• expired

Xiaomi Mi 5 4G Phone - 5.15", 3GB/32GB, Snapdragon 820 $289.99 US (~$379.33 AU) Shipped @ Geekbuying

210
This post contains affiliate links. OzBargain might earn commissions when you click through and make purchases. Please see this page for more information.

Tonight Geekbuying have the Xiaomi Mi 5 on sale for $289.99 US with free shipping.

The phone is running MIUI 7 (Android 6.0 Marshmallow) with a powerful Snapdragon 820 SoC, inbuilt NFC and fast charging support.

  • TNT Shipping is not available for this phone.

Also checkout Geekbuying's Tablet Promotion including the Jumper Ezpad Mini 3 tablet for $78.99 US.


Mi 5 Specifications

  • MIUI 7 (Based on Android 6.0 Marshmallow)
  • 5.15" 1920x1080 FHD IPS Display w/ Corning Gorilla Glass 4
  • Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 Quad-core CPU @ 1.8GHz
  • Adreno 530 GPU
  • 3GB LPDDR4 RAM
  • 32GB Storage (UFS 2.0)
  • Dual Nano SIM
  • 16.0MP Rear Camera (Sony IMX298), 4.0MP Front Camera
  • 3000mAh Battery
  • Fingerprint Reader, NFC, IR Sensor, USB Type-C, Fast Charging (QC 3.0)
  • 2G: GSM 850 /900 /1800/ 1900MHz
  • 3G: WCDMA 850 /900/1900/2100MHz
  • 4G: FDD-LTE B1/3/7(1800/2100/2600MHz), TDD-LTE:38/39/40/41
  • Bluetooth 4.2, Dual Band WiFi (802.11 a/b/g/n/ac)
  • GPS, A-GPS, GLONASS, Beidou
  • 144.55 x 69.2 x 7.25mm
  • 129g (Lighter than the Redmi Note 3)

Package contents: Phone, Type-C cable, Eject pin & Power adapter

Don't forget 3.20% cashback at Cashrewards

Related Stores

Geekbuying
Geekbuying

closed Comments

    • +2

      these tests are just plain stupid.

      • Although I agree the tests aren't very scientific there still seems to be some validity when you compare the video to other phones that don't bend (by the same guy). For example the Note 7 https://youtu.be/571pu66vEBc?t=3m56s and many others. The Mi5 seems to bend VERY easily. For people that keep their phones in either front or back pockets in tight jeans these tests would be of interest.

    • +3

      If you push with all your strength at literally the middle of your phone and do not relent for ages, it will crack in half?

      • except that there are plenty of phones that don't. See my comment above.

    • Perhaps don't forcefully bend your phone, and all will be good! Also don't take various sharp object and scratch the screen and back casing with them in a certain order.

  • Replacement for boot looped LG G4?

    Decent replacement???

    • +2

      I'm in the same boat ….. Will never buy LG again, that's for sure.

      It's very difficult to find a direct "china brand" replacement for the LG's specs, as almost none of them have LTE Band 28(700mhz).

      • +1

        This is the only xiaomi that has band 28: http://www.geekbuying.com/item/Xiaomi-Redmi-Note-3-Pro-5-5-I…

        Not sure if it match the lg's specs tho

        • +5

          I'll have that one on sale later in the week too.

        • Good find, The international model must be a new addition to the Note 3 line…. I hadn't seen it before.

        • +3

          @ash2000: Released for the Taiwan market who use B28 like us.

        • +1

          that will be good as the Australian carriers are using band 28 for LTE aggregation so twice the speed of non band 28 connections.

        • @Clear:

          Ah Ok…. Thanks. Was also looking at the Asus Zenfone 3 (TW version). That has B28 also, which makes sense.

        • +2

          @garage sale:

          twice the speed of non band 28 connections.

          B28's "long range" and penetrability of buildings is the thing that appeals to me most. Speed is just an added bonus!

        • @ash2000: Looks like you accidentally hit the associated box ;)

        • +1

          @Clear:

          Ooops…… Ta!

        • Tempted to wait for the,3gb/42gb version noted to be discounted and available on 30/08

        • @garage sale: That's assuming the Redmi supports carrier aggregation. Everything I've seen so far suggests it does not, but I haven't managed to get one to test.

      • Mine happened last night.
        Still waiting for QD-AU on eBay to get back to me.

        • Mine happened last night.

          Typically it happens after 6 to 12 months of use. Same story for the G3, G4 and some LG nexus phones.

          When I factory rest mine I can get it up and running again….. But I never know when it will next fail. Typically, it happens at the most inopportune times. It's made me very reluctant to spend big $$ on a replacement phone when I can simply get a very well spec'ed china handset for sub $300.

        • @ash2000:
          No joy after factory reset either…….

