Xiaomi is reportedly planning to launch its new Android TV-powered Mi Box in the USA and other markets in “early Q4 2016”, according to a Xiaomi source speaking to TechCrunch.
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TechCrunch reports that the Mi Box will launch “as soon as October” for under $100, citing an anonymous Xiaomi source.
All of this has occurred away from Western markets – currently, the company only sells a handful of headphones and USB battery packs in its United States online store. Miami will also offer a Mi Game Controller, sold separately from the Mi Box. The Mi Box isn’t likely to put Xiaomi on America’s radar the way a good phone might, but it would be the furthest it’s stuck its toes in the West’s water. Although the Mi Box was announced in May, Xiaomi did not share any details regarding its availability on the market. We got to see the set-top box in all its glory but the company did not confirm precisely when it would release this product and how much it’s going to charge for it.
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As first described at Google I/O, the Mi Box features support for 4K Ultra HD resolution and is powered by the Android TV platform, putting it in the same range of devices as the Nvidia Shield TV or the Asus Nexus Player. It runs Android OS and packs a quad-core ARM CPU, complemented by a Mali 450 graphics processing unit, 2GB RAM and 8GB of internal memory. The single HDMI 2.0a port sends 4K video to your TV at 60 frames per second, while Dolby Digital Plus support makes for immersive audio.
