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Hey, guys. This ROM is originally made by Shumxin, I am just sharing it because I recently started using it and I actually liked it a lot. It is based on Android Lollipop 5.1.1. The SCREENSHOTS are given in the attachments. (I am using UPPERCASE letters so that you don't ignore the important parts.)
Here are it's pros and the cons, followed by a conclusion;
PROS:
1) The system is VERY smooth and works lightning fast. Your phone won't lag a bit. (More than 2 GB of RAM stays free when idle, shown in screenshot)
2) FANTASTIC BATTERY LIFE. Battery usage is VERY LOW, this is what impressed me the most.
2) Even though the UI's default theme is very boring, you can spice it up with a theme, like the one I used. There are ABOVE hundreds of THEMES available.
3) Camera app has some nice features add.
CONS:
1) You'll probably run away after reading this; Gapps cannot be flashed while using this ROM. However, you can download it externally. But once everything has been installed (including the Play Services framework), the Play Store crashes in some cases, and in the other cases it won't connect to the servers. And here's a problem for Clash of Clans players; even if Google Play is installed, you won't be able to play COC and all other games that requires Google Play.
2) The market is very messed up, well, for who doesn't know Chinese language
CONCLUSION:
If you are a gamer, this ROM is a straight no. And if you were wondering about how can we download applications, we can always download the apk files from apkmirror.com and alternative website (Google up).
If you are a regular user seeking for fluid performance and good battery saving options, this ROM is a MUST. Trust me when I say this, you'll love it.
Visit this thread to download:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/oneplus-x/general/rom-color-os-v2-1-oneplus-x-shumxin-t3320161
@meraj99 Does your WhatsApp receive notifications without locking it in the background
Adesh15 said:
@meraj99 Does your WhatsApp receive notifications without locking it in the background
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes, it can be controlled though
Adesh15 said:
@meraj99 Does your WhatsApp receive notifications without locking it in the background
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
AFAIK, there's a setting in COS, that let's background apps to be FCed that you need to enable for Whatsapp to run in background in COS. I used COS on my Oppo Find 7S, till I relinquished it to my wife....enough knowledge is enough...
Dead Cookies leave no trails...
I've been running OldDroid's OpenKirin for Honor 8 on my US (C567) Mate 9 for a few days and I'm very happy with it. It fixed the main bugs I've experienced with EMUI 8 since the Oreo upgrade. Those bugs include widgets not updating after a half hour even when exempted from battery optimization, some apps not working (e.g. US Topo, a GPS hiking app, that was battery-optimized to stop even when exempted from battery optimization), and EMUI's favoring its own launcher over third party launchers like Nova, sometimes to the point of crashing. Then there were irritants like apps that I don't use that couldn't be removed, EMUI lockscreen wallpaper whose magazine no longer updates. If I wanted to be tightly controlled, I'd buy an iphone.
So with Wirmpolter's patient help, I took the plunge and installed AOSP, specifically OldDroid's OpenKirin for the Honor 8. This is a treble-based OS, with some specialization for the Kirin processor. I've written an installation guide aimed at a relatively inexperienced installer:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=76231795&postcount=23
All of my major and minor frustrations with EMUI have been resolved. All my apps work. All the hardware works (although I have to turn off the equalizer to get music to play through the headphones). The camera and video work great. Battery life is good. You can install without replacing the stock recovery, which is good because if you don't touch the stock recovery, it is pretty much always possible to unbrick your phone.
If you are eyeing a new phone or thinking about rolling back to Nougat because of your dissatisfaction with Oreo/EMUI 8 on the Mate 9, then I'd suggest trying OpenKirin. It worked for me.
Hi! Does the headphone jack work with 3rd party music players and video players like say VLC? I have a lot of music on my SD so will the app be able to read it? Also, compared to stock EMUI how would you rate battery life?
Thanks, looking forward to this.
Although, not willing to be a guinea pig at the moment. Hoping some others will try this out and give some feedback. Definitely, need a fully functioning camera, including video.
Works with VLC
Vankata1 said:
Hi! Does the headphone jack work with 3rd party music players and video players like say VLC? I have a lot of music on my SD so will the app be able to read it? Also, compared to stock EMUI how would you rate battery life?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
VLC works with headphones -- I use VLC, though my main music player is Music Folder Player Full, which also works with headphones. (If you carry a lot of music organized into folders, check it out.) Neither app can see the SD card, so you would have to move music to the main storage with the Files program in order to access it with VLC. I carry about 10GB of music, so I copy all of it onto main storage. Again, to make the headphones work, I use Simple Tiny Equalizer to turn off the equalizer. You can do this in app, too.
I'm finding battery life about the same, possibly a bit worse. I used to end a day with about 30% remaining, and now I end it with 20%. Small sample. I might be using it more intensely, though, or EMUI's aggressive battery management that disables widgets and apps may have saved some battery.