          Still no response or reply from supplier

        • @albanyson:

          How long since you bought it?

          Is it Australian stock?

        • @ash2000:

          QD-AU eBay purchase
          Bought Oct 2015
          Serial Number 509, (2015/sept)

        • @albanyson:

          September 2015 manufacture date is the dodgy stock. Fingers crossed the seller does the right thing. Of course it will likely be a slow process. :(

        • @ash2000:
          6-8 weeks turn around has been noted on some other threads……up to around 3mknths depending on how busy they are.
          Gets sent back direct from LG

      • My nexus 5 gave me boot loop after one yr.
        I will never touch LG and most of Korean products!

    • +6

      An astonishingly good replacement!

      I just got the 4Gb/128Gb 'Black, Ceramic, Pro' version of this phone from "Hong Kong Goldway" on Aliexpress for AUD$651 including DHL shipping (should come down to about $605 with CashRewards). Xiaomi has dropped their retail price by about AUD$40 since I ordered, so it'll be a bit cheaper now.

      I ordered on a Monday evening (6pm, 1st August) and had the phone in my hands in Sydney, Australia by lunchtime Friday (11:16 am, 5th August)! Best service I've ever had from China!

      I've used it happily on Vodafone (Hello Mobile, Lebara Mobile) and Optus (Optus) networks. The phone connects to 4G and 4G+ on both networks with no dramas at all, and download speeds are quick as you'd expect with 4G. With two SIM cards inserted, you tell the phone which SIM should be your default for data and for calls/messages (can be the same, or different). The phone connects to the network you've designated as 'data' with best available 4G, and to the other with 3G. Both SIM slots are 4G capable, both SIM slots are active at the same time (for eg: I have my regular number on Vodafone for calls/texts and another number using one of those $2 Optus $10 starter packs from Coles for data. 500Gb/day for five days and $2 ain't to be sneezed at!).

      I haven't tried Telstra yet, but if someone can point me to a cheap starter pack that will allow me to try it, I'm happy to do so and report back.

      The 'flagship' Xiaomi phones, Mi5, Mi4, Mi3, don't accept a flash memory card.

      I upgraded from a 2Gb/16Gb Xiaomi Mi 3 phone that I've had for 18 months. The Mi 5 is, as you'd expect, very noticeably faster. The extra 2Gb of RAM in the Pro version makes a massive difference. Things like Pokemon Go will stay in memory in the background without swapping out after a few minutes like it does with the 2Gb phone, and everything starts at lightening speed.

      Despite that Xiaomi claim that this is their first phone with 'full NFC support', it still doesn't work. I've tried adding an NAB Visa card to the phone. It adds fine, but when I've tried to use it at Woolworths and McDonalds, the terminals say "please insert card". I think that NFC is probably still a broken technology.

      This phone has IR Blaster (Mi 3 had NFC and no IR, Mi 4 had no NFC and IR, Mi 5 finally has both).

      MIUI version 8 is available in a global developer rom (Xiaomi have 'global' and 'china' roms in 'stable' and 'developer' versions) available now. MIUI 8 global stable is rumoured to be due in a couple of weeks. It already works fine, I'm running MIUI 8 6.8.18/Android 6.0.1 on the Mi5 and 6.8.11/6.0.1 on the Mi3 already. No hassles at all.

      Mi 5 apparently supports Quick Charge 3.0. I'm still waiting for a '3.0' charger to arrive, but I've tested with a Quick Charge 2.0 charger and, as expected, it charges quickly! :-)

      The Mi 5 has a USB Type C connector. Works flawlessly. Cables are a bit hard to find in local stores. Officeworks asks $30 for a USB-A to USB-C cable, and a guy in one store told me they sell out as soon as they get new stock. Far more reasonable prices can be had online.

      Xiaomi have a little Type-C-male to Micro-USB-female adaptor (packaging for this product appears to be genuine) for around four dollars. It works fine for charge and data.

      I've used a frosted matte glass screen protector - the frosted approach feels a little odd at first, but it grows on you quickly, I recommend it - and a firm-ish TPU plastic case - Sydney seller, arrived quickly, fits very well - to round things out. The phone with a ceramic back is a very very slippery little sucker, it really needs a case to stop it sliding off your lap, desk, whatever and onto the floor all the time!

      I can't speak directly for the 2Gb version of the phone, I haven't tried it, but in all other respects, it's a really really nice phone, I'm very happy with it, would buy again! :-)

      edit: I should add that in this phone and other recently released models, Xiaomi has started locking the boot loader, ostensibly to thwart dodgy sellers who load all kinds of adware, unofficial roms and general junk on the phones before shipping, and also to make it more difficult for a thief to disable find-my-phone functions. They will allow you to unlock it if you wish, you just need to submit a request online in copy-pasted-from-google-translate Chinese and wait a little while. Some folks have reported a 2 week wait, my approval came in a couple of days. My phone arrived with a genuine global MIUI 7 rom installed, I wanted MIUI 8, so I jumped through the hoops and upgraded it. It was a bit of a hassle, I think it'll get easier when the stable global rom is out. Happy to help with advice if you try and get stuck.

