Redmi 3s Prime review

Redmi 3s prime review

Xiaomi launched the Redmi 3S and the Redmi 3s prime. This is the Redmi 3S Prime review, there is not much of a difference between the Redmi 3S and the 3S Prime, apart from the price, RAM/ROM and fingerprint sensor.

Inside the Box

When you unbox the package ,you will find the handset, SIM tray ejector pin, data cable, user guide, warranty card and travel charger (5V/2A). Earphone is not included. SAR value : 0.617W/Kg (head) and 0.429W/Kg (body).

Design

In terms of design. there is very little to differentiate between the Redmi 3s Prime and the Redmi Note 3. If you ignore the difference in the placement of the front facing camera and sensors on top of the display or that of the rear camera and flash, it is pretty much a compact version of the Redmi Note 3. The metal body is curved at the edges, which makes it quite slippery but the compact size ensures that it fits well in the hand.

When we first saw the Xiaomi Redmi 3S Prime, it looked like a mini Redmi Note 3 from nearly every angle. Xiaomi phones have started to look quite similar in design. For the company, this might be a way to establish a linear look throughout its product portfolio but sadly this is what Samsung did few years ago with its Galaxy smartphones, and we weren't fans of that move for long. If I were to nitpick,xiaomi seems to have discarded their idea of design symmetry where the camera lens, flash and fingerprint sensor were in one line bang in the center of the phone. Xiaomi had made a big deal about it in the redmi note 3 but somehow forgot about it in the Redmi 3s Prime. Having said that, there is no doubt that the Redmi 3s Prime is one of the most premium smartphones in the sub-Rs 10,000 price bracket, just like the Redmi Note 3. The speaker grille is at the bottom of the back. The physical buttons for volume and power are on the right, while the hybrid SIM slot is on the left. The phone accepts one Micro-SIM and another Nano-SIM or microSD card for storage. Unfortunately, this means that users will have to choose between a second SIM and a microSD card.

There is an infrared emitter and a 3.5mm audio jack on the top. The bottom has a standard Micro-USB port and a microphone. The Redmi 3S Prime sports an all-metal body which means that the device itself feels premium regardless of the price tag it carries. At 144 grams, the Redmi 3S is slightly heavy for a budget device, but the curved sides make it easy to grip. The extra weight can safely be put down to the massive battery inside the smartphone.

Screen is 5 inches supporting 1280 x 720 pixels resolution. Color reproduction, viewing angles and touch response are just great. It is not mentioned if the screen comes with any protection, but screen is scratch resistant to some minor extent. If you have a history of damaging screen then it would be better if you use a screen guard.However, it doesn’t come with any significant protection, though Xiaomi says that it has some protection from multiple vendors. During my usage I didn’t manage to scratch the display but it would be a good idea to get a tempered glass or a screen protector.

There is LED notification below the dedicated button on the front and you can select a color from the list. The dedicated button do not light up. This handset is packed with Accelerometer, gyro, magnetic, hall, step, light and proximity sensors.

Redmi 3S / 3S prime is running MIUI 7 based on Android Marshmallow 6.0.1.which is another a reason for buying it.

RAM AND ROM

Now depending on the model – on 3S you get 2GB RAM and 16GB eMMC 5.0 ROM. On the 3S Prime there is 3GB RAM and 32GB eMMC 5.1 ROM. OTG is supported. On the first boot (3S Prime) you will get around 1.9GB free RAM and around 22 GB free space. User can use micro SD card of up to 128GB.

OR

Under the hood, the Redmi 3S and Redmi 3S Prime both pack the octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 (MMB29) processor, with four cores clocked at 1.1GHz and four cores at 1.4GHz, plus an integrated Adreno 505 GPU. Apart from the fingerprint sensor, the only differences between the Xiaomi Redmi 3S and Redmi 3S Prime are the amounts of RAM and storage. The Redmi 3S features 2GB of RAM with 16GB of inbuilt storage, while the Redmi 3S Prime has 3GB of RAM and 32GB of storage.

Performance

The Xiaomi Redmi 3S Prime sets a standard for other smartphones in the same price band. We didn't face any lags while multitasking on this device, and there were no noticeable frame rate drops while playing games like Dead Trigger 2.

Apps loaded quickly and the screen responded to touches without any complaints. The only issue that we faced was occasional restarts while running benchmarks, which is a repetition of what happened during the review of the Redmi Note 3. There was no heating while charging the phone or talking on calls. The phone did heat up a bit while using the camera app, but it never became too uncomfortable to use. We encountered no issues while talking for long hours on the phone.

We did try using the fingerprint scanner on the Redmi 3S Prime with wet fingers and it worked without refusing to recognise prints even once. We were impressed with the speed of fingerprint recognition.

SOUND

The quality of sound through the speaker at the back of the handset was impressive, except that it went flat at maximum volume with no stereo effect. We did check the quality of music through our own wired earphones and we were not disappointed. There are plenty of tweaking options for music lovers.

BENCHMARK

·       Quadrant – 21893

·       Antutu (64 bit) – 42150 | 3D score – 7435

·       Nenamark 2 – 59.9fps

·       Internal storage Speed – Read (134MB/s), Write (82MB/s)

·       Multi Touch – 10 Point

CAMERA

The camera is nothing worth writing home about either. The front facing 5-megapixel camera gives out grainy results under most lighting conditions. The rear 13-megapixel camera is slightly better, but it isn’t something that you would get printed. Well, who does that anyway these days. Photos in low light conditions are grainy again and even in good lighting come out to be soft when zoomed in. It seems good camera sensors haven’t yet percolated to entry-level smartphones. And that’s really a pity for smartphones like the Redmi 3s Prime.Camera quality is above average.

OTHERS

The Redmi 3S / 3S Prime supports 4G LTE with VoLTE. Sound (speaker / in-call) is loud and clear. I did not face any network issues. 4G, WiFi, GPS and Bluetooth worked well.

There is IR blaster on the front you can use that to control other electronic items like AC, TV etc. The finger print sensor on the back is also pretty fast and accurate. You can unlock directly using finger print sensor, just tap the sensor.

DIFFERENCE AND VERDICT

The Redmi 3S Prime no doubt is a very good handset with a very good price tag, however it does not come with fast charging support and the Snapdragon 430 hardware is not as powerful as the Snapdragon 650 hardware redmi note 3  is using.

Redmi 3S prime cannot play 4K videos smoothly, Redmi Note 3 can. Also when you compare the benchmarks there is a good difference. Having said that the 3S is still a very good buy, you will hardly notice any difference in performance with you daily usage though technically Note 3 is powerful.

The only criteria when deciding between the Redmi 3S and the Redmi Note 3 should be the screen size – you decide if you want a handset with 5 inch screen or 5.5 inch screen.

There is not much off a price difference between the 3S Prime and the Note 3 (2GB), makes sense to go for Redmi Note 3, however the Redmi 3S without finger print sensor for Rs. 6,999 is excellent buy in case you ignore the finger print sensor.

rating= 9/10