As an aside, VLC can see my local network, like a Windows PC. I can play music and videos at home from my NAS. I didn't know Android could do this.
Guinea pig
vijer said:
Thanks, looking forward to this.
Although, not willing to be a guinea pig at the moment. Hoping some others will try this out and give some feedback. Definitely, need a fully functioning camera, including video.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My willingness to be a guinea pig was very much influenced by (1) having a pretty great backup phone (ZTE Axon), which I set up first and used during the process and (2) the time I was spending looking at new phone announcements and reviews, gearing up to ditch my phone. But I like the Mate 9 -- fast, big battery, big screen, fantastic camera, headphone jack -- and I don't really want to start carrying a USB-C to 3.5mm dongle around. There was nothing wrong with the phone except EMUI 8.
prestonmcafee said:
My willingness to be a guinea pig was very much influenced by (1) having a pretty great backup phone (ZTE Axon), which I set up first and used during the process and (2) the time I was spending looking at new phone announcements and reviews, gearing up to ditch my phone. But I like the Mate 9 -- fast, big battery, big screen, fantastic camera, headphone jack -- and I don't really want to start carrying a USB-C to 3.5mm dongle around. There was nothing wrong with the phone except EMUI 8.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The Mate 9 is the best phone I have owned so far and I am considering the Mate 10. I hate the pro version, don't like those long skinny screens.
EMUI 8 is okay (I don't access settings often and I don't have any issues using Nova Launcher), but I would like to get rid of some of the locked in software (Duo, Facebook App Manager, Email, Gboard, Google, Google Play Movies/Music, Hi Care, HiSuite, Huawei Home, Huawei Mobile, Music, Notepad - a lot can be disabled but why not just allow deletion?) and I would really like to use OpenGapps Pico. But I really need to access my ExtSd from PowerAmp and Moon+Reader, so that is the real deal breaker.
Are you able to use OpenGapps? Does the vanilla Oreo come with Google's bloatware too?
OpenGapps
vijer said:
The Mate 9 is the best phone I have owned so far and I am considering the Mate 10. I hate the pro version, don't like those long skinny screens.
EMUI 8 is okay (I don't access settings often and I don't have any issues using Nova Launcher), but I would like to get rid of some of the locked in software (Duo, Facebook App Manager, Email, Gboard, Google, Google Play Movies/Music, Hi Care, HiSuite, Huawei Home, Huawei Mobile, Music, Notepad - a lot can be disabled but why not just allow deletion?) and I would really like to use OpenGapps Pico. But I really need to access my ExtSd from PowerAmp and Moon+Reader, so that is the real deal breaker.
Are you able to use OpenGapps? Does the vanilla Oreo come with Googles bloatware too?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm with you on the long, skinny screens. I carry my phone in my shirt pocket most of the time, and it just barely has its center of gravity below the top edge of my pocket. Any taller and it will fall out even more frequently.
EMUI occasionally asked to replace Nova, and would crash if I added a EMUI widget to the homescreen. I hadn't realized how many apps couldn't be removed. For me, Facebook App manager is especially awful as I'm not on FB and FB track non-users, e.g. through the Like button on third party websites.
Not all the Gapps were embedded but some were. I think I had to add Gmail but Play, Google (search app), Chrome etc were present. It appears I can't uninstall the Google search app. (Of course, with the phone rooted, I can.) OpenKirin is not a vanilla AOSP in that way.
Did you try/can you try viper4android? ive been trying to get it working on emui8 and have had no luck.
really wanting to switch to aosp
viper4android
KitsuneUK said:
Did you try/can you try viper4android? ive been trying to get it working on emui8 and have had no luck.
really wanting to switch to aosp
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The reviews are too negative, especially claiming popups, for me to try this. I'm not saying that the reviews are accurate as they often are not. But I've had to hard reset sometimes to remove a pernicious app, and this one isn't worth the risk. Sorry.
A cleaner version of android is more likely to run any app that didn't come from the phone manufacturer.
prestonmcafee said:
I'm with you on the long, skinny screens. I carry my phone in my shirt pocket most of the time, and it just barely has its center of gravity below the top edge of my pocket. Any taller and it will fall out even more frequently.
EMUI occasionally asked to replace Nova, and would crash if I added a EMUI widget to the homescreen. I hadn't realized how many apps couldn't be removed. For me, Facebook App manager is especially awful as I'm not on FB and FB track non-users, e.g. through the Like button on third party websites.
