Xiaomi began off 2017 in India with the discharge of the next new release in their maximum successful device inside the states. The Xiaomi Redmi Note four is the successor of last yr’s Xiaomi Redmi Note three, which changed into applauded for its performance and battery life, bringing within the high-quality fee package in its product category. With the Redmi Note 4, can Xiaomi enhance on these two regions? Let’s find out!
Just like its predecessor, the Xiaomi Redmi Note four is available in SoC variations: one with a MediaTek Helio X20 and the other proposing a Qualcomm Snapdragon 625. Alongside those chipsets, you can find unique mixtures of RAM + Storage options as indexed underneath:
SoC RAM Internal Storage
Mediatek Helio X20 2GB 16GB
3GB 64GB
Qualcomm Snapdragon 625 2GB 32GB
3GB 32GB
4GB 64GB
Our review unit is from the Indian market, and therefore it comes with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 625 SoC, in conjunction with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of inner garage.
Performance
The Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 (Snapdragon 650) that we reviewed left us mightily impressed by way of the sheer overall performance of the SoC in each processing pace and energy efficiency, in each benchmarks and the real global. The addition of 2x Cortex-A72 cores in a separate overall performance cluster supplemented the 4x Cortex-A53 cores in the efficiency cluster, allowing the device to ace numerous benchmarks conveniently. The Redmi Note three positioned up an definitely untouchable wall of performance towards its competition inside the affordable section, a reality that largely contributed to it being Xiaomi’s most a hit product inside the Indian market.
However, on the floor, the Xiaomi Redmi Note four (Snapdragon 625) winds up in the back of the Redmi Note 3 (Snapdragon 650) primarily based on natural specs. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 625 bears 8x Cortex-A53 cores on a 14nm fabrication manner. It’s claimed that the cluster setup is meant to be divided into a overall performance (4x cores) and performance (4x cores) mixture (as intended), but within the real international we robotically noticed that every one 8 cores have been capable of accomplishing the two.0GHz peak clock pace and staying there, so we are willing to agree with that the clusters are applied instead homogeneously.
The removal of the Cortex-A72 cores ought to be first-rate felt in overall performance-extensive scenarios as opposed to every day usage instances in which the Cortex-A53 cores have to be enough, although some brief burst operations will probable take a hit in overall performance as properly. The loss of A72 cores will also impact benchmark scores. The place that would be an improvement is battery lifestyles, because the SD625 SoC additionally stands to enjoy the 14nm fabrication method as against the SD650’s 28nm process. While that gain also translate to higher performance below comparable situations, it’s in large part offset by using the difference in center setups.
So how precisely does the Xiaomi Redmi Note four fare?
CPU & System
The Xiaomi Redmi Note four settles in the low and mid end close to benchmark performance. It trails behind in numerous benchmarks in opposition to its predecessor, that’s inline with our preliminary evaluation of the spec sheet. While the RN3 was a powerful mid-ranger at its exceptional overall performance, the RN4 is a good mid-range tool at satisfactory.
Starting off with GeekBench, a benchmark that enables narrowly examine the CPU performance, we find that the Redmi Note four lags at the back of the Redmi Note 3 by using a terrific margin. The RN4 scored 841/2927 at its maximum, even as the RN3 should control 1492/3482 at its pleasant for the duration of our ultimate assessment. Individual numbers via themselves have little that means, but as an assessment across the two generation of gadgets, it is indicative of the decline in sheer computing capacity between the 2016 product and the 2017 product.
Other tests which degree overall performance thru summary algorithms, like BaseMark OS II and AnTuTu, share similar effects. Total score on BaseMark OS II was decrease whilst compared to the ratings on the Redmi Note 3 and Mi Max (Snapdragon 650, 3GB RAM), albeit anomalous conduct became noticed with system scoring better and reminiscence scoring half of in contrast. AnTuTu rating changed into lower at the Redmi Note 4 as well. The margins of distinction might not be very massive, but they continually exist.
The wonder that we did discover become in PCMark assessments in which the Redmi Note 4 scores better than both the Xiaomi Redmi Note three and the Xiaomi Mi Max. In reality, the score on Work 1.Zero test on PCMark has the Redmi Note 4 score closer to the OnePlus 3 with its Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 SoC and 6GB of LPDDR4 RAM rankings (6692 vs 6748 respectively). This behavior is unexpected as PCMark’s exams aren’t totally summary exams, but take a holistic technique to benchmarking by way of setting the device through common use case situations in a much less-discrete testing environment that still makes use of system sources.
The outcomes of PCMark echo throughout the overall overall performance of the device. I was for my part dissatisfied upon studying that the Redmi Note four was a downgrade on paper over its predecessor. But the realistic performance of the cellphone left me pleasantly amazed.
