REDMI PAD SE 2 weeks in Review.

Brand : REDMI ( A subsidiary of Xiaomi)

Tech : Android Tab

Price : RM799 from the MI shop at a local mall

Release date : 15.8.2023

Ok So this is my 2 weeks in Review of the REDMI PAD SE. Now let's get the boring nerdy stuff out of the way and I'll give you the basic rundown of the specs:

Screen Size : 11 inches IPS LCD

Processor : Snapdragon 680

GPU : Adreno 610

RAM : 8gb

Storage : 256gb

Battery size : 8000mAh

Body : Aluminum 

There, those are the stats  that people usually look at when looking at a tab. I won't cover the camera and other stuff as those are the things I don't usually use, plus you're not gonna shoot a Hollywood blockbuster with this tab. So now let's get on to the real world usage based on what I've done with it so far.

General performance

The mid-range processor works very well. Nothing feels slow, I barely noticed any lag. YouTube videos runs at 1080p perfectly, but any higher and it starts to stutter. The speakers on this thing is very good and surprised me pleasantly. The Dolby sound speakers plays all the trance and rock songs from YouTube and even games with clarity and no distortion. Netflix movies also sound great but as will all speakers the "loudness" depends on the audio mastering of the source. Some movies and YouTube videos were not that loud even at max volume and some made me feel like I was at a music festival. 

Work

Now here's the main reason I bought this thing. As a word processor, PowerPoint reader etc this thing chews through that with no issue. The same can be said for video editing, as of this writing, I had just finished editing a project on Adobe Premier Rush and it was more than capable of rendering videos. Albeit it was an 11 seconds video. I will update on how it will handle longer projects as I become better acquainted with the software and learning others like capcut and KineMaster. It is also a very capable music editor, though I have failed in this regard due to my unfamiliarity with the software as I am more used to Adobe Audition on the PC. Photoshop and similar software is also an easy task for it to handle. It also serves well during my emcee jobs as I use it to read my scripts. So all in all productivity is not an issue. Unless of course you go balls out and run tons of apps and render an hour long video. Then it might melt.....

Gaming

Now for the secondary reason I bought it. I did not try Gemshin or Honkai so I do not know how they perform on it. But I do use emulators on this thing. As I call it, my "fake Steamdeck". Anything from the Atari to the 32 bit era works flawlessly. Sega megadrive, Nintendo, super Nintendo and PSP ran just fine. I only ran into some minor issues with PS2 emulation. This is game dependent, some games run smooth and perfect, some need tweaking and some even with tweaking still lag. So Ps2 is around 90% Working. The only Android game I tried so far is In to the dead 2 and that looked good and ran fine at max settings.

Movies

Netflix and other movie apps ran perfectly and 1080p is more than enough to enjoy on this 11 inch screen. Like I mentioned earlier anything higher than 1080p and you will see stuttering. But not the end of the world. I mean you want to watch 4k on a tab, get the higher end ones. The Xiaomi Pad 6s Pro and Samsung Tab s9 Ultra comes to mind.

Battery Life

The battery life on this this is efficient. As of the time of this writing, I still have 43% battery left and the last time I charged the tab was at 1pm yesterday. It is currently 12:07am. That's roughly 11 hours ish. And between then and now, I did some movies, gaming (Xenogears Rules), paperwork, video editing, photo editing and now writing this blog. So it is very efficient at managing and conserving power. 

Conclusion

It's not the most powerful thing out there. And I won't argue that there are "better" tabs out there from other companies. But for Rm799 what you get is a fully functional tab that can do paperwork, photo editing, music editing, video editing, emulator games, comic readers and other media. It's an all in one package. You can argue about benchmarks till you're blue in the face but as far as real world usage goes, you won't or barely notice what those benchmarks show. Overall for the price range and for all its capabilities I give the REDMI Pad Se a solid 8.9/10