Not all the Gapps were embedded but some were. I think I had to add Gmail but Play, Google (search app), Chrome etc were present. It appears I can't uninstall the Google search app. (Of course, with the phone rooted, I can.) OpenKirin is not a vanilla AOSP in that way.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ya, I remember having an issues with one or two widgets, but then I decided I didn't want all that stuff and just made three widgets using KWGT widget maker and I haven't had any issues since, except occasionally the music pause/start doesn't respond.
I was able to remove many apps, but those I listed, and most of those can be disabled. Still, would rather have a clean ROM.
Some of these app issues are Google changes. I used to use ROM Toolbox Pro to remove apps but Google made them remove the feature. I think Google is trying to force more apps like Chrome and Search on us. I don't use the Gmail app, instead I use AquaMail which is a superior interface and I have 7 email accounts that it manages.
Did you try installing OpenGapps? I did on the Huawei Oreo and it installs but then the phone boot loops. I used the pico version which has the bare minimum Gapps. Don't know if the issue is the way Huawei made the ROM or if this is a Google change.
Anyway, the biggest issue is the limited support for the external SD card. Maybe a future update will resolve that issue.
I'll definitely update when OldDroid does, at least fairly quickly, and report if the next version improves the SD card. I'm doing all right with it just as a source of backup files.
I found another advantage of OpenKirin. I didn't get google maps directions over bluetooth in car (an Audi) since updating to Oreo/EMUI 8. I'm not sure why. I tried deleting and re-adding the connection, which didn't fix it, and music and telephone calls played fine over bluetooth, so it wasn't the bluetooth connection. Now bluetooth directions work perfectly, as well as music and calls (which did before).
I took the plunge and flashed OpenKirin - it's decent, limited bloat, but I just can't live with the external SD card access problem. Hopefully, OpenKirin developers will work on it.
vijer said:
I took the plunge and flashed OpenKirin - it's decent, limited bloat, but I just can't live with the external SD card access problem. Hopefully, OpenKirin developers will work on it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How's the performance? I tried Phh-Treble, RROS and Lineage OS, this last two are for the Honor View 10, all of them work, can read external SDCard but all of them have performance issues, when you are heavy using the phone, switching from app to app, copypasting things, taking photos, etc., the phones lost all kinds of smoothness that seems to have when you just flash it.
IOmega666 said:
How's the performance? I tried Phh-Treble, RROS and Lineage OS, this last two are for the Honor View 10, all of them work, can read external SDCard but all of them have performance issues, when you are heavy using the phone, switching from app to app, copypasting things, taking photos, etc., the phones lost all kinds of smoothness that seems to have when you just flash it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry, I can't answer your question. I have too much on my external SD to live without it. 300 ebooks 2000 mp3s 400 videos several hundred images
Camera app can't see the storage
Root explorer can't see the storage
PowerAmp can
QuickPik can't
Moon+Reader cant
VLC can't
So after fiddling with it for a while I went back to MHA-L29 8.0.0.368
I haven't noticed any performance issues after about a week of uptime. I don't game, though, so may not stress the system like some do.
vijer said:
Sorry, I can't answer your question. I have too much on my external SD to live without it. 300 ebooks 2000 mp3s 400 videos several hundred images
Camera app can't see the storage
Root explorer can't see the storage
PowerAmp can
QuickPik can't
Moon+Reader cant
VLC can't
So after fiddling with it for a while I went back to MHA-L29 8.0.0.368
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah I know that bug, experienced it in Phh-Treble, hopefully is easy to fix and it was fixed on Phh-Treble, so it'll be soo fixed on this OpenKirik AOSP, what matters most to me is performance
prestonmcafee said:
I haven't noticed any performance issues after about a week of uptime. I don't game, though, so may not stress the system like some do.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I guess it deservers a try-
I finally took the dive and installed this on my primary device last night.
Ran into one issue: apparently, Huawei pulled the unlock request page offline. All of the available links to it that I could find went to a 404 page. (DC Unlocker to the rescue, I guess.)
In any case:
No issues with headphones. A few minor graphical glitches with the volume control panel and similar things but that's about it.
Magisk gets Google Pay and other SafetyNet demanding apps working, AdGuard doesn't mysteriously stop running because of overly aggressive memory management, dual SIM functionality seems fine.
45 minutes SOT, 92% remaining. No performance issues of note, aside from the minor graphical glitches feels smoother than EMUI did.
Update: I found something that gets rid of the graphical glitches, which (so far) seems to have a negligible effect on performance. Turn on GPU rendering profiling to be output to adb, all of the weird scrolling and clipping glitches go away...
GPU Rendering
irony_delerium said:
I finally took the dive and installed this on my primary device last night.
Ran into one issue: apparently, Huawei pulled the unlock request page offline. All of the available links to it that I could find went to a 404 page. (DC Unlocker to the rescue, I guess.)
In any case:
No issues with headphones. A few minor graphical glitches with the volume control panel and similar things but that's about it.