MIUI eight is chock full of animations, that may deliver a sense of fluidity to the OS revel in however ends up feeling much less snappy and now not quite as instantaneous. Actions sense deliberate and gradual, so the first few hours with the phone felt as if the device become consciously and intentionally slowing down movements, giving an air of incompetence to the underlying SoC strength. The gradual reaction times were very obvious as I had jumped from a totally snappy and reactive OnePlus 3 right down to the Redmi Note 4.
Going via menus within the submit-setup, there have been some settings which I played round with to get an revel in that didn’t sense as lethargic. In developer settings, I accelerated the animations from the default 1x to zero.5x for Window animations, Transition animations and Animator durations, just to peer if the device started out stuttering. I additionally turned off Memory Optimization and MIUI Optimization, both of that are settings which are opaque in their workings and have been observed to be unfavorable to the real hardware potential in my beyond Xiaomi stories. I also turned off “System Animations” in the Battery Settings, even though I am unsure of which animations these refer to as animations nonetheless persisted to exist in all the predicted places.
Once the animations were sped up and the “optimizations” grew to become off, the every day usage enjoy at the Redmi Note four became similar to that of the Redmi Note three and different merchandise within the price variety. It isn’t a flagship-like experience, as apps nevertheless take a substantial 2d to open up (made apparent while you completely turn off all animations inside the Developer Settings). But for a mean consumer going approximately his daily enterprise, there may be no substantial difference between the Redmi Note four and the theoretically-better Redmi Note 3.
The Redmi Note 4 makes its predecessor proud with exquisite thermal overall performance
Great performance incorporates onto thermal throttling. The predecessor Redmi Note three changed into an absolute thermal pride to use, as heat dissipation become superb and throttling due to warmness buildup become now not important. The Redmi Note four makes its predecessors proud as it accomplishes the same outcomes. In our throttling checks with consecutive benchmark runs, the Redmi Note 4 confirmed simplest a mild decline in benchmark scores while temperatures rose. Temperature stagnated and hovered round 36°C, and overall performance simplest showed nominal versions. Do word, due to the better ambient temperature of my city thanks to its tropical weather, this unique throttling test starts at 30°C base temperature — only a point to don’t forget whilst comparing throttling overall performance throughout our other device opinions which start out around 28°C.
Another issue to factor out, the minimum frequency at the Snapdragon 625 is 652MHz and not any lower for some purpose. The telephone still plays well within the battery branch, as we are able to be aware later on in this article.
GPU & Gaming
The GPU is a place wherein the Redmi Note 4 indicates a greater downgrade from the Redmi Note 3.
The RN4 makes use of the Adreno 506, whilst the RN3 makes use of the Adreno 510. While the Adreno 506 is based at the 14nm fabrication system and has a higher clock speed, it has much less range of ALU’s (96 vs 128) and manages to score lesser GFLOPS (a hundred thirty vs 180). Most video games at the Redmi Note 4 start off on the lowest photo setting as their endorsed putting, however you could ramp them up on famous titles and nonetheless keep playability.
Benchmarking rankings for the GPU place it nicely beneath the Redmi Note 3. The Redmi Note 4 rankings approximately ⅔ the framerate on comparable checks.
GPU throttling, however, is surely negligible. Granted, the GPU isn’t the quality performer, however our throttling evaluation suggests that it is a as an alternative consistent performer. GFXBench’s Manhattan three.1 Endurance tests had the tool scoring a alternatively constant 377 frames throughout 30 consecutive benchmark runs. The variations within the score are of the order of ±zero.1 body across the exams, so whilst the scores aren’t astonishing by way of themselves, the consistency is.
GPU Throttling
When it involves games, most titles carry out just as well at the Redmi Note four as they do on the Redmi Note three. Games do start at low first-class, but you can push them as much as max information with none difficulty as famous titles generally tend to artificially cap the framerate to 30 on most gadgets. Asphalt 8 and Warhammer 40k Freeblade had no problems churning out their 30FPS ceiling in gameplay at highest settings. On the alternative hand, Dead Trigger 2 does perform towards 45FPS as compared to the 55FPS average executed at the Redmi Note three at maximum settings.
The takeaway from the CPU and GPU overall performance sections is that the Redmi Note four is certainly a practical downgrade from the Redmi Note 3. But this statement is as a substitute myopic in its outlook, as performance in practical situations is nearly same and variations unnoticeable. Outside the scope of benchmarks, the Redmi Note four does now not come across as the inferior device, and everyday usersdoing normal tasks will not be able to differentiate among the Redmi Note three and the Redmi Note four. I’d even go as some distance as saying that advanced customers will also be unable to distinguish among the Snapdragon 650 and the Snapdragon 625 in performance except they exit of their way to locate deltas with the aid of checking out each side with the aid of aspect.
