Experience of switching from Xiaomi 15 Ultra to 17 Pro Max

After placing the order at the end of September and waiting for 6 days, it finally arrived. After a day of tinkering, it feels really great.

1. Photography: Backlighting is indeed impressive

In terms of photo quality, the 17pm still has a noticeable gap compared to the 15u in terms of imaging—less sharp and rich. You can actually feel this without even looking at the specs. No wonder many 15u photography enthusiasts are reluctant to upgrade and are waiting for the 17u. However, the 17pm performs better in backlighting, delivering great results with just a simple shot.

2. Personalization of the back screen

Beyond selfies and sticky note functionality, the personalization offered by the back screen is also very appealing. It reminds me of books like "Forty Years of Folk Art," which argue that while contemporary industrialization has brought rapid productivity growth, the uniformity of industrial products only focuses on meeting basic needs, making it hard to convey and respect emotional and personalized demands.

Today's tech products are often caught up in chasing specs—higher, faster, stronger. How to make them more approachable and meet people's emotional and personalized needs might be a direction worth exploring in the future.

3. Gaming features of the back screen

I've tinkered with various handheld consoles and dabbled in emulators. By setting up the emulator to disable the on-screen button layer, assign shortcuts for the menu and closing programs, and adding some shader effects, the gaming experience becomes entirely button-based, just like a handheld console, without needing to touch the main or back screens.

During the game copying process, the seamless compatibility with Apple devices was a pleasant surprise—directly controlling the phone from a Mac and dragging files across screens.

However, due to the lack of L and R buttons and the smaller screen, the experience varies by platform. For FC and MD games, many influencers use nostalgia as a gimmick, but while they're playable, the long-term experience isn't great. After all, these games were designed for larger screens with richer visual information, so they can feel a bit cramped on a smaller display.

Games designed for small screens with simpler visuals, like GBA and GB titles, are probably a better fit. The screen is slightly smaller than the original handhelds, but the long-term experience is still acceptable.

4. Overall impressions

The 17pm's standard features are decent, but the biggest driver behind its popularity is its uniqueness and scarcity. In recent years, tech products have been chasing specs and iterative, homogenized features. Products that dare to innovate while catering to personalization and gaming needs are few and far between.

$XIAOMI-W(01810.HK)