Magisk gets Google Pay and other SafetyNet demanding apps working, AdGuard doesn't mysteriously stop running because of overly aggressive memory management, dual SIM functionality seems fine.
45 minutes SOT, 92% remaining. No performance issues of note, aside from the minor graphical glitches feels smoother than EMUI did.
Update: I found something that gets rid of the graphical glitches, which (so far) seems to have a negligible effect on performance. Turn on GPU rendering profiling to be output to adb, all of the weird scrolling and clipping glitches go away...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have a "Profile GPU rendering" under developer options, defaulted to Off, with two other options: On screen as bars, and "In adb shell dumpsys gfxinfo". Is the latter what you mean by output to adb, or am I missing something? I hadn't noticed glitches, other than occasionally missing half of the first line of text in some reading apps. With the in adb setting, I was unable to replicate that glitch, but it doesn't happen often, so could be unrelated.
When I choose "In adb shell dumpsys gfxinfo" and then restart, it returns to off.
prestonmcafee said:
I have a "Profile GPU rendering" under developer options, defaulted to Off, with two other options: On screen as bars, and "In adb shell dumpsys gfxinfo". Is the latter what you mean by output to adb, or am I missing something? I hadn't noticed glitches, other than occasionally missing half of the first line of text in some reading apps. With the in adb setting, I was unable to replicate that glitch, but it doesn't happen often, so could be unrelated.
When I choose "In adb shell dumpsys gfxinfo" and then restart, it returns to off.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The latter is what I meant. The glitches I keep seeing are:
1) The volume panel, when it's opening and closing, seems to lose it's edges. As soon as the animation is complete, of course, it returns to normal.
2) In Chrome, at least, when scrolling through a select box, the edges of it seem to stick (top and sides).
I've seen a few others, mostly in the same vein. It usually looks to be as though a scrollable view isn't clipped correctly by the underlying driver, and turning on profiling causes it to render strictly.
I'm not surprised that it turns itself off at reboot, I haven't rebooted this since I got everything installed on it.
irony_delerium said:
The latter is what I meant. The glitches I keep seeing are:
1) The volume panel, when it's opening and closing, seems to lose it's edges. As soon as the animation is complete, of course, it returns to normal.
2) In Chrome, at least, when scrolling through a select box, the edges of it seem to stick (top and sides). .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I replicated 1) and that your fix works. I had noticed some scrolling artifacts in Firefox, but don't seem to be able to replicate them at the moment. But then, I notice scrolling artifacts on laptops, too. I'll leave it set to adb.
When you hand your phone to granny to take a photo of you, can she get the job done? Rate this thread to express how you deem the Xiaomi Mi 8's camera software. A higher rating indicates that the software is easy to use, fast, uncluttered, and inclusive of advanced features for when you need them.
Then, drop a comment if you have anything to add!
Software out of box is a tragicomedy on Global version. You have to change it to developer version at least. --> rating: *
Sort list of problems:
- battery life is short.
- lot of unnecessary apps which can not be disabled or removed.
- multiple maintenance softwares which helps nothing.
- menu system is complicated, often used features is hard to reach eg SOT.
- launcher is a basic one without any options.
- some features are not enabled in MIUI 10.2.3: Galileo, themes, notch settings, etc.
- bluetooth problems: it can not see my HR sensor, but works with custom rom.
- Slow LTE in some region: you have to set up manually the correct network in the hidden menu. Hard to find the necessary information.
But you can flash custom roms, eg. Havoc. --> rating: **** (it has some bugs therefore not 5*)
Some problem will stay in custom roms too: eg. slow LTE -> network type have to be changed.
As a person that didn't use any but AOSP, MIUI feels like a clone of ios, but a bad one. I'll try to provide the issues which wasn't mentioned on previous post.
- Background processes are highly restricted, which leads to issues with messaging apps like WhatsApp. The notifications will be usually delivered late, and sometimes you need to open the app manually to receive messages.
- As an AOSP, TouchWiz and ZenUI user, it's really hard to get used to the UI.
- To unlock bootloader, you have to ask for it and wait for 14 days to be able to do it.
- They add issues and remove good features with every update.
- Face recognition for the unlock works only for some regions.
- Ads in system apps. What the hell?
- Forces you to use Mi services which are fishy. Do you really want to give your information to a Chinese company for free?
Software is rubbish and the bloatware and ads are terrible. Will be flashing the pixel 3 Android as soon as possible. It's a Shame because the phone is really good.
Sent from my MI 8 using Tapatalk
When you hand your phone to granny to take a photo of you, can she get the job done? Rate this thread to express how you deem the Realme X2's camera software. A higher rating indicates that the software is easy to use, fast, uncluttered, and inclusive of advanced features for when you need them.
Then, drop a comment if you have anything to add!