After my usage of the device, I am greater at peace with Xiaomi’s decision to head for a an SoC that does not have a overall performance cluster setup as they have ended up with an outstanding package deal nevertheless. App and OS performance is quick, famous freemium titles typically max out at fps, and the device performs admirably underneath extended utilization situations with minimum throttling and a relaxed maximum temperature ceiling.
RAM Management and Storage
One of the weakest links in the Redmi Note 3 bundle changed into its restricted RAM and liveable garage. The base variant got here with a RAM and storage mixture of 2GB + 16GB, even as the better variation bumped these up to 3GB + 32GB. We reviewed the 2GB variant of the Redmi Note 3 and mentioned the disappointing multitasking abilties of the tool. MIUI’s heavy handedness in dealing with historical past applications in addition to its own bloat ended up giving us a completely negative performer. Our Mi Max assessment, which was accomplished on the 3GB RAM variant with the Snapdragon 650 SoC, stated the improvement a further GB of RAM added to the revel in.
With the Redmi Note 4, Xiaomi tries to restoration this one damaged aspect. To cater to a much broader price range situation, the tool is available in 3 RAM + Storage mixtures in India: 2GB+32GB, 3GB+32GB and 4GB+64GB. Our evaluate unit is the pinnacle variation, and our enjoy affirms that extra RAM is virtually good on devices that run MIUI and is well worth the extra cost.
More RAM is actually proper on devices that run MIUI and is properly really worth the extra price
To absolutely make use of all that RAM though, one does want to turn off Xiaomi’s MIUI “optimizations”. These settings attempt to near down historical past packages and tactics mercilessly, aiming for greater “battery existence”. So even though you may have extra than 2GB of free RAM, you would find your ultimate accessed background application would be closed away and reset upon a display screen off, or your ultimate sport that you were playing before an sudden name came thru is no longer in memory and desires to reload from scratch.
The 4GB LPDDR3 RAM variant of the tool, with out MIUI’s optimization interference, can keep more than 12 apps in memory. This is enough for the wishes of most people. There is no bizarre or anomalous behaviour when you have plenty of apps open. You can even switch from video games like Warhammer 40K Freeblade and Asphalt 8 and again without a issues. As a long way as preserving apps in memory goes, the experience is comparable to fashionable day flagships.
The 64GB of eMMC garage (consumer accessible: 56GB) formatted to EXT4 filesystem allows the Redmi Note 4 to evaluate with the Redmi Note 3 and the Mi Max on Read and Write speeds for the maximum part. The most effective upgrades visible are in Sequential Write speeds, wherein the device comes towards flagship like performance. High sequential write speeds might are available in beneficial when writing large documents like movies into the internal storage, so there’s restrained scope in seeing these upgrades until you plan to be a heavy records creator for your budget tool.
In addition to the internal garage, the Redmi Note four additionally gives storage expandability via a microsd card slot (via the Hybrid Dual SIM tray). Seeing as there may be no 16GB garage choice even on the base variant, most users could be satisfied with the 32GB and 64GB alternatives by means of themselves. But having the choice is continually first-class, and we respect the choice.
App Opening speeds on the Xiaomi Redmi Note four are ok. Seeing that that is a finances device in the end, we do no longer have high expectations. For the maximum part, the tool offers establishing speeds (bloodless start) akin to other low give up and price range gadgets, and as clearly predicted, tastes dirt when as compared to flagships. Even as compared to the Mi Max, the RN4 opens up apps (bloodless begin) slower with the aid of a margin of ~1 2d throughout an averaged run of Play Store, Gmail, Hangouts and Chrome. The distinction may also appear minuscule, but it adds up through the day in case you hold the default MIUI “optimizations” enabled. If you don’t, then the new begin timing of apps comes down significantly.
Overall, on the performance cease, the Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 is any other strong performer from Xiaomi’s stables. It is a theoretical downgrade in certain areas, however does now not permit any of that affect its real global overall performance. It is important to keep in mind that Xiaomi’s goal demographic with this smartphone is the finances audience, folks who cross for devices just like the Lenovo Moto G4. The previous Redmi Note three was an absolute monster inside the price range and set the bar a touch too excessive for even Xiaomi to 1 up. So despite the fact that the Redmi Note four shoots for the celebs and misses, it nevertheless finally ends up quite excessive.
Battery Life and Charging
The upgrades to the Redmi Note four over the Redmi Note 3 come within the battery life department, and that is an accomplishment via itself. The Redmi Note 3 was one of the pleasant phones I have experienced for battery lifestyles, dwarfed best through the likes of the Mi Max even as coming out on top of the OnePlus 3. So to move beyond this is no small feat.
