Redmi 3S review: 699 yuan with fingerprint recognition + long battery life

IT168 evaluation June 14, is also the first day after the release of Meilan 3S, millet also through the official website directly released the red rice 3S cell phone. In my opinion quite outside, but also in the reason. Because it can not be called an iterative product, but more in favor of the previous generation of products to do hardware features on the supplement. Redmi 3S canceled the pattern design of the back of the Redmi 3, the processor was replaced by Qualcomm's latest mid-range SOC - Snapdragon 430, in addition to the addition of fingerprint recognition. If you compare the high end versions of the two phones, they are even identical except for the different processors. Whether it's the industrial design, the size of the memory or the quality of the camera, they are all the same. This leaves us with the question, what is the significance of Xiaomi launching the Redmi 3S phone?

First of all, this issue needs to be viewed from two angles. From a subjective point of view, the cell phone industry is highly competitive, and the thousand-dollar machine market is even more so, almost every month there will be a manufacturer to launch a product under one thousand dollars. In order to maintain the brand heat, especially for the original cost-effective, new national product of millet, push the new, for the user needs to continue to refine the product line, in order to get sustained attention, and let consumers get involved.

Objectively, Meizu's latest Meizu Blue 3 cell phone, not only using metal body design and 2.5D glass design, but also equipped with fingerprint recognition, and support for the full network pass. The price is only 699 yuan, the same as the Redmi 3 phone, but the standard version of the Redmi 3 does not support fingerprint recognition. This shakes the millet has been in the mouth of consumers in the price-performance king title. As a result, Xiaomi desperately needed to launch a new product to compete with it, so the Redmi 3S was born.

While the Redmi 3S has slightly fewer upgrades and is a bit of a rehash of the same old stuff, the flashpoints on the phone are still very much in evidence, and that's the ultra-long battery life. First of all, Xiaomi will be a 4100mAh battery in this only 139.3x69.6x8.5mm circumference of the phone, and the body weight control to 144g, this point is not easy. To know that most of the market only on the 5.5-inch screen phone will be configured more than 4000mAh battery capacity. In addition, Redmi 3S smaller screen also means getting more power saving, and then with MIUI 8 in the power saving optimization quite a lot of effort. Officially, the Redmi 3S will last for 2 or 3 days under normal use without any problem.

Here's a visual comparison of the hardware specs of the Redmi 3 and the Redmi 3S through a table of parameters.

"Comparison of Redmi 3 and Redmi 3s parameters

Model number

Redmi 3

Redmi 3S

Screen size

5-inch

5 inches

Resolution

1280x720

1280x720

Processor

Qualcomm Snapdragon 616

Qualcomm Snapdragon 430

Frequency

Octa-core 1.5GHz

Octa-core 1.4GHz

Body Memory

16GB

16GB

Operating RAM

2GB

2GB

Main Camera

13M, F/2.0 PDAF

13M, F/2.0 PDAF

Front Camera

5M, F/2.2, Beauty Support

5M, F/2.2, Beauty Support

Body Size

139.3x69.6x8.5mm

139.3x69.6x8.5mm

Body weight

144g

144g

Battery

4100 mAh

4100 mAh

Body color

White Gold/Gray

White/Gold/Gray

Operating System

MIUI 7

MIUI 8 (Developer)

Fingerprint Identification

No in Standard, Yes in Premium

Yes

Network Formats

Mobile/Link/Telecom

Mobile/Link/Telecom

Mobile/Link/Telecom

Mobile/Unicom/ Telecom

Price

From Rs. 699

From Rs. 699

From the table, apart from the fingerprint recognition, the difference between these two is mainly in the processor. Snapdragon 430 is currently the highest specification version of the Qualcomm 400 series chips, its CPU architecture and Snapdragon 616 are the same, are composed of 8 A53 cores, but in terms of main frequency, Redmi 3S used on the Snapdragon 430 CPU main frequency of 4x1.5GHz + 4x1.2GHz, Redmi 3 used on the Snapdragon 616 CPU main frequency of 4x1.4GHz + 4x1.1GHz, Redmi 3 used on the Snapdragon 616 main frequency of 4x1.4GHz + 4x1.1GHz, Redmi 616 CPU main frequency of 4x1.4GHz + 4x1.1GHz. However, in terms of GPU, the Snapdragon 430 is an Adreno 505 model and the Snapdragon 616 is an Adreno 405 model. In other words, the Redmi 3S has a slightly scaled down CPU section but a more powerful GPU. Let's cut the crap and pull out a score to see.