Holding a RMX1991 Realme X2 8/128.
RMX1991_11_A.10 ROM
The software is nothing to shout about, it seems poorer than my RedmiNote4MTK.
Developer options cannot stay open & uninterrupted by the notification screen.
Overly aggressive power profiles.
Inconsistent - does not have scrollbar in some parts of the settings where it is needed while some parts have a row of alphabets at the LHS, while some don't.
Phone seems to "forget" power profile and permission settings.
How to change realme x2 Chinese version to global
How to change realme x2 Chinese version to global
I have Chinese version RMX 1991 and i want to swap to global kindly help !?
hamood tayeb said:
How to change realme x2 Chinese version to global
I have Chinese version RMX 1991 and i want to swap to global kindly help !?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you cant. wait for twrp and flash roms
Color os is really not that bad my x2 just arrived last night and it's the Chinese version and all i had to do is to uninstall all those apps + adb tutorial for the grayed out apps and i was set to go, there was nothing wrong with it at all + i did the latest update and all is good
The only downside so far is that you can't hide the notch in system apps like ... Youtube or Chrome. Gaming mode is better than on MIUI 10, no permanent white line on the left screen, so no burn-in risk in gaming mode.
Do you guys have problems with notifications? I have china version and aplicatios like WhatsApp and instagram doesnt able me to recive notification when they are closed, i can recive only when they are on task lista. I tried changing everycing in configuration and reinstall , still not working... HELP PLS!
SergioDani47 said:
Do you guys have problems with notifications? I have china version and aplicatios like WhatsApp and instagram doesnt able me to recive notification when they are closed, i can recive only when they are on task lista. I tried changing everycing in configuration and reinstall , still not working... HELP PLS!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
me too. fb and messenger
I want a better camera quality and better software, is the worst aspect in this phone.
SergioDani47 said:
Do you guys have problems with notifications? I have china version and aplicatios like WhatsApp and instagram doesnt able me to recive notification when they are closed, i can recive only when they are on task lista. I tried changing everycing in configuration and reinstall , still not working... HELP PLS!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
jorgeee said:
me too. fb and messenger
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
#1. Have you tried App Management / (choose the app) / Auto Startup ?
You are only allowed to have 5 apps that auto-startup but I picked the 5 most important one for me.
#2. Have you tried App Management / (choose the app) / Power Saver / Allow Background Running ?
TyTN4Me said:
#1. Have you tried App Management / (choose the app) / Auto Startup ?
You are only allowed to have 5 apps that auto-startup but I picked the 5 most important one for me.
#2. Have you tried App Management / (choose the app) / Power Saver / Allow Background Running ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
tried everything nothing changes. you must run the apps background to receive notifications
Hello!
I just wanted to know if this phones' software have ads anywhere in the UI? If yes, is there an option to opt-out?
Secondly, I've heard Xiaomi phones are notorious for having stock apps that ask for unwanted permission to function (eg: calculator wanting to access contacts etc.), is this one a victim of that?
Also does the stock os has an option to disable gesture based navigation and use on-screen navigation bar instead?
Finally, does it come with 3rd party keyboard(like swiftkey etc.) out of the box, or how is the built-in one in terms of privacy? Was it known for data gathering in the past?
If you have the device in hand, please do check these things and let me know. Are there anything else that I should be aware of, like known issues? I am not planning to flash custom roms or modify deeply.
Thanks in advance.
@n1troV I have been using my M3 for more than one month, I hope that I have answered all your questions.
1. ads anywhere in the UI?
Yes, in all Xiaomi system apps, you have to go through the settings in each of them and choose to trun off "Recommendations", to disable ads for each app.
2. unwanted permission
The calculator in MIUI does not require any permissions, in the settings, the Storage permission is listed, but denied, the calculator can still be used without the permission. There are a lot of pre-installed Google apps. The dialer, messages, and contacts apps are also from Google.
(Edit: The Taiwanese version uses the original MIUI dialer app and messages app)
3. option to disable gesture based navigation
Yes, it can be changed in the settings, please see the screenshot below.
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}
4. 3rd party keyboard
Yes, it came with Gboard pre-installed, you can install a different keyboard, if you do not want to use it. By default, Gboard sends analytics data back to Google, but that can be disabled in the settings.
I am using the stock MIUI ROM, and the fingerprint unlocking was very slow when I got the phone, but after getting two system updates, now the unlocking speed is faster.
If possible, I suggest that you can use Szaki/XiaomiADBFastbootTools (can be downloaded from GItHub) to debloat the phone with adb, to remove some unwanted system apps like MSA , WMService, Analytics, Chrome and other Google apps.
I used the phone for navigation several times, and the GNSS accuracy is about 4m, it is usually enough, but sometimes if another road is too close, the maps app thinks I am on the other road.