For ahead and backward comparisons, we examined out the Redmi Note four on each of PCMark’s Battery Life take a look at versions. On Work 2.Zero, the tool offers out a mammoth 16h 41m of battery existence at lowest brightness, even as continuing on with an impressive 8h 15m of existence at most brightness. On Work 1.0, that’s what we utilized in our critiques of the OnePlus three, Mi Max and the Redmi Note 3, the Redmi Note four comes out the best with a existence of 19h 15m and 9h 31m at minimal and maximum brightness respectively.
The Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 has the first-class battery life of any device that I actually have used so far
PCMark Work 1.Zero: Minimum Brightness
PCMark Work 1.Zero: Maximum Brightness
PCMark Work 2.0: Minimum Brightness
PCMark Work 2.Zero: Maximum Brightness
Much of the credit here, in particular during battery benchmarking, is going to the big 4000/4100 mAh (min/typ) non-detachable battery and the Qualcomm Snapdragon 625 SoC and its Cortex-A53 cores on the 14nm FinFET fabrication method. Qualcomm claimed a reduction of as much as 35% in strength intake in comparison to the previous era (which would be the Snapdragon 61x collection in this situation). Xiaomi claims an boom of 25% in battery existence over the Redmi Note 3. We do not accept as true with the numbers, but it in reality is a marked development over some thing that turned into nice-in-elegance by means of itself.
It is so tough to kill this device that for sake of charging time trying out, we ended up spending 1h 42min simply looking to get the telephone down from 20% to zero%!
As a long way as Screen On instances are involved, most days stop with round 6 and 1/2 hours of display on time with around 25% battery nonetheless to go. My utilization classifies beneath heavy usage in those situations, way to steady LTE connection (courtesy of Reliance Jio) and Dual-SIM utilization. These 6 hours could be a combined bag of Chrome surfing, Whatsapp, Telegram, Slack, Reddit Sync, YouTube and a blended of around 1 and half hours of Ingress and Vainglory gaming. The Redmi Note four is pure beast mode in relation to battery, and with a suitable level of performance, there in reality is not any tradeoff in achieving those insane numbers.
On medium to mild utilization with much extra tool standby and wifi switchover, the phone can without problems eke out two days of utilization. Average users will be actually content with the battery life in this device, no matter their utilization depth.
The excellent part of this insane battery overall performance is that the phone manages to do all of that even as nonetheless maintaining a popular length shape element, without having a bulky battery and body. As we are able to increase upon in our complete review, the Redmi Note four offers pleasant ergonomics and permits for at ease managing too.
As insane as the battery lifestyles is, the charging charge of the Xiaomi Redmi Note four is the complete opposite. The telephone comes with a 5V/2A charger within the field. Xiaomi makes no mention of any rapid charging competencies on the device despite the fact that the Snapdragon 625 helps Qualcomm Quick Charge three.0.
Charging with the provided box charger continuously takes approximately three hours to rate a dead Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 to a hundred%. Charging charge appreciably tapers off closer to the higher probabilities.
An hour’s really worth of fee is ideal enough for the battery to move from zero to 50%. External temperatures while charging remain a fab 36-38 °C at the same time as the cellphone is idling/asleep, although the charger brick itself manages to move better than 50°C even as charging (not an trouble in view that no person needs to continuously handle the charger, however simply some thing really worth bringing up). We had was hoping Xiaomi might comprise enhancements on this region due to the fact the Mi Max and the Redmi Note 3 had similar charging overall performance, but regrettably, that is not the case.
All in all, the Redmi Note 4 is a battery beast that works just as well as its predecessor in maximum situations. The slow charging charges are offset with the aid of the actually insane battery performance. Not only does the phone final lengthy, it also is a pleasure to apply for long durations of time as nicely.
For a finances tool, the spec sheet does not do justice to the performance of the Snapdragon 625 on this device. During every day usage, you may probable understand no difference among this smartphone and its predecessor in performance. Gaming does go through a piece, however that is best while you bear in mind very heavy and demanding titles. The tool is likewise exceptional to apply as a long way as peak external temperature is worried, and sees negligible thermal throttling for both CPU and GPU. RAM performance is a huge improvement, and we would easily advocate spending the extra money and getting the higher RAM variation. Storage also is abundant as Xiaomi has achieved away with 16GB alternatives for inner storage, with the base version starting off at 32GB and nonetheless assisting microsd expandability.
The Xiaomi Redmi Note 4 (Snapdragon 625) is on sale in India for nine,999 ($a hundred and fifty) for the 2GB+32GB choice; ₹10,999 ($one hundred sixty five) for the 3GB+32GB choice and ₹12,999 ($195) for the 4GB+64GB option. Stay tuned for our complete overview of the tool, in which we can take a look at all the different aspects of the phone!
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