ad

Breaking News

REDMI 1 S : miui 6 update & review

he Redmi 1S has been a real hot selling device for Xiaomi. As we all know, Xiaomi won many new markets with Redmi 1S because of its affordable price tag and good specs!


Anyways, last night Xiaomi made a huge announcement for all the International Redmi 1S users. It was announced on the MIUI forum last night that "MIUI 6 Global Beta Build" for the "hot and sensational" Redmi 1S had entered the public beta stage. It means, if you are a Xiaomi Redmi 1S user you can download the MIUI 6 ROM right away. You do not need to be a part of any beta testing team!

The announcement was made by Mr. Donovan Sung from Xiaomi Global Team. I got my hands on the ROM and prepared a detailed review for all the users. Anyways, let's get started!



Friends Be The First To "Witnesse the longest and most comprehensive review ever made in MIUI English Forum history".





SETTING UP THE DEVICE

You'll be WELCOME by MIUI 6 with a different touch of design sense. Allow me to give you an idea of what MIUI 6 setting up looks like. But just like MIUI 5, you'll be asked for your desired languages, locations and input methods. The setup will also ask you to connect to you wireless network and set your data usage.



The setup will also ask you to connect to you Google and Mi Cloud Account. But if you want then you can skip the step and do later also.







USER INTERFACE


After setting up the device, it will ask you to Pinch to edit Home Screen. Just pinch it, then you will be on Home Screen.



This is how the new dropdown toggles and notifications looks like. You'll see more blur effect on other apps. They look so neat and elegant.



Below you can see the Notification Icon top left corner, than you can see the notification panel, you can also see how in-coming call and you can see the missed call floating notification.



This is how the Dial pad and In-Call interface looks like. Design sense is simple and UI in flat.



This is folder view in MIUI 6.



This is how all the lock screen looks like in MIUI 6.



This is how the new launcher looks like. MIUI 6 includes a nice-looking flat icons. Also, the new launcher shows a more minimal interface for settings widgets, effects, and wallpapers.



This is how new wedgets look like in MIUI 6.

 

This is how we uninstall apps in MIUI 6.

 

In addition to the visual effects and flat UI, MIUI 6 have also add more interactive multitasking experience for the users by adding the "card-slot" multitasking system tray which will help you in navigation. You can still opt for the previous UI by simply pinching in or out. Also, this is how we clear background apps and free the ram. You can see UI is flat and clean.






SETTINGS


This is the overall Settings options you will find in MIUI 6. You will notice there is no "General Settings" like in MIUI 5.



This is the "SIM cards and mobile network" settings, so everything related is here.

 

This is overall "Notifications settings" in MIUI 6.



This is the "Wallpaper" and "Do not disturb" settings in MIUI 6.

 

This is the "Lock screen" settings you will find in MIUI 6.



This is the "Privacy" settings you will find in MIUI 6.

 

This is the "Additional settings" you will find inside "Settings". All the necessary settings are put inside here.



This is the "Battery" setting inside the "Additional settings".



This is all "about phone".







SYSTEM APPS


Music App: This is how the MIUI 6 music player looks like. Again with beautiful blur effects. MIUI 6 is packed with powerful Music player. It has lots of functions and plays your music with ease of functionality and DIRAC is also included. Quality of output from headphone jack is excellent.



MIUI Music app also lets you load your own song files, as well as allows you to create your own "Favorities" and "Create playlist". Music app can also load the song lyrics, which is really a nice feature.



This is the now playing screen. When you play the different songs then you will notice the background changes according to the current album art.


Themes App: This is how the New Theme App looks like, and i must say this is really better than previous one.



MIUI 6 have built-in MIUI themes app which will allow you to access more then 5,000 beautiful themes for your phone, each theme is artfully designed to customize your phone the way you want it to be.



The new themes app have different theme categories like Top charts, Categories, Featured, Customize and Local themes to choose from. Also, we can search themes with key words such as "India" for local themes.


Camera App: 
The overall interface of camera has been improved and new features are included which are easily noticeable. I must say the camera quality is really nice. And, HDR mode is directly available on screen and flash settings is just beside it. Swiping right in camera mode gives you additional options like Manual, Timer, Panorama and Scene mode. We also have video recording option so as to quickly start capturing video while intermittently taking snaps. Under camera settings we have options which will give you more camera control.



In Camera App all the Filters are really awesome and useful. But i personally liked "Mosaic" filter.

Below is the Camera Sample, first image is taken in HDR Mode ON; second image is taken with HDR Mode OFF and Flash OFF; third image is taken HDR Mode OFF and Flash ON.





Note: These pictures are taken indoor in low light.


Browser App: MIUI 6 comes with the feature-rich MIUI Browser, now with new flatter looks. It does a great job browsing, syncing with your Mi account, supports downloads.

 

There is a night mode too for surfing the web without disturbing others in night and it also saves battery. In benchmark i found it faster than Chrome.