▲Redmi 3S scoring results

From the scoring results, although the CPU part of the Redmi 3S compared to the Redmi 3 a slight shrinkage, but the comprehensive scoring results are still stronger than the Redmi 3 (Redmi 3 AnTuTu scores in the 35,000 or so). If you compare horizontally, Redmi 3S has the same score as Meizu Note 3. In other words, even though the Redmi 3S is priced at only 699 yuan, but the performance has been in the upper level of the thousand yuan machine.

"Appearance and industrial design

Redmi 3S, as an upgraded model of Redmi 3, has made some adjustments in the details, which is more obvious in that the star pattern on the back of the Redmi 3, which has received mixed reviews, has been eliminated. However, the overall look remains the same as the Redmi 3, with the stamped metal body, polycarbonate wrapped edges, and the 5-inch fit size being retained. The Redmi 3S was launched in 3 colors in one ****, Silver, Grey and Gold, and the Gold version we're reviewing is also a new color scheme introduced with the adoption of a metal body for the Redmi series.

We can see that the front panel of the Redmi 3S also features a gold color scheme, which is in line with the tone of the entire device. The layout of the front panel is also the usual design of the current Redmi series, which is simply summarized by the elimination of the "MI" logo and the use of metallic polycarbonate edges. The Redmi 3S is equipped with a 5-inch 720P resolution screen, according to official promotional data, does not have the sun screen function (Redmi 3 support), but supports eye protection mode and color temperature adjustment. Screen black edge control is good, within the acceptable range.

Back of the body, Redmi 3S is the mainstream design of the current metal 1000 yuan machine, the camera layout in the upper left corner, fingerprint recognition upper center. The middle part of the metal body made of stamping to ensure the feel, the two sides of the polycarbonate material for splicing to ensure the normal signal overflow. The color difference between the two materials is well controlled, and the seams are handled more smoothly, making the unity of the back somewhat improved. It's also worth noting that the starburst design on the back, which has received mixed reviews, has been removed from the Xiaomi 3S.

The side of the body, we can clearly see the screen edge of the polycarbonate edge, this part is slightly higher than the screen, the use of metallic luster of the spray is particularly conspicuous. The reason for this design, on the one hand, is for cost and aesthetic considerations, on the other hand is to play a role in protecting the screen. In addition, Xiaomi officially claimed that due to the use of higher energy density battery, 4100mAh battery volume can be reduced, the thickness of the whole machine is maintained at 8.5mm, compared with the Redmi 2 series of the corresponding thin 0.9mm.

Top of the body, the Redmi 3S is equipped with a 3.5mm headphone jack, a noise-canceling microphone and an infrared remote control sensor. Starting from the Xiaomi 4, the infrared remote control sensor has also become a standard feature of every Xiaomi-produced phone, which is also closely related to the Xiaomi smart home ecological chain layout advocated by Xiaomi. The bottom is the traditional microUSB charging and data interface (using 5V/2A standard charging head), it should be noted that the machine supports QC3.0 fast charging standard, change the fast charging head can accelerate the charging rate.

In addition, the Redmi 3S adopts a single card slot with three card positions. Users can choose one Micro SIM card + one Nano SIM card to realize the dual SIM dual standby function, or choose one Micro SIM card + one TF card expansion, the maximum expansion capacity of 128GB. of course, this approach also makes the Redmi 3S can not realize the dual SIM dual standby + TF card expansion function.

Overall, the appearance of the Redmi 3S and Redmi 3 difference is minimal, is still Redmi's usual design routine, metal body and 5-inch size to ensure that the whole machine feel in the hand. Coincidentally, Meizu also released the Meizu Blue 3S this week at the same 699 price point, and thanks to a 2.5D glass cover on the front panel, the look is a bit more refined compared to the Redmi.

Gallery appearance details of minor adjustments 699 yuan Redmi 3S unboxing picture appreciation

"MIUI 8 system highlights interpretation

MIUI through iterations, has long been the current smartphone customization ROM in the top, in each generation of millet cell phone is a plus. The latest MIUI 8 release has further improved MIUI's interface, features and performance, and has been well received in the public beta stage. With the help of this Redmi 3S, we also do some combing of MIUI 8. It should be noted that the review machine pre-installed MIUI 8 for the beta version, the production machine will be pre-installed MIUI 7 stable version of the transition, is expected to complete the upgrade in a month.