By default, VoWiFi is not enabled on this phone, but it can be enabled by disabling carrier check, using the code *#*#869434#*#* in the dialer.
If privacy is important to you, you can use a private DNS service like AdGuard DNS or NextDNS to block unwanted connections.
The phone is not perfect, but it is still a good phone for its price. If you want to have more RAM and an ultra-wide-angle camera, you can take a look at Redmi 9T, it has almost the same hardware, but it's better, and its price is the same as or similiar to M3's price, depending on which country you are in.
You can ask me if you have any other questions about the phone.
Thank you very much! You've answered pretty much all of questions I had and then some. I was unaware of the sluggish fingerprint sensor and inaccurate GPS, neither of which are dealbreakers to me, personally.
I've considered 9T too, I actually dig the design language of that one abit more than M3 and there's a slight bump in performance too. It's significantly more expensive compared to the m3 where I live though.
By the way, have you tested read/write performance of the ufs storage on the m3? If you have some free time, please do run passmarks' disk benchmark utility and share some screenshots along with the storage capacity.
Moreover, are there any noticeable lags/frame drops in the UI, delays in app opening? I am not expecting ~$150 phone to perform like ~$1000 flagships but I'd like to know what the general user experience is like.
And thanks for the tips on secure DNS. I was thinking of implementing pihole for network-wide ad-blocking, will look into private DNS services too.
Thanks again for taking your time to write a well-detailed reply, cheers!
@n1troV It takes about 2 seconds for the phone to open an app, I have tested with different apps. I think it's acceptable for the price.
My previous phone had SD625 chip, and M3 has SD662 chip, after changing to M3, I feel that M3 is a lot faster.
There is one thing I forgot to mention, this phone has dual speakers, but when I tried it the bottom speaker is a lilltle louder than the top speaker, I think when I watched review videos of M3, someone also mentioned this problem.
I will test the storage speed tomorrow when I have time.
n1troV said:
If you have some free time, please do run passmarks' disk benchmark utility and share some screenshots along with the storage capacity.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Below is a screenshot of passmark.
(Edit: The phone has 4GB of RAM, but passmark only shows 3GB)
I have the 128GB version, so the storage is UFS 2.2, the SD card I use is Kingston Canvas Select Plus 32GB.
I also have another screenshot of the CIT mode, it shows the hardware information of the phone.
To show you what it feels like to open apps and to scroll through Google Play on the phone, I have recorded a video using the built-in screen recorder, it is in the attached zip file.
Thank you! The ufs storage performance was abit underwhelming though. Have you had an emmc 5.1 based phones in the past? I suppose those chips perform about the same in benchmarks. In fact, having ufs based storage is one of the main reasons I've considered m3 hoping it would help sustain good overall ui performance/snappiness although that does not seem to be the case here.
As for the muffled earpiece speaker; I guess i can pass on that since even higher end phones suffer from the same issue likely due to the fact that there isn't much space in phones with edge-to edge displays and camera hardware to fit a better speaker.
Does this phone support streaming off of popular platforms? There used to be a requirement of some codecs or something along those lines to support drm enabled streaming out of the box iirc, can this one do?
Lastly; if you're in the market for sub $200 phone and m3 and 9t are not your options, what would be your next best pick? Just curious.
@n1troV Previously, I had used two different Redmi phones, both with emmc storage, and they have Snapdragon 435 and Snapdragon 625 chips.
After start using my M3, when I transfered files from my laptop to the M3 using a USB cable, it still took a long time, the speed of transfering files from PC does not feel any faster than my previous phones that have emmc storage. I think this is because the phone only has a USB 2.0 port.
The phone supports Widevine L1 DRM certification, so it can play DRM content at the maximum quality.
I have not played any DRM content on it, but the "DRM Info" app shows that the security level is L1.
I already got used to XIaomi's MIUI, since I used two Redmi phones previously, I would only choose a phone that is made by Xiaomi, this is why I bought the M3.
Before I bought the M3, I had thought about buying other phones that are made by Xiaomi, including Redmi Note 8T (It is not sold in where I live), Redmi Note 9 Pro (It supports NFC, but it is too expensive), and Redmi 9.
When I decided to buy a new phone, because the Redmi phone I was using (Redmi 6 Pro) had GPS issues, last year, I went to XIaomi's website again, and saw that there was a new phone called POCO M3, and I compared its specs with Redmi 9.The specs of M3 are a better than Redmi 9's, except that the CPU of Redmi 9 has better performance, and Redmi 9 has a wide-angle camera. So I decided to buy the M3, since I don't take photos often, and I don't play mobile games.
After using the M3, I feel that the side-mounted fingerprint sensor is a lot more convenient than the rear-mounted fingerprint sensors that my previous phones have, with the side-mounted fingerprint sensor, it's easy to unlock the phone even when it is on the table.