      • Great write up, great real world feed back and great info.

        Does the lack of B28 get noticeable at all?

        After losing my LG G4 to boot loop….I dont want to spend more than 400.

        200 would be ideal. Hough realistically 200-400 should get me something decent at a fair price.

        Tempted.on the 3gb/32gb version as above in the comment

        • This is the first phone I've had that does 4G (I upgraded from an Xiaomi Mi 3 2Gb/8Gb model) so my experience is limited. I spend much of my time within, say, a 20Km radius of the Sydney CBD and the phone is pretty much always connected to 4G+ while out and about, or 4G when it's also got a WiFi connection.

          Occasionally, in dodgy signal locations (such as my garage, in a shopping centre, etc) it'll drop down to one of the faster version of 3G (usually 'H+'), but that seems reasonable in the situations where it happens.

          So, short answer, no, I don't notice the lack of B28.

      • Hows the camera quality?

        • Awesome! Better than any phone camera I've had before. Astonishingly good for such a tiny gadget!

          Having said that, it's not actually tiny, as mobile phone cameras go. Because it has optical image stabilisation built in, the camera module is actually fairly large.

          Have a look at this video, an official teardown by a guy who works for Xiaomi - it looks like maybe he's training repair techs or something). At the fourteen minute mark, he compares the Mi5 camera module to a module from a previous Mi phone. It's a lot bigger. A few seconds after that he demo's how the optical image stabilisation moves the whole lense around.

  • +1

    Does not have 4G band 28 for Telstra/Optus nor band 5 for Vodafone.

    At nearly $400 they're pretty big compromises.

    • -1

      That's a big negative.

    • Shrug, my Mi5Pro works fine on 4G on Voda and Optus. Haven't tried Telstra yet.

  • thought you guys cant send phones/batteries to australia?

    • It's only power banks that most postal companies are rejecting currently. Inbuilt batteries are fine.

  • +3

    lack of Australian band support limits the appeal

    • +21

      Yep. Well said. I'm not buying until it supports Silverchair and Savage Garden

      • +1

        I think he meant rubber band.

      • +2

        Not worth until it supports Killing Heidi too tbh

  • +2

    i will highly recommend you guys to stay away from this website, i bought an android tablet which does not work and have serious issue. I tried to claim the warranty and came to know this website does not have Australian address where i can ship the tablet on. Australia post is also not sending it to Hong Kong because of battery and now the only option is other couriers. These guys are not helpful at all. This was my experience with them.

    • As I explained previously. Auspost accept lithium batteries. It's likely that the staff at the PO you visited were not aware of the changes.

  • +1

    aliexpress is slightly cheaper at USD 284.99 if you go for white/gold color versions
    http://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/Original-xiaomi-Mi5-…

  • THis model has teething GPS issue, it does not work well for some reason which means you can't play some of the games using GPS (eg Pokemon Go and Ingress etc).

    • This post provides a solution to that particular issue if it's the google.maps lock issue you are posting about.
      http://en.miui.com/thread-319797-1-1.html

      • Basically says it was a problem with most recent version of google maps and suggests using an older version.

      • Thanks! I have been having GPS issues. Will try this.

  • It looks like there may be hope to getting band 5 and band 28 unlocked.

    http://forum.xda-developers.com/mi-5/how-to/mi5-mi-max-unloc…

    Also the mi5 prime is $330usd on aliexpress. Besides the 64gig of storage it also has the normal (non underclocked) snapdragon 820 which is a good bonus. I think the price from xiaomi direct in China is about $315usd so not much mark-up since postage is included too.

  • Any deals on 64gb and 128gb?

  • Hi Clear. I purchased this and i recently stopped getting service on my phone…I have tried everything I can find on the internet with no positive outcome. How do I get in touch for warranty purposes? Is there a service centre in Aus?

    • Have you tried the simcard with another phone?

      • +1

        Yeah I have. Also went to get a new sim but still didn't work. Tried toggling airplane mode as well, and checking all the radios were on. Seems like a lot of people have similar issues on the Xiaomi forum when I googled the problem.

        I'm going to try update the phone to latest firmware when I get the chance on a computer since for some reason I can't flash updates via the in-phone application?

        Nonetheless, I just want to know how to access the last resort if it still doesn't fix the problem.

        • Geekbuying would probably ask for it to be returned to a warehouse in China or Hong Kong.

Login or Join to leave a comment