Xiaomi phones in the U.S...

[Eshelmen]

Hi All,

I am very late to the party here with this brand. Probably because they seem to not work great(or at all) with 4G bands out here in the U.S, so I've only just heard about them.

Why is this? They have some pretty sweet hardware in some of these, and the most expensive one is around $300!

Is there any plans for Xiaomi to change this?

 

[Fremunaln]

Many reasons, however I think one of the primary ones is that the device as a phone is probably not well supported and I do not believe they support customers/aftersales specifically in the NA

 

[Aurelius]

Hi All,

I am very late to the party here with this brand. Probably because they seem to not work great(or at all) with 4G bands out here in the U.S, so I've only just heard about them.

Why is this? They have some pretty sweet hardware in some of these, and the most expensive one is around $300!

Is there any plans for Xiaomi to change this?

As a general rule, cellular chipsets rarely support a huge variety of bands in any one configuration, so you can't simply make a phone that works equally well in every corner of the world. And Xiaomi unsurprisingly would rather favor China and main markets like India than a country where it knows it won't have a huge audience.

I wouldn't expect Xiaomi to directly sell phones in the US any time soon for one main reason: lawsuits. Xiaomi's copying of Apple has been... less than subtle at times, and officially selling phones in the US would immediately invite trade dress (and maybe patent) lawsuits. Combine that with a general distrust of Chinese vendors (although Xiaomi doesn't do cellular infrastructure) and it wouldn't be a great experience.

 

[kirbyrj]

You can always check which bands are active in your area and match them up with the Xiaomi phone you're looking at to see how well it might work. I was looking at the Mi A1 for a while, but it just didn't match up well with AT&T bands in use in my area. Might have better luck in urban areas. There are apps for your phone which will show you what 4G bands you are connected to at any given time.

 

[xDiVolatilX]

This thread was in 2019. It is now 2021 almost 2022. How about the Xiaomi Mi now? The specs are awesome with a small price tag. I've been looking around at these phones how's the cellular connection in the USA? Any reviews from anyone online or owners here?

 

[GotNoRice]

Chinese companies, such as Xiaomi, are mandated by the Chinese government to include back-doors for Chinese government officials to access information easily, and required by the Chinese government to turn over any information collected by your phone to the Chinese government immediately upon request. Using a phone designed by a Chinese company makes about as much sense as wiping your ass with jalapeño-coated toilet paper.

 

[xDiVolatilX]

Chinese companies, such as Xiaomi, are mandated by the Chinese government to include back-doors for Chinese government officials to access information easily, and required by the Chinese government to turn over any information collected by your phone to the Chinese government immediately upon request. Using a phone designed by a Chinese company makes about as much sense as wiping your ass with jalapeño-coated toilet paper.

Lmao well there goes that idea out the window haha even in USA they will pull my info? What the?

 

[GotNoRice]

Lmao well there goes that idea out the window haha even in USA they will pull my info? What the?

China doesn't care that you aren't in China. Just like the Chinese government-sponsored hacking rings don't care that the trade secrets they are stealing are coming from companies in the USA. You might think, "Why would the Chinese care about me?" and the answer is that they probably don't. That is, until you or someone like you connects to your company's internal network via WiFi and your phone gives them a backdoor into your company network. Or maybe you just have too much money in your bank account and someone in China decides that they want it. Easy, since most people use their phone and/or email for 2FA. There is just no good reason to have a phone that leaves the door open to bad people by design.

 

[xDiVolatilX]

China doesn't care that you aren't in China. Just like the Chinese government-sponsored hacking rings don't care that the trade secrets they are stealing are coming from companies in the USA. You might think, "Why would the Chinese care about me?" and the answer is that they probably don't. That is, until you or someone like you connects to your company's internal network via WiFi and your phone gives them a backdoor into your company network. Or maybe you just have too much money in your bank account and someone in China decides that they want it. Easy, since most people use their phone and/or email for 2FA. There is just no good reason to have a phone that leaves the door open to bad people by design.

Wow interesting. What's a good alternative phone? I want a good bang for your buck phone that doesn't have an oled screen. I want an LCD screen phone with good specs do you know of any? I like the samsungs but I hate the oled screens they all have

 

[CHANG3D]

Considering that Apple had to put in a backdoor for the FBI and not do end-to-end encryption because of politicians on both sides of the isle...

 

[GotNoRice]

Considering that Apple had to put in a backdoor for the FBI and not do end-to-end encryption because of politicians on both sides of the isle...

There is a difference between a democracy and a dictatorship. The FBI is not going to try to steal trade secrets from your company, control which websites you are allowed to visit, or force your phone to automatically censor certain words like "Taiwan".

More on Xiaomi...
https://www.reuters.com/business/me...se-phones-due-censorship-concerns-2021-09-21/

Flagship phones sold in Europe by China's smartphone giant Xiaomi Corp have a built-in ability to detect and censor terms such as "Free Tibet", "Long live Taiwan independence" or "democracy movement"

"Our recommendation is to not buy new Chinese phones, and to get rid of those already purchased as fast as reasonably possible"

 

[Mchart]

This gives a good overview of why you generally don't want to be using one of these wholly Chinese devices if you live in a Western country (And aren't a member of the PRC).

https://arstechnica.com/information...severe-warnings-on-chinese-smartphone-models/

Several of the Xiaomi system applications on the Mi 10T 5G regularly download a file called MiAdBlackListConfig from servers in Singapore. In this file, the NCSC found 449 records identifying religious, political, and social groups. Software classes in these Xiaomi applications use MiAdBlackListConfig to analyze multimedia which might be displayed on the device and block that content if "undesirable" keywords are associated with it.

Although the NCSC discovered that the actual content filtering via MiAdBlackListConfig is disabled on phones registered in the European Union, the phones still regularly download the blocklist itself—and, the agency says, can be remotely reactivated at any time.