 

On the positive side, it has a built-in Reading mode, which isn't available in Chrome. It enlarges the text font and strips away unneeded elements, leaving only the article you are reading in focus.

 

The browser is fast and loads web pages quickly. Since it is the default browser, it comes with many pre-loaded bookmarks websites. The desktop mode becomes very handy while browsing our own MIUI forum.


Gallery App: This is how the "Gallery App" looks. The concept of new Gallery App is simple andstraightforward. But it packed with bunch of awesome editing features.



When you open the Gallery App then you will see "Photos", "Offline" and "Mi Cloud".


  • Photos: Here your photos are saved according to the date.
  • Offline: Here your photos are saved in internal or external memory.
  • Mi Cloud: Here are your photos available in Mi Cloud Backup.

 

This is how the settings menu looks like in Gallery App.


Calendar App: This is how the new Calendar App looks like. The custom and now flat Calendar looks good, syncs with your accounts including Google and other accunts available.

 

It offers Day, Week and Month views as well. The green header in new Calendar App looks awesome in the first place.



Calendar app comes with smart reminder feature, which will never let you miss any important events in your life.


Weather App: This is how the new Weather App looks like. The weather app is very neat and simple and gives you details straight to the point.

In weather app, you can select city manually also, from the list of cities available or just search the name of your city. Also, you added your location after enabling location from settings.



The weather app comes with a whole new interfaces and features which is very convenient to use. Swiping down from top, updates the weather. While scrolling down gives you more details like humidity,Visibility, Wind, UV index, Precipitation and as well as sunrise and sunset time also.


Notes App: This is how Note App looks like in MIUI 6, which is really different than what was available in MIUI 5.




The Notes app in MIUI 6 shows notes arranged in list view. We can now set reminder for notes which can be exploited under emergency conditions or during a meetings where you need to pull over the agenda. You can also assign a particular color to notes and strike off feature helps you to strike off those particulars you have completed. This is very handy while buying various items/shopping.


File Explorer: This is how the File Explorer looks like in MIUI 6. This new file explorer is different than what we used in MIUI 5, but still it is somewhat same as MIUI 5 in terms of feature like FTP. Additionally we clean up tools which will come handy.





Security: This is how the new Security App looks like in MIUI 6. The security app interface has turned into minimal and slick design but has retained its prowess and useability. We had Cleaner, Data Usage, Blocklist, Battery, Virus scan and permissions in MIUI 5 also but once you start using Security App in MIUI 6, you will find the noticeable changes.


The Cleaner function, will help you free up storage, boost memory, enhance speed, and secure your device against malicious apps and vulnerabilities. The built-in network control features, which will help you monitor network traffic and save data.


You will find more power-saving modes, which will help you adjust the standby time of your device, according to your needs. So, you don't have to worry about running out of battery at important moments in your life. Security app will also protect against malware and virus. Permissions however have no noticeable change except the interface.






SYSTEM TOOLS


Mi Account: This app shows Mi Cloud, Accounts and Devices. This allows us to quickly access the Mi cloud storage files and remaining user space. It also shows how many accounts are synced and which device is currently connected to your Mi account. 




Mail App: This how the mail app looks. very clean and organized.




Update App: This is how the Update App looks in MIUI 6. The updater app shows a different and fresh looking animated bubble-like figures.


Clock App: I personally like the new clock app, and it is clean and refreshing. In clock app when you will select Alarm, Clock, Stopwatch and Timer than you will have a 'boucing' animation which looks really nice.



The clock app allows user to add various cities and is displayed at the bottom. On other hand, the stopwatch and timer functionality is a bit improved and have become more user friendly.


Recorder App: This is how the Recorder App looks like in MIUI 6. The new look of the Recorder app. The animation responds to the amount of sound it hears.

 


Radio App: This is how the Radio App looks like in MIUI 6.





Calculator App: 
There is no major difference here, just UI changed with flat look and a button is provided at the right upper corner to switch between standard and scientific calculator.

 


Compass App: This is how the Compass App looks like in MIUI 6. If you p
lacing your device in a horizontal position then compass will show in dark background but once you hold your device in a vertical position, you'll see the background transform into the camera view and you can see the directions on the screen along with real time images.




Report Bug App: This is how bug report app looks like in MIUI 6.

 





RAM MANAGEMENT & MULTITASKING

I have seen countless users questioning about "RAM MANAGEMENT & MULTITASKING", so i tried to cover this aspect in my review. I opened almost all the Apps in my device to check the Ram Management and issues which come because of poor Ram Management. I find out, the maximum of 16 Apps, I can run in the background and still can do pretty much multitasking. Opening 16 Apps in the background and still can do multitasking, this is really awesome.

 

When I opened 16 Apps in the background, the free Ram drop to 195MB which is still very good. And after clearning all the Apps, I got 417MB Free RAM. I was using Redmi 1S since last year, and I have never seen such results on even MIUI 5. So, Xiaomi Dev's really done magic here.

