Sometimes it seems like phone makers try to please mobile gamers by slapping RGB lighting on an otherwise boring phone generic components, but with the Black Shark 4, Xiaomi is trying something new: adding Tactile buttons built into the shoulders that can make a real difference.
Unlike other gaming phones like the Red Magic 6 Y Asus ROG Phone 5, which feature touch sensors on their sides, the Black Shark 4 and Black Shark 4 Pro come with real physical buttons that you can use as triggers in landscape mode. Xiaomi says that triggers can make the difference between light and heavy pressure, and can even lock in place when not in use to prevent accidental pressure. Now some may call me a traditionalist, but especially when it comes to mobile gaming, it’s sometimes nice to have real touch controls instead of relying solely on touch.
TThe Black Shark 4 features a fairly tame design (at least among gaming phones) with a rear triple lens camera module and a small RGB light on its back, although it is unclear if that eye-catching X-theme painting Work is optional or not on all models.
Both models feature a 6.67-inch AMOLED screen made by Samsung that features a 144Hz refresh rate and a 720Hz touch-sensitive sample rate (which is the highest touch sample rate seen on a phone to date). along with a super fast 120 watt wired charging. and a Decent-sized 4500 mAh battery, which Xiaomi claims can be fully charged in less than 15 minutes.
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Unfortunately, if you want maximum performance, you will have to go for the more expensive Black Shark 4 Pro as it features a more powerful Snapdragon 888 processor (the standard Black Shark 4 gets a SD 870) and a special RAMDISK that allows the phone to use memory like traditional storage, which according to Xiaomi can greatly improve the performance of a specific application.
Other Specifications include 8GB or 12GB of RAM and up to 256GB of storage, with a special configuration of 16GB of RAM and 512GB reserved for the high-spec Black Shark 4 Pro. You also get a dedicated 3.5mm headphone jack and a bunch of software-based gaming tweaks like performance improvements and do-not-disturb settings built into JOYUI 12.5, which is based on Android 11.
WWith Chinese prices for the Black Shark 4 and Black Shark 4 Pro starting at just 2499 yuan (about $ 385) and 3999 yuan (about $ 615), respectively, Xiaomi’s new gaming phone may end up being a pretty good value, as well. The Red Magic 6 starts around $ 585 and the ROG Phone 5 is coming at even higher around $ 950 to start.
Wwith three new gaming phones debuting In the last two weeks, mobile gamers should have a lot more options when it comes to their phone of choice very soon.