Smartphone giant Xiaomi is under aggressive expansion ever since its consumer electronics portfolio took off in 2017, with the debut of its Mi TV line of affordable smart TVs. The company is now reportedly turning its attention to the desktop PC monitor market, Shortly after its April announcement of the Mi Display 1A , the company is planning a product under its Redmi brand that rewrote the rules of "bang for the buck" in the smartphones market.

Big things have small beginnings, the Redmi Monitor 1A will be a cost-cut version of the Mi Display 1A. The monitor will offer a 23.5-inch display panel with thin bezels on three sides, likely Full HD resolution, 178°/178° viewing angles, 250 cd/m² brightness, and 60 Hz refresh-rate. Uninterested? Wait till you hear what Xiaomi is reportedly asking for this thing: USD $86. That's it. The Mi Display 1A under Xiaomi's main brand goes for $99. If these two pick up traction, even in China, Xiaomi has the guts to pull off extraordinary value propositions (think a 28-inch 4K IPS monitor under $250), spelling trouble for current monitor makers. Xiaomi plans to announce the Redmi Monitor 1A along with several other consumer electronics products tomorrow (May 26).

Micron Technology, Inc., today announced it has shipped the world's first low-power DDR5 DRAM in mass production to be used in the soon-to-be-released Xiaomi Mi 10 smartphone. As Xiaomi's memory technology partner, Micron provides LPDDR5 DRAM with superior power efficiency and faster data access speeds to meet growing consumer demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and 5G functionality in smartphones.

"Micron's leadership in delivering the industry's first low-power DDR5 DRAM for use in a smartphone will accelerate enablement of 5G and AI applications," said Dr. Raj Talluri, senior vice president and general manager of the Mobile Business Unit at Micron. "Our customers and partners require next-generation memory solutions, based on the latest process technology, that drive unmatched power and performance to support 5G and AI systems. Micron's LPDDR5 DRAM addresses those requirements with a 50% increase in data access speeds and more than 20% power efficiency compared to previous generations."

"We value Micron's long-standing leadership and innovation in memory," said Chang Cheng, vice president at Xiaomi Group. "Micron's LPDDR5 DRAM market-leading features ensure our Xiaomi Mi 10 smartphone will remain power-efficient while still offering incredible performance and greater stability. We believe LPDDR5 will be the standard configuration for all flagship devices in 2020."

Xiaomi, the China-based electronics juggernaut that has carved itself into most markets with its aggressive price/performance ratios, has just announced two new gaming monitors in its new Mi Surface Display lineup. First up is a 34", 21:9 UltraWide monitor with a resolution of 3440 x 1440. This one also carries a 144 Hz refresh rate monitor with support for AMD FreeSync (which might also mean it is G-Sync compatible). This same panel offers a 1500R curvature, which is somewhat treated as a must in larger diagonal 21:9 monitors, and Xiaomi is quoting a 5 ms GtG response time, which, paired with the 144 Hz refresh rate, should be more than enough for all but the most seriously competitive gamers.

Color coverage is being quoted at 121% of the sRGB color gamut. The bezels are reportedly around the 2mm mark in the 34" model. The stand and the monitor's connection is ensured by a magnetic clasp. The 34" monitor is being joined by a 1080p, 24" monitor as well, of which there were no additional details being shared. Connectivity details also weren't shared at time of writing. Xiaomi's new Mi Surface Display 34" is priced at 2,499 Yuan (around $352).

SK Hynix Inc. today announced that it held a ceremony celebrating the completion of an expanded fabrication plant (or 'C2F') in Wuxi, China, on April 18th. C2F is an expansion of the existing DRAM production line, C2, in Wuxi. The Company decided to expand its production line in 2016 in order to solve the shortage of production space due to technology migration. About 500 people attended the ceremony, including Li Xiaomin, Party Secretary of Wuxi, Guo Yuanqiang, Vice Governor of Jiangsu, Choi Youngsam, Consul-General in Shanghai, Lee Seok-hee, Chief Executive Officer of SK Hynix, and representatives of clients and business partners.

SK Hynix signed a contract with Wuxi City, Jiangsu Province, China, in 2004 to establish a local factory and completed the production line (C2) in 2006 to start producing DRAM. C2 is the Company's first 300mm FAB and has played a major role in SK Hynix's growth to date. However, with technology scaling, the number of processes has increased and the equipment has become larger, which led to the shortage of the cleanroom space. SK Hynix, therefore, has invested a total of 950 billion KRW from June 2017 to April 2019 to secure additional production space.

Worldwide shipments of virtual reality (VR) headsets were down 33.7% year over year in the second quarter of 2018 (2Q18), according to the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Augmented and Virtual Reality Headset Tracker. IDC expects this to be a temporary setback as the VR market finds its legs. The arrival of new products, such as the Oculus Go and HTC Vive Pro, and new brands, combined with the need for greater headset fidelity all point to a positive outlook for the quarters ahead.

Screenless viewers brought a lot of attention to VR in the early days as the entire market was artificially propped up by brands like Samsung, Alcatel, and Google that bundled the headsets with smartphones. However, since then, the screenless viewer category has declined substantially, shrinking from 1 million headsets in 2Q17 to 409,000 in 2Q18. This category was the largest contributor to the decline in shipments for the overall VR headset market.

Xiaomi, the leading Chinese brand for electronic products, will release Mi Laptop Air 13.3" on June 27, 2018, at Palacio Neptuno in Madrid of Spain. Customers from Spain can place orders online on Xiaomi's Spanish official website or on e-commerce platform PC Componentes. People can also go to the four Xiaomi-authorized stores in Madrid and one in Barcelona to have a hands-on experience and order on site.

Mi Air 13.3" is a perfect combination of light and performance. The laptop comes with all-metal body which merely weighs 1.3kg and measures 14.8mm in thickness. It has a 1920×1080 resolution display with 5.59mm super-narrow bezel, and the frameless glass allows users to easily concentrate on the screen. The full lamination technology effectively reduces the air gap between the screen and the glass, delivering an outstanding display result. As for the overall appearance, the bead blasting process gives the laptop a fine touch feeling, and the dark grey color of the body, coupled with the black keyboard, conveys an elegant feeling.

Xiaomi held its Mi Mix 2S launch event at Shanghai, China a few hours ago where the Chinese giant revealed their first-ever gaming laptop. The Mi Gaming Laptop sports a clean, brushed aluminum chassis which measures 20.9mm at its thickest point. Being a gamer-oriented product, Xiaomi has added RGB lighting to four different zones around the laptop's body. The Mi Gaming Laptop features a 15.6-inch Full HD panel with a 72% color gamut and slim 9.9mm bezels. The keyboard also has its own RGB lighting and comes with features like 30-key rollover and five programmable keys. In terms of connectivity options, the Mi Gaming laptop provides users with four high-speed USB 3.0 ports, two USB-C ports, a HDMI port, and a 3.5mm jack with its own high-powered amp. Equipped with stereo 3W speakers, the laptop has also earned the Dolby Atmos and Hi-Res Audio certifications.

For cooling, Xiaomi implemented their own 3+2 design for the heatpipes and four air exhausts. Xiaomi's solution relies on two fans to provide active cooling. The Mi Gaming laptop is powered by Intel's latest Kaby Lake Core i7-7700HQ processor and it's available in two versions. The base version carries a $960 price tag and comes with a NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti, 8GB of memory, a 128GB SSD and a 1TB hard drive. The high-end version goes for $1,440 and boasts an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060, 16GB of memory, a 256GB NVMe SSD, and a 1TB hard drive. The Mi Gaming Laptop will go on sale in China from April 13.