Xiaomi, as a brand, is most known for its smartphones. Maybe even its TVs. But audio products? No.
The company is trying to change that impression as it has recently launched a new smart speaker in the country. The Xiaomi Smart Speaker IR Control retails for Rs 4,999.
It’s foremost a smart speaker, but it’s got an IR blaster up its sleeve. The IR blaster lets you control your remote-control appliances that aren’t already “smart”. It can also show you the time on its LCD display. The smart speaker has Google Assistant which is driven by a 1.5-inch, 360-degree speaker module.
That’s Xiaomi’s Smart Speaker IR Control in a nutshell. The Smart Speaker (as I’ll refer to it hereon) is pretty compact. It measures about 5.6 inches in height and weighs under 650 grams. This is a speaker you can put in any room and table. The speaker comes with two mics, four touch buttons, and a One-Dot LED (to tell you the time). The single down-firing speaker’s grille covers all four sides of the bottom of the device.
There are three downsides to the Smart Speaker. First, the speaker is made out of matte black plastic. This means that the device shows a lot of dust and requires one to regularly clean it. Second, the device requires a constant power connection as it doesn’t come with any battery. There’s a port on the back for the power cable. Lastly, the light on the LED can get very bright at night, and could disturb oneself.
The top of the device features the controls for adjusting volume, muting the microphone and playing/pausing. It’s pretty self-explanatory and works with relative ease.
The design may be plain, but it has got a good build quality to it. For this price range, Xiaomi has done a good job.
To set up the Smart Speaker, one needs to go through two different apps. First, fire up the Google Home app to start the setup process. Second, you’ll need to do further setting up inside the Mi Home app. Both apps can be uninstalled, but that is not recommended as they do come with useful features.
The Mi Home app is useful for changing the home automation settings and even configuring the IR control feature. The Google Home app, on the other hand, allows for you to active Voice Match, volume levels, accessibility features and much more.
The Smart Speaker can be connected to another device via Bluetooth (the speaker supports Bluetooth 5.0) or over Chromecast. One can connect the Smart Speaker to a smartphone, tablet, or even a smart TV.
Coming to the audio quality of the Smart Speaker. Overall, the bass is weak. One can’t expect much from a 1.5-inch driver. It’s the mid-range that shines the most and there is good vocal clarity in the songs. What the Smart Speaker is good for is filling up a small room with its sound. The treble is bright, vocals come with good tonality and there is some good energy to the songs coming from this speaker.
The microphone performance was strictly okay. One has to shout to get Google Assistant to listen to the “Okay, Google” command while any song is playing. Don’t try shouting the command while playing a song at 75% volume. Most of the time, the speaker will fail to recognise your voice.
Is it worth the relatively inexpensive price tag?
At Rs 4,999, the Smart Speaker IR Control from Xiaomi is a device that outperforms its stature. Its main competitors are the Home Mini from Google and the Echo Dot from Amazon. It comes out as the winner in a three-way fight as it sounds better. Don’t go by the looks here. The Smart Speaker also has the IR control trick up its sleeve and can do more than most other smart speakers out there.
The Smart Speaker IR Control’s USP is its smarts rather than sound quality, and that isn’t necessarily a bad thing, in this case. It does have a lot of “smarts” going for it and keep it on a table in your room and it’ll be a nice little daily companion.