"Crafted design, refined craftsmanship

MIUI 8 has redrawn a lot of the system's interface, and the color choices are brighter, with large blocks of color being used repeatedly, reflecting youth and vitality. The system's animation effects have also been redesigned, pursuing not only the coolness of animation transformations, but also the natural logic behind the kinetic effects, such as the numbers popping out of the keyboard when dialing, the interface shrinking and removing when hanging up the phone, and the shredder kinetic effect for deleting sticky notes.

In order to improve the reading experience on the mobile side, MIUI 8 has been optimized for fonts, and launched the Xiaomi Lanting font in conjunction with Founder. It is reported that Xiaomi Lanting has been carefully polished over 18 months, updating 6,763 commonly used Chinese characters, punctuation marks, Latin letters, and expanding to a full font of 27,533 characters. Actual reading to see, millet Lanting is indeed more delicate and beautiful, as to whether it can improve the fatigue of reading for a long time, but also need more verification, after all, the font there are some metaphysical meaning, different from person to person.

"Functionality is perfect, convenient and practical

MIUI is known for its timely and complete functionality updates, and MIUI 8, as a leapfrog upgrade, brings many fresh and practical features, covering a variety of scenarios in life, mainly focusing on the following points.

"1, the new album

MIUI 8 album in the photo management is more convenient, support for continuous shooting aggregation, synchronization tips and album storage (folded picture cache album), and added the album thinning function, that is, the cell phone displays thumbnails, the cloud to save the original picture mode, you can save 90% of the storage space, for storage is very useful for some of the tight friends. In addition, the new album also supports multimedia editing, image editing comes with a variety of filters, and has a wealth of professional parameter adjustment; and video editing built-in a number of video templates, even if the editing foundation is weak, you can also produce a large blockbuster, easy to social sharing.

"2, strong sweep

To a certain extent, MIUI 8 sweep is the expansion of the common text search, incorporating a lot of counter-intuitive features. Sweep is not only limited to the daily barcode and QR code, but also supports Sweep Litao, translation, Sweep question search, Sweep business card, Sweep document and so on. One of the scanning question search function is called black technology, encounter can't topic sweep, can give a comprehensive solution steps, support from the first year to senior high school all subjects of the question bank, absolutely is the gospel of the students friends.

"3, hover ball

The appearance of the hover ball, in a sense, is the MIUI 8 for large-screen cell phone one-handed operation to make improvements. Hover ball can be dragged to any position on the page, automatically transparent does not block the contents of the browser. Unlike other hoverballs that operate by clicking, MIUI's hoverball uses a sliding operation and supports five shortcut functions. Users can customize high-frequency actions into the hoverball, which facilitates daily operations and improves efficiency.

"4, other small features: long screenshot and calculator

Calculator is also a new upgrade, you can realize the calculation steps at any time to modify, but also supports the Chinese case conversion, and support for exchange rates, personal tax, mortgage calculations, unit conversion and other aspects of the calculation, very practical. It also includes a long screenshot function that not only takes regular scrolling screenshots, but also allows you to drag the area you need to take a screenshot of up and down, and supports precise cropping, marking, and mosaic painting, making it easy to share and edit longer emails and web pages on a daily basis.

"Improved performance, focus on safety

MIUI 7 had made significant improvements to the system's performance, making it much smoother, and MIUI 8 goes one step further by introducing the Chained Startup Control feature for the phenomenon of Android apps starting up with each other, prohibiting non-essential apps from starting up with each other, thus effectively controlling the running of background programs and memory consumption, and making the system more fluid and power-saving.

In addition to the above, the system is also equipped with a new Chained Startup Control feature, which prohibits non-essential apps from starting each other up.

Additionally, MIUI 8 focuses on security and privacy, firstly in the function of "split", which is not only limited to the double-opening of certain social applications, but also allows a cell phone to complete the "split", i.e., to set different passwords/fingerprints to log into different phones. By setting up different passwords/fingerprints to log into different desktops, the data between the split is also isolated from each other and encrypted storage. In today's world of cell phone privacy, this feature will have more significance in some scenarios, such as when someone borrows a cell phone, quietly enter the "guest" account, hide some of the more private applications, which will not let people notice, but also to protect their privacy.

Secondly, in response to the increasingly rampant fake base station SMS fraud, MIUI 8 has introduced a fake base station identification function, and can intercept spam, identify phishing URLs in SMS through big data, and make effective reminders. Even if you mistakenly touch the phishing URL link in the SMS, it doesn't matter, MIUI browser's URL detection will further verify the URL, and if necessary, carry out the corresponding blocking and filtering, to fully ensure the safety of cell phone use.

