Now that Xiaomi‘s regular flagship smartphones have been pushed more into the premium segment of the market, the smartphone that people like me are more interested in has become their T series. And today, the company has launched a brand new set of devices called the Xiaomi 12T and Xiaomi 12T Pro.
The crazy part? One of them has an insane 200MP camera.
Xiaomi 12T & 12T Pro Malaysian pricing and availability
The Xiaomi 12T series will come in three configurations. Pre-orders for the device start on the 4th of October 2022 at 10pm and will go on until the 12th of October 2022 at authorised Xiaomi stores and retailers nationwide. It will also be available online at Xiaomi official stores on both Shopee and Lazada. The prices are as follows:
Xiaomi 12T, 8GB + 256GB – RM1,999
Xiaomi 12T Pro, 8GB + 256GB – RM2,699
Xiaomi 12T Pro, 12GB + 256GB – RM2,999
If you pre-order the devices, you will get a bunch of free gifts. Pre-ordering the Xiaomi 12T either online or at authorised stores will net you a pair of Redmi Buds 3 Pro for free, worth RM239. If you pre-order the Xiaomi 12T Pro in-store, you will receive a free Xiaomi Smart Band 7 Pro (worth RM299) and a pair of Redmi Buds 3 Pro (worth RM239. However, if you pre-order the Xiaomi 12T Pro online, you’ll receive a free Mi Watch instead (worth RM469).
Every purchase of any of a Xiaomi 12T series device, will also include a 1+1 year extended warranty worth RM499 plus a free screen replacement worth RM199.
Xiaomi 12T Pro
Leading the lineup is the Xiaomi 12T Pro. It’s definitely the more capable of the two devices and it does not pull any punches when it comes to the spec sheet. This smartphone packs a Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 processor with up to 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM and 256GB of UFS 3.1 internal storage.
Keeping the lights on, you also get a sweet 5,000 mAh battery, but the kicker here is that the phone supports fast charging of up to 120W via the included USB Type C cable and charging brick. Despite the lower wattage though, Xiaomi claims the same 0-100% charge time as the OnePlus 10T, which is 19 minutes.
I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced charging like this before, but it is absolutely game-changing to the way you charge a smartphone. Coupled with the large capacity battery, it seems like this phone would be great for power users.
Up front, the phone also has a pretty nice screen. It’s a 6.67″ CrystalRes AMOLED DotDisplay, but it has a rather unconventional resolution. It pushes 2712×1220 pixels across the display, which means as far as resolution is concerned it is higher res than Full HD+ but not quite a Quad HD. This does give it a crisp 446 pixels per inch however. On top of that, this phone features a 120Hz refresh rate which is adaptive from 30Hz, 60Hz, 90Hz and 120Hz.
But, the star of the show here is definitely going to be that camera system. It is a triple camera setup with an 8MP ultra-wide and a 2MP macro camera, but he main shooter is a 200MP wide camera with a f/1.69 aperture lens. This sensor is Samsung’s new ISOCELL HP1 sensor and it measures 1/1.22″ with 64 micron pixels.
Naturally, this phone will support pixel binning from 4-in-1 to 16-in-1 when shooting in different conditions. On top of that, the sensor also supports Optical Image Stabilisation (OIS), and all that extra resolution is supposed to give it a detailed 2x in-sensor zoom. It is also capable of shooting 8K and HDR10+ video. For selfies, the phone features a 20MP selfie shooter.
Other nice features include a pair of stereo speakers tuned by Harman Kardon, dual SIM and 5G connectivity, plus what Xiaomi claims to be a robust cooling system for their powerful internals. They’re claiming a 65% larger vapour chamber and 125% higher thermal material coverage on this device compared to its predecessor.
The phone has Corning’s Gorilla Glass 5 on the front, as well as a frosted glass back, but the frame feels distinctively like plastic. That being said, the phone doesn’t feel cheap in the hand. In fact it feels like an improvement over its predecessor the Xiaomi 11T Pro.
Xiaomi 12T
The Xiaomi 12T is the more affordable sibling in the lineup, but it does retain a lot of the features of the 12T Pro, with a couple of sacrifices. Probably the biggest difference is the smartphone’s processor. Instead of Snapdragon’s top-of-the-line SoC, you’re getting a brand new MediaTek Dimensity 8100 Ultra chip at its core.
We’re not quite sure what the performance figures for this processor is just yet, but according to Xiaomi, the chip has been “fully upgraded” with an all-new GPU structure to increase performance and power efficiency by up to 30% compared to its predecessor. Paired to that your getting up to 8GB of RAM and up to 256GB of internal storage.
Next up, you also lose the 200MP camera on the Pro variant. But, you still get a very high resolution 108MP main wide camera at the back with an f/1.65 aperture lens, which is even larger than the Pro. Alongside it, you’re still seeing an 8MP ultra-wide camera and a 2MP macro shooter.
Besides that, the phones are almost identical. It looks almost the same, and even features the same 6.67″ AMOLED display from its Pro brother, with the 2712×1220 pixel resolution and 120Hz refresh rate. Another bit of good news is the fact that it is also powered by a 5,000 mAh battery that also supports 120W of fast-charging.
