoint on the keyboard... that would be a perfect laptop (oh, put 16gigs ram into 12" model, and a 1T SSD...).
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You can run Linux on it, unless the BIOS/UEFI is fucked. There have been quite a few devices that really could only run Windows 10 due to UEFI lockdown.
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Can you get the laptop at a discount, without Windows 10 on it?
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As long as you don't disturb the Central Committee's backdoors, have at it.
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OMG how cool would it be if it came with Red Star OS!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
My stash of Thinkpads with Windows 7... (Score:2)
look more and more desirable by the day.
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look more and more desirable by the day.
You are one sick puppy...
Compatibility? (Score:2)
Too bad (Score:1)
Too bad it has backdoored Intel CPU... can't they make some non-US ARM ones?
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Why would you need a display with a resolution higher than 1080P to run low resolution systems?
A MacBook Air without the Apple logo (Score:3)
I wonder if they copied the UEFI as well, if so, this could be a cheap Mac clone (given it doesn't have yesteryear's wifi and Bluetooth).
"no dedicated GPU" (Score:2)
I presume they mean Intel integrated GPU, rather than some software-only display solution, because Intel CPUs have come with pretty decent on-die GPUs for a few years now.
It sounds like the usual ignorant bashing of integrated GPUs all over again. I guess it was true in the very early 2000s or so, but now it's just silly. For example, AMD has advertised their APU chips with the slogan of "discrete-level GPUs", since they've included Radeon GPUs on the same die, naturally with much fewer processing units
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I am typing this on an AMD APU system that claims to have an integrated Radeon HD 8400, and I can assure you that it is terrible gutter trash and is barely functional with any significant applications running.
So, just like having a real Radeon then?
I kid, I kid. I'm not going to look that one up, but a lot of these integrated chipsets are nothing like what the model number would imply. I remember nVidia outright changed the name they were reporting for a couple of different integrated video chipsets, without actually doing anything to improve performance. That was worth a snicker, too.
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> I'm guessing that those who choose an "Air" laptop with a big-ass Nvidia GPU,
> don't know what they're doing.
Yeah? Just wait few months for Xiaomi VR system. :) I think they know what they are doing.
Sick of hearing about Xiaomi (Score:2)
It is priced at $750. No word on when -- and if -- the laptop will be available outside China.
So why even convert the price to USD? For that matter why even post the story on slashdot? I doubt the Chinese government allows their citizens access to slashdot.
Why? (Score:2)
Why is it so expensive?