The original Xiaomi Mi Box that was available internationally was a hit and although wasn’t available in stores here quite a few purchased one for their home entertainment system. Today Xiaomi announced their new version of the Mi Box, the Mi Box 4.
The Mi Box 4 is Xiaomi’s attempt to integrate into their smart ecosystem with a device that can connect to the rest of the Xiaomi devices around your house.
The Mi Box 4 comes in two variants, a Mi Box 4 and a Mi Box 4c. The 4 is the higher specced version and is only available in white, measuring 1.6cm thick. It weighs just 145 grams with 2GB of RAM and 8GB of internal storage onboard.
The Mi Box 4c has just 1GB of RAM and 4GB of internal storage and comes in a matte black colour.
The devices have a 3.5mm composite output, Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n, one HDMI port and a USB port. Both devices support 4K HDR Ultra HD, h.265 hardware decoding and supports Dolby + DTS audio output. Only the Mi Box 4 supports Bluetooth while the 4c does not so comes with an IR remote control instead of the Bluetooth one that comes with the 4.
As with every new device lately, the Mi Box 4 (and 4c) comes with AI technology that learns the users watching habits to provide content recommendations. Xiaomi have also included a digital voice assistant, PatchWall, allowing the user to search for keywords, open apps, check the weather or calendar.
The Mi Box 4 may well be running Android underneath but will run a customised MIUI interface on top, and not the Android TV that the original Mi Box ran.
The Mi Box 4 is priced at 349 Yuan ($66AU) and the Mi Box 4c will cost 249 Yuan ($47AU). Pre-order begins now and shipping starts in just a few days on February the 1st. Unfortunately the Mi Box 4 is only available in China and we cannot see it ever coming to Australia, or even being useful here.
My Xiaomi Mi Box is a favourite in our house so this follow up is really disappointing.
will run a customised MIUI interface = boo
only available in China and we cannot see it ever coming to Australia = boo. But then I doubt I would by it with the customised interface.