CES 2017 is turning into the geek equivalent to what a candy shop is to a kid. I can really imagine someone looking wide-eyed at the surroundings and wondering if this is the promised land of tech heaven. But enough of romanticising about things, let's get back to brass tacks.
Rivalries are legendary in any field and, perhaps, more in the field of tech, with everyone scurrying out in the rat race to produce some bit of gadget that will make them the front runner among the colleagues. Even if you have reached that sweet moment of glory there is always danger looming in the horizon as the things are always on the flux and you need to hold on to your crown.
Xiaomi is slowly emerging as one of those serious contenders that the tech giants are getting scared of and they have good reasons to. Their motto seems to be simple – Fabulous tech at a fabulous price, no one can argue with that mindset. At its CES 2017 event, Xiaomi unveiled the latest Mi TV 4 and Mi Router HD both of which are going to be available in China in the near future and will slowly roll out to other parts of the globe .
Xiaomi Mi TV 4 features a frameless design or as Xiaomi VP Hugo Barra likes to call it a "frameless TV", measures 4.9mm at its thinnest point and is being flaunted as being 30 per cent thinner than the iPhone 7.
The television is also modular in nature which means that the users can swap out motherboard and other peripherals when they want to upgrade. The entire experience comes bundled with the Mi TV Bar, which boasts of 10 speakers, 2 wireless rear satellite speakers, and a subwoofer. Mi TV 4 is also the first in the line-up that has Dolby Atmos audio technology aimed to provide a cinema-grade experience to the viewer.
And to gift wrap this entire experience into a sweet "I love technology" gift, Mi TV 4 has an AI (artificial intelligence) based recommendations UI called PatchWall, which is not exactly an AI built from scratch and relies on the Android OS platform but it is supposed to be based on deep learning technology, which means that it can rummage through the meta data of movies and TV shows and cross reference it with the viewer's preferences and can churn out a tailor made experience.
Xiaomi hasn't announced the exact price for Mi TV 4 but Barra promised that it will be "well under" $2,000, making it really good piece of tech at a very affordable price. Tech giants across the world, I hope you guys are taking pointers from this.