Excellent! I'm relatively new to the world of android phones and almost everybody here is pushing big-name-brand phones despite them having worse specs purely for the brand recognition (I suppose?) I've come to conclusion that M3 offers good value/performance for the price you're paying, not without its fair share of shortcomings though. That's to be expected, I guess.
Thanks for saving me lot of time not having to search answers for each questions I had. It certainly helped getting answers directly from an owner of the mighty M3.
That usb 2.0 bottleneck situation is understandable though. There are $1k devices on the other side of the pond still utilizing usb2 protocol, so yeah.
I mostly agree with your argument on fingerprint sensor placement except I personally prefer rear-mounted sensors mostly due to the fact that those got large surface area to work with and tends to be more accurate and quick. Usually your index finger sits there so its only natural to unlock the device as you pick it. Only downside is not able to unlock when device is on table.
Side mounted sensors on the other hand solve that issue but depending on the placement, it might be hard to reach specially on big phones. Having a hole cut on the side of the frame shouldn't help in terms of structural rigidity either. Eitherway I'd pick any capasitive implementation over gimmicky in-display sensor in a heartbeat.
@n1troV I just remembered that I could also do a read/write speed test on my old phone (Redmi 4X), it has LPDDR3 RAM and emmc 5.1 storage, the screenshot below shows the test results of Redmi 4X.
(POCO M3 has LPDDR4X RAM)
Since you have not used Xiaomi phones before, I think you need to know that Mi and Redmi phones have the original MIUI launcher, and the MIUI launcher does not have an app drawer, but POCO phones only have the POCO launcher, it has an app drawer, and cannot be disabled.
I have tried to install the MIUI launcher on my M3, but it could not be installed, so the only ways to install MIUI launcher on POCO phones are installing a custom ROM, or root/installing a magisk module.
Hmm it turns out ufs based storage is still significantly faster, at least on the reads.
You brought up an interesting point on the launcher, does M3 use swipe up gesture to launch app drawer or it has an option to have that dedicated grid style icon?
I don't dig the stock icons/ui elements on the above mentioned phones though. As long as a 3rd party launcher can be installed with unread counts reliably shown without random crashes, it should be fine.
I've had friends who used Mi phones in the past that I got to have some hands on time with (can't recall the exact model names), most of them were either android go/one devices though. Miui based phones were from 2016-17 so I'm sure alot has changed since then.
EDIT:
I might consider flashing custom rom as my last resort option, specially if I found stock apps constantly phoning home. Preferably a privacy focused rom (graphene/lineage?) with bare essential apps and 3rd party store (aurora?) minus the google stuff. That is only if services like realtime notifications are unaffected. Also there's a steep learning curve as I've not done any of this before
@n1troV The POCO launcher uses the swipe up gesture to open the app drawer, if you do not want to have an app drawer, there is a 3rd party launcher called Lawndesk, it can be installed and used on M3, and it can show unread counts after giving it the notification access permission.
Other 3rd party launchers can also be installed on the phone, but almost all of them have app drawers.
I had unlocked the bootloader of the phone and installed Magisk on it before, but it was difficult to update the phone with Magisk installed, so I reinstalled stock MIUI ROM and relocked the bootloader with Mi flash tool.
I am currently using NextDNS on the phone, because it is customizable, below is a screenshot showing blocked connections to Xiaomi. I have disabled all analytics options in the M3's system settings, I have also removed (debloated) all system apps that are related to analytics or system ads, but the phone still 'phones home'.
I still prefer using the stock ROM and POCO launcher, at least I have blocked those connections with NextDNS.
cbw said:
if you do not want to have an app drawer
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey that's not what I mean. Remember before the swipe up gesture was a thing, there used to be an icon on the bottom row of the home screen that opened app drawer on tap? I was wondering if such option is present on M3 to use drawer icon instead of swipe up.
cbw said:
I have disabled all analytics options in the M3's system settings, I have also removed (debloated) all system apps that are related to analytics or system ads, but the phone still 'phones home'.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
See, this is the kind of stuff that bothers me. You went through all the trouble navigating deep in system settings and opting out, yet it does sh!t like this in the background. In the screenshot you've attached, you seem to have narrowed down results to the requests made to domains that contain "mi" in it. Who knows what else its pinging
It's impractical for average user to go through each and every request phone is making as there is probably hundreds if not thousands of them. I really do believe that if you opted out of something it should not be pinging servers over the web period. Privacy is becoming a bigger and bigger problem every day yet most people ignore it entirely. I doubt average user would know or care about such sketchy behaviors of their "personal" devices.
tl:dr Probably not the best for privacy, at least not out of the box.
n1troV said:
there used to be an icon on the bottom row of the home screen that opened app drawer on tap?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
POCO launcher does not have that option, but there is a small arrow that can be clicked to open the app drawer.
