New Xiaomi TV Stick 4K with more power and HDR10+ is here
The original Xiaomi TV Stick 4K was launched about two years ago—a fundamentally solid product, but many users were bothered by the lack of support for some HDR formats. Today, the second-generation model was launched, which fixes this problem and brings numerous other improvements.
The Xiaomi TV Stick 4K 2nd Generation features a new chipset with a quad-core Cortex-A55 CPU and an ARM Mali-G310 V2 GPU. Compared to the old chip with four A35s and a Mali-G31 MP2 GPU, the new network player offers 80% higher CPU performance and a whopping 150% increase in GPU performance. However, the storage capacity remains unchanged at 2 GB RAM and 8 GB storage.
The stick now runs the Google TV interface. Google has caused some confusion with the naming of its TV products—Google TV is the name of the current software. Android TV is the older interface, but also the name of the operating system.
The new stick supports not only Dolby Vision but also HDR10+, which was missing from the first-generation stick. For audio, it supports both Dolby Atmos and DTS:X. The original stick already supported AV1 decoding, as does this one. Connectivity has been upgraded to the faster Wi-Fi 6/ax instead of Wi-Fi 5/ac. Bluetooth, however, remains unchanged with version 5.2.
Xiaomi TV Stick 4K 2nd Generation with Bluetooth Remote Control
The included remote control has some new buttons. It uses Bluetooth because the stick is likely hidden behind the TV and infrared doesn’t work (IR requires line of sight). In addition to the Netflix and Prime Video buttons, YouTube and app buttons have been added.
The Xiaomi TV Stick 4K 2nd Generation is already available on AliExpress for €40 / $46 – with a reported 52% discount. Various other retailers should follow soon.