 

In addition to the visual effects and flater interface, MIUI 6 have also add more interactive multitasking experience for the users by adding the "card-slot" multitasking system tray which will help you in navigation. You can still opt for the previous UI by simply pinching in or out. In addition to that, multitasking is really smooth and lag-free in MIUI 6 Global Beta Rom.





BENCHMARKS RESULT


To test the performance of Redmi 1S running MIUI 6 Global Beta, i choosed 3 different benchmark apps.

When I run AnTuTu 5.7 benchmark, I got pretty good score of 21112 points, which is clearly more than i expected on MIUI 6. When i was running MIUI 5 on Redmi 1S then I used to get nearly 20000 to 20800 points. So, I am really happy with performance.



NenaMark2 2.4 also scored nice score of 57.1 fps. Previosuly, on MIUI 5 i used to get around 55 fps (sometimes more, sometimes less). Again, this is the example of nice performance on MIUI 6.



In Vellamo Mobile Benchmark version 3.1, I have done three different benchmark test including web-browser benchmark. In web-browser benchmark default Mi Browser is definitely faster than Google Chrome. In multi-core benchmark test, Redmi 1S scored 1123. And, in single-core benchmark test, Redmi 1S scored 886 points which is better than Samsung Galaxy S3 and catching up with HTC One M7.



The MIUI 6 Global Beta run fast and lag-free on the Xiaomi Redmi 1S, as all of its system apps and popular heavy-duty office apps. Above benchmark result witness the same.





GAMING PERFORMANCE


Gaming perforamce on MIUI 6 Global Beta Rom is really smooth and lag-free. I have tested some games and played for hours but didn't faced any lags so far. But in case, you have opened several Apps in background then you may face lags. So, if you want better gaming performace then I will recommend you enable the Performance mode.

Method to enable the Performance mode :
Settings >> Additional settings >> Battery >> Power settings >> Performance.


I played "Danger Dash version 3.0.3" for like 30 minutes continuously, game was smooth and lag-free. Then, I played "Bing Bong version 1.09" for another 35 minutes continuously, but still device performance was really fine. On other hand, Bing Bong game was really frustrating and challenging.

For the first 25 mintues device was not heating, but afterwards i noticed slight heating. That's why I am happy with the thermal throttling in MIUI 6 Global Beta Rom.


 

Note: In Performance mode, device will get better performance so it may heat up. Also, heating may vary with games to games, on high fps games like Asphalt 8, you may face more heating after playing for sometime.





LIST OF ALL THE BUGS & ISSUES I FOUND SO FAR ON THIS ROM


01. CIT/Hardware Test not working.

02. Front camera giving lower resolution images.

03. Internal Storage showing External (SD) storage files in Redmi 1S.

04. Launcher force closes in background after using certain apps.

05. Notification panel is not rotating to landscape mode.

06. Panaroma mode in Stock Camera does not start Panning immediately, it takes approximately 15 to 20 seconds to begin Panning.

07. Phone occasionally has difficulty connecting to network after restarting.

08. Phone battery occasionally drops quickly after rebooting.

09. Report Bug app (Tools >> Report Bug >> Apps) unable to connect to network on wifi.

10. Sometimes SIM 1 or SIM 2 not detecting after rebooting, if Sim Lock is enabled.

11. There is a delay in switching on the display when a call is received. The phone starts ringing, but the display is switched on after 2 to 3 seconds.

12. When you load several apps in background then you may face lag in Camera App. Sometimes lag gets too much and mobile get's hang.

Tip: Whenever you want to use Camera App, always clear Ram beforehand.

13. When you load several apps in background then you may face "System launcher isn't responding". But it doesn't happen everytime, just sometimes it happens.
 





LIST OF PROS & CONS


PROS:
  • Rom is running on Kitkat (4.4.4 KTU84P).
  • Better Ram management and multitasking.
  • Different touch of design sense.
  • UI is flat, neat and elegant.
  • Packed with powerful features.
  • New widgets are nice and helpful.
  • Camera interface has been improved and new features are included.
  • Build on latest release 5.4.10
  • Less heating as compared to MIUI 5.
  • Display becomes more beautiful and vivid.


CONS:
  • There is no pre-installed video app in the rom.
  • Music app should have more features like in Chinese rom.
  • Music and Radio app should have options to choose songs online.
  • There is no macro mode in camera.
  • Need more mathematical operations in scientific calculator.
  • Since global rom is not pre-rooted some users many find it annoying.
  • Battery consumption was rather the same as before.
  • Vibration intensity is same as before.





FINAL VERDICT

This Rom is near to perfect, it is already stable enough to be used in day to day life. Yes, there are some minor bugs, which I found in this rom, but they will not prevent you from using your phone like the way you want.

Overall, I'm really more than impressed with the MIUI 6 Global Beta Rom for Redmi 1S. There are no major bugs which will prevent you from using this Rom. But like all other Rom's there are some minor bugs which Developers can fix. For me, MIUI 6 Global Beta Rom is the best among all other Rom's available for Redmi 1S.


source: miuiforum

No comments