Overall, MIUI 8 has a lot of highlights, compared to MIUI 7 enhancement and improvement is obvious, become more beautiful, more powerful, more secure, worthy of Xiaomi users to upgrade, in the Redmi 3S is a no-brainer plus.

In the camera part of the hardware parameters of the Redmi 3S and Redmi 3 are identical. Redmi 3S is equipped with a 13-megapixel rear camera with an aperture of F2.0, as well as a 5-megapixel front camera with an aperture of F2.2, of which the main camera supports PDAF phase focus, which can focus in as fast as 0.1 seconds. In addition, on the software side, the Redmi 3S has built-in leveling, scene mode, manual mode and other functions, which improves the playability of the camera function. Here's a look at how the Redmi 3S performs through sample photos.

▲

Exterior zoom-in sample

From this sample, we can see that the word "TAXI" on the top of the black car model is clearly recognizable, and the darker "TAXI" on the side has also been restored. The front grille after 100% enlargement, you can still distinguish the staggered lines, which is also a good performance in the same price range of cell phones. It should be said that the Redmi 3S, with its 13 megapixels, has enough resolving power for everyday use, and is perfectly suited to the task of sharing life's shots.

▲

Click to view the original image (Figure 1)

▲Click to view the original image (Figure 2)

From the indoor samples, the Redmi 3S boasts quite a good imaging level in decent lighting conditions. Figure 1 shows high color saturation and accurate color reproduction, while also showing good background bokeh, bringing the little doll to life. Figure 2 shows the sharpness of the Redmi 3S's samples, with the text on the toy car still coming through clearly even when zoomed in on the original image.

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Click to view the original image (Figure 3)

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Click to view the original image (Figure 4)

From the macro samples in Figure 3, the performance of the Redmi 3S is more general. When taking the samples, the phone's viewfinder box shows that focusing has been completed, but the samples taken are slightly out of focus. However, in terms of color saturation and the white balance of the samples, the Redmi 3S has my heart. Its imaging is close to the true colors of things, while at the same time enhancing the saturation a little on top of that, making the samples very pleasing to the eye.

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Click here to view the original image (Figure 5)

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Click here to view the original image (Figure 6)

The night scene performance of the Redmi 3S is also noteworthy, and although it can't match the detail of flagship phones, it's good enough to express the image without the glare that's common on $1,000 phones. It is a good idea. At the same time, when shooting a self-luminous billboard, the Redmi 3S is rare in its ability to capture the text of the advertisement clearly while also retaining the highlights.

All in all, the Redmi 3S's imaging level is good enough for general life scenes, although the noise control is slightly insufficient, and the samples are slightly smeared, but both the color performance and the stability of the white balance, the Redmi 3S has been able to outperform most of the thousand-dollar machines. At the same time, for a phone priced at just $699, we should give it some latitude in the camera department.

"Buying advice:

It must be said that the Redmi 3S is really a good value for money and practical model. This is mainly due to the ease of use of MIUI 8 and the large 4100mAh battery. If you're looking for a competitor to compare, it's the Meizu 3S. They both have features such as metal body, fingerprint recognition, and full network connectivity, while Flyme OS has a smoothness and functionality that does not belong to MIUI. Their main point of difference is that Meilan 3S is slightly better in terms of face value due to its front fingerprint and 2.5D glass design, while Redmi 3S has a considerable advantage in terms of battery life.

So if you're a heavy phone user, I'd recommend buying the Redmi 3S, as it will ensure you don't lose power for at least a full day and say goodbye to mobile power. If you're more about the exterior design, then the Meilan 3S is also a good choice. As for performance, for the thousand dollar machine is no longer the main decisive point, the user experience of the two are evenly matched, although it can not run smoothly large games, but like the battle royal this type of game is still easy to manage.

" Review Summary:

The Redmi 3S is identical to the Redmi 3 (Premium Edition) in terms of industrial design, and if you let an average user choose, it's impossible to tell the difference between the two. The appearance of Redmi 3S is mainly to make up for some of the defects of the Redmi 3, such as the lack of fingerprint recognition, the beauty of the back pattern is quite controversial, and so on. Therefore, according to my judgment, Xiaomi will gradually reduce the shipments of Redmi 3 in the future, and even completely replace Redmi 3 with Redmi 3S.

In general, Redmi 3S has a good body size and more durable body design. Hardware performance and imaging quality can fully meet the needs of people's daily life. In addition, long battery life is one of its major selling points and one of the pain points for many users. Currently on the market, Redmi 3S is definitely the strongest battery life among 5-inch phones, without one. If you want to buy a small screen and withstand heavy use of the phone, then Redmi 3S you deserve.