I have found a 3rd party launcher called Apex Launcher, it still has the old Android icon for opening the app drawer, but I think the old version (3.3.3) of it is better than the current version.
n1troV said:
you seem to have narrowed down results to the requests made to domains that contain "mi" in it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I had to do it, because I also use other apps, and browse websites, so if I didn't do it, it would show a lot of domains, including the ones used by other apps and websites.
For browsing websites on the phone, I suggest that you can install an extension called ublock origin, but most mobile browsers don't support extensions. Kiwi Browser and Firefox Android (There is also a fork called Iceraven, it supports more extensions compared to Firefox) support extensions, so you can install extensions on them for privacy.
n1troV said:
Who knows what else its pinging
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have just restarted the phone, cleared the log in NextDNS, and stopped using the phone for 25 minutes, I have only opened NextDNS's website with Kiwi Browser, below is a screenshot of NextDNS's log.
Thanks for the update on stock launcher and possible third party options.
cbw said:
I also use other apps, and browse websites, so if I didn't do it, it would show a lot of domains, including the ones used by other apps and websites.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I understand that. Embedded trackers within apps is whole another story. I was more concerned about OS telemetry that cannot be disabled. There is no guarantee that the phone is pinging domains only have "mi" in it.
cbw said:
I suggest that you can install an extension called ublock origin, but most mobile browsers don't support extensions. Kiwi Browser and Firefox Android (There is also a fork called Iceraven, it supports more extensions compared to Firefox) support extensions, so you can install extensions on them for privacy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am also aware that the mobile firefox has somewhat limited extension support. However adding more and more extensions doesn't exactly help with browser fingerprinting. In fact it makes matters worse as you stand out more compared to the "default" ff installations. uBo is my go to addon for adblocking on computers, will definitely have that on phone as well.
cbw said:
I have just restarted the phone, cleared the log in NextDNS, and stopped using the phone for 25 minutes, I have only opened NextDNS's website with Kiwi Browser
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I suppose you're logged into google account and has sync enabled? I mean still its imperfect way to track ALL the requests phone is making specially when its on standby, and for such small period of time. Unless its connected to pi-hole or some sort of firewall/nw analyzer all the time, there's no way you can tell whats going on
n1troV said:
I suppose you're logged into google account and has sync enabled?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes I have enabled sync for my Google account. With DNS, I could not find a better way to track the requests, because DNS cannot tell which requests are coming from a specific app.
I have installed AdGuard to filter requests on my phone (with local VPN method), and I will post screenshots of blocked requests later.
These are the blocked requests.
Xiaomi Cloud (and Cloud Backup), Xiaomi Service Framework, and System Apps Updater can be uninstalled using Szaki/XiaomiADBFastbootTools.
It is possible to use Android Debug Bridge (adb) to uninstall Google Play Services, but I do not know if it is safe to do it.
After searching online about uninstalling the Mi Account app, I found this.
https://gist.github.com/Biswa96/81fe477079fa5279f7cfd7b98d5519c7
Do not uninstall com.xiaomi.account if you've already logged in MI account.
You will get "This device is locked" message and won't be able to unlock it!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey, thanks for saving the day, again! I'm so glad the first person to reply to my thread happens to be somewhat privacy conscious.
cbw said:
I could not find a better way to track the requests, because DNS cannot tell which requests are coming from a specific app.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Exactly! Unfortunately same thing applies for network activity monitors. Pi-hole seem to have a decent dashboard, probably 3rd party hardware firewalls too.
cbw said:
uninstalling the Mi Account app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm not planning to log into any third party services. Probably not even google on setup wizard.
I was wondering, is there a way to sandbox apps in android? As in you could isolate app data from one another and have full control over each app as to whether it's getting access to internet/gps and whatnot. I heard Shelter does this, not sure how that works exactly.
Unrelated to privacy: does the stock launcher has option to "lock homescreen grid"?
n1troV said:
Shelter
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It will cause bootloop in MIUI.
I also saw this in Shelter's description.
Some vendor / custom ROMs may have a broken implementation that may cause crashes and even bricking of your device. One such example is MIUI from Xiaomi.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If I want to test apps without installing them on my phone, I use a virtual machine app called "VMOS Pro", it works well on my M3, but it sends analytics data to several servers, and there is no option to disable that.
By the way, POCO launcher also sends data to two different severs, "api.accelerator.intl.miui.com" and "api.ad.intl.xiaomi.com", so you might want to avoid using it, POCO launcher can be uninstalled using adb or XiaomiADBFastbootTools.
n1troV said:
does the stock launcher has option to "lock homescreen grid"?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes.