Xiaomi on Thursday unveiled the world’s best Android-based iPhone X clone. The Mi 8 Explorer Edition is the most expensive version of the Mi 8 family, and the only Android phone in the world to have a notch exactly like the iPhone X, complete with cameras that do 3D facial recognition.
The phone has other unique features, including an in-display fingerprint sensor that also happens to be pressure sensitive, a dual-band GPS system, and a transparent glass rear panel that’s supposed to show the phone’s internal components. The latter is just a marketing trick, albeit a hot one if you ask me. But it turns out it may all be fake.
As spotted by Twitter user Chengming Alpert, the glass back of the Mi 8 Explorer Edition might show a sticker instead of the actual components.
https://twitter.com/ChengmingAlpert/status/1002145711117479937
One argument is that the Snapdragon 845 processor can’t be in that position.
The reason for that: the S845 can't be in that position; all the components around is too far away from each other; no graphite or other pipe/wire/cable for thermal.
— Alpert7 (@Alpertcr7) May 31, 2018
Xiaomi, meanwhile, maintains that the transparent back on the Mi 8 Explorer Edition does show the actual components — here’s what the company told The Verge.
“The transparent back on Mi 8 Explorer Edition is indeed made of transparent glass, and there isn’t a sticker with a picture on it. The parts that you see on the back upper half, for example, are parts of the actual mainboard.”
We’ll probably have to wait for the Mi 8 Explorer Edition’s real-world release to see whether Xiaomi is telling the truth or not.
