Xiaomi.
If you have a friend who is really into Android phones you might have heard that name before.
Xiaomi is a Chinese consumer electronics company that started making software, then phones
and now all sorts of products.
A lot of people like to call them "the Apple of China" and it is hard to deny they take
a lot of creative inspiration from Apple.
From design to the way they do product reveals.
And while some people will quickly brush them aside as a simple copy cat the reality is that this
brand is a huge deal in Asia and is very quickly becoming a well known name on this side of
the world as well, with a growing number of options for importing Xiaomi devices to the
west.
Some people consider that an opportunity of having a "apple quality" device on a different
OS for a lower price.
So when Xiaomi announced they where planning to start doing laptops last year a lot of
people got exited.
This is the 13 inch version of that… the Xiaomi Notebook Air 13.
This is being sold as an import from china by places like GearBest.
Link to this laptop is in the description.
Since this is a chinese model it came with one of those Windows version that are only
in Chinese and required a full Windows reinstall, or at least that is what I think because I
could never figure out how to change the language.
And while there are a ton of interesting reviews out there about the quality vs price of this
device, it is what is inside this thing that caught my attention.
Looking at this device, and its name, it is obvious this is meant to be another contender
for the market of "put as much power as you can on a thin portable laptop while keeping
decent battery life"
On its heart it has a Intel Core i5-7200U an ultra low voltage dual core CPU meant to
use as little power as possible, a monumental 8 GB of ram.
As for the GPU well… this an Optimus laptop.
If you are not familiar with the term Optimus, it is a technology that allows a laptop to
switch between two GPUs, an integrated low power GPU and a better dedicated one, with
the ability to select which program will use which GPU.
That way you can theoretically maximize battery use and still have a decent GPU when you need
it.
The low powered GPU on this device is an IntelHD Graphics 620, a newer intelHD included on the i5.
If you are limited to gaming on this device you can actually get a lot out of it.
Out of curiosity I decided to launch the GTA V benchmark an all the lowest settings and
shadows removed using the configuration file and I was surprised to see it gave playable
results.
It still has trouble in certain areas but it provides a result way over what I
expected.
You might see this more of this intelHD in the future, as I might use it for some intense games.
The other GPU in this laptop is a dedicated Nvidia MX150, wait what?
If you are as confused as I was the MX150 is new development that starting showing up
in new laptops after August.
And from what it could gather it is not meant for modern AAA games but rather to provide
decent performance on ultra thin notebooks, only promising decent performance on highly
optimized E-sports titles.
A quick look into benchmarks apparently locates it in power way under the GTX 750 that I used
on the budget VR video and interestingly enough under the GTX 460.
For reference, I have used the 7 year old GTX 460 in this channel in a number of videos.
it is usually my last resort when dealing with a game that unoptimized to that no other
devices will play it, even after reducing graphics to the minimum.
So, given that, as people get new laptops for school or work a lot of people would be
curious about the gaming possibilities of this particular GPU...
I asked myself: "Could super low graphics and performance tweaks allow this super thin
laptop to play some really heavy AAA releases?"
For this purpose I picked 3 of the games that have given me the most trouble recently and
got to work.
First Nier: Automata.
This game's performance issues are well known and still discussed.
And on 720 will all the settings to the lowest the game was giving me around 27 fps on the
open areas, an on 1080 closer to 18.
This game does not behave well under 30.
Thankfully, the FAR mod that I used on the video is still perfectly usable, disabling
global illumination makes it climb between 45 and 50 for 720 which is pretty fluid and
even as high as 1080 it manages to maintain something close to 30.
Good!
That was quite the change.
Another title I wanted to try is Dishonored 2, which some people have called them one
of the worst PC ports of last year, or just ever, with widespread performance issues even
on high end systems.
I recently did a video explaining how to disable a series of posts effects and fog in the game
for a small boost in performance.
That, combined with the lowest settings and a resolution of 720p managed to nail between
35 and 40 FPS on open areas, although it is worth mentioning it does much better on on
smaller areas, even while in combat.
But the performance is all over the place, as long you use a cap or some patience is
can be considered quite playable.
Another thing I wanted to try is Unknownplayer's Battleground, which seems to be hottest thing
in the universe at the moment.
A lot of people still complain quite vocally about this game's performance on all systems
across the board, which is why I made a video about some interesting tweaks for it.
Before heading that way tough I need to acknowle some things.
Bluehole on their website has stated that changing the configuration files is not permitted.
You can imagine the opinions I have about this, I understand this in order to avoid
cheating but barring people from changing configuration files all together seems a bit
extreme, specially when people have been looking for performance tweaks on files since the
start of PC Gaming… and it could be argued some of these actually put people in a disadvantage.
In any case, I will add a disclaimer here that I will have on all future mentions of
this game and in the description of the old video.
If you decide to use any of these tweaks you do so at your own risk so, be aware of that.
So in the name of science I disabled a bunch of effects anyway and launched the game on
720 and lowest settings.
Interestingly enough the game has received some optimizations since I last talked about
it, and that, together with the bunch of things I disabled, makes for better performance than
I expected.
I still noticed slowdowns on open areas but it did not drop under what I would consider
playable, and having some really high numbers on some specific areas specially with the
lighting disabled.
So yeah, apart from the fact that I can never accurately rely on these types of benchmarks
for lowest settings it is obvious that, if tweaks are available, you can get really good
performance on some intense games on ultra portable laptops.
So… what do you think?
Did you experience an aneurysm by seeing such an obviously overpowered GPU on this channel?
And, do not worry, I am going back to Intel Atom gaming for the next video.
Do you think gaming on laptops will always be a lost cause?
Or is this actually worth it?
Let me know.
See you all in the next video.
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