Develop Bugs

Newman K1

I recently purchased the Newman K1
Does anyone know how to root it?
Does anyone how to install the original android 4.2rom on this, it came with lewa OS4.2 installed
Thanks for your help

ok

Ηas anyone bought this phone so we can have some general presentation?

A slightly late reply. I've been using the Freelander branded version of this phone (Freelander i30) as my main device for the past month and a half, and I'm pretty impressed: it's the first Chinese phone I've used where everything works without much hassle, including GPS. Camera is also decent by normal standards, and perfectly usable for snapshots.
Its main drawback is limited 3G support, as only the 2100 frequency is supported. A couple other very minor annoyances are the digitizer grid which can be seen in direct sunlight by turning the phone at a certain angle, the tendency of the screen to get dirty, and the average in-call audio quality. They don't pose a problem in use, in fact I bet most owners won't even notice them.
As for the rest, it's pretty great: the screen is very bright with good viewing angles colors and contrast; signal reception is ok, about the same as most other phones I had; firmware support is excellent, with two official ROMs (plain Android and Lewa) and frequent updates; GPS is very quick to fix and usually gets to 5m precision; audio quality through the headphone jack is pretty good, even usable by audiophile standards. Battery life is great, with moderate use I can do more than 3 days, heavy use a full day with something to spare.
For its price it's a very good phone, with good community support (there's an excellent thread on 4pda with English recoveries, custom ROMs, etc.). If you have any questions just ask and I'll try to answer them.

ludoo said:
A slightly late reply. I've been using the Freelander branded version of this phone (Freelander i30) as my main device for the past month and a half, and I'm pretty impressed: it's the first Chinese phone I've used where everything works without much hassle, including GPS. Camera is also decent by normal standards, and perfectly usable for snapshots.
Its main drawback is limited 3G support, as only the 2100 frequency is supported. A couple other very minor annoyances are the digitizer grid which can be seen in direct sunlight by turning the phone at a certain angle, the tendency of the screen to get dirty, and the average in-call audio quality. They don't pose a problem in use, in fact I bet most owners won't even notice them.
As for the rest, it's pretty great: the screen is very bright with good viewing angles colors and contrast; signal reception is ok, about the same as most other phones I had; firmware support is excellent, with two official ROMs (plain Android and Lewa) and frequent updates; GPS is very quick to fix and usually gets to 5m precision; audio quality through the headphone jack is pretty good, even usable by audiophile standards. Battery life is great, with moderate use I can do more than 3 days, heavy use a full day with something to spare.
For its price it's a very good phone, with good community support (there's an excellent thread on 4pda with English recoveries, custom ROMs, etc.). If you have any questions just ask and I'll try to answer them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you tell me that you have found 2 roms you mention?

You mean where have I found them? Sure
Newman K1 ROMs are released on the Newman BBS (forum) in this thread, they can also be found on the 4PDA thread in the formware section.
If instead you meant if I like them, the Lewa ROM is beautiful and very well done, but I prefer stock Android. They both work very well, rooting is easy with motochopper.

ludoo said:
You mean where have I found them? Sure
Newman K1 ROMs are released on the Newman BBS (forum) in this thread, they can also be found on the 4PDA thread in the formware section.
If instead you meant if I like them, the Lewa ROM is beautiful and very well done, but I prefer stock Android. They both work very well, rooting is easy with motochopper.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
and 2 Forum that suggest it is in non-intelligible languages for me, is there some topik here on xda or some anyway in English;

What's wrong with google translate?
Sent from my Newman K1 using Tapatalk 2

ludoo said:
What's wrong with google translate?
Sent from my Newman K1 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is one solution ...

ludoo said:
A slightly late reply. I've been using the Freelander branded version of this phone (Freelander i30) as my main device for the past month and a half, and I'm pretty impressed: it's the first Chinese phone I've used where everything works without much hassle, including GPS. Camera is also decent by normal standards, and perfectly usable for snapshots.
Its main drawback is limited 3G support, as only the 2100 frequency is supported. A couple other very minor annoyances are the digitizer grid which can be seen in direct sunlight by turning the phone at a certain angle, the tendency of the screen to get dirty, and the average in-call audio quality. They don't pose a problem in use, in fact I bet most owners won't even notice them.
As for the rest, it's pretty great: the screen is very bright with good viewing angles colors and contrast; signal reception is ok, about the same as most other phones I had; firmware support is excellent, with two official ROMs (plain Android and Lewa) and frequent updates; GPS is very quick to fix and usually gets to 5m precision; audio quality through the headphone jack is pretty good, even usable by audiophile standards. Battery life is great, with moderate use I can do more than 3 days, heavy use a full day with something to spare.
For its price it's a very good phone, with good community support (there's an excellent thread on 4pda with English recoveries, custom ROMs, etc.). If you have any questions just ask and I'll try to answer them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's great, thanks for your input. It's been a nightmare trying to find any community support for this phone (in English anyway!). I've just ordered this from Merimobiles. When you mention about the screen getting dirty quite easily, do you mean smudge marks easily appear or that dirt gets easily trapped at the sides of the screen ? And how average is the audio quality, is it fairly difficult to understand what someone is saying or is the clarity just missing ? Thanks

georger010 said:
That's great, thanks for your input. It's been a nightmare trying to find any community support for this phone (in English anyway!). I've just ordered this from Merimobiles. When you mention about the screen getting dirty quite easily, do you mean smudge marks easily appear or that dirt gets easily trapped at the sides of the screen ? And how average is the audio quality, is it fairly difficult to understand what someone is saying or is the clarity just missing ? Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What I mean by saying the screen gets easily dirty is that it's pretty easy to leave smudges on it and they are less easily wiped without some sort of liquid (water is fine), as if it was missing an oleophobic coating or had a very weak one. From reading around it's a common issue with most Chinese phones, I guess they save a few pennies by using a weak/no coating. It's not a big issue, especially if you use a screen protector or even if you don't like me, I just clean it more often than other phones I had. You could also try a "diy" coating, there are threads by people using car wax or windshield water repellent liquids.
The audio is ok, now I don't even notice anything during calls. I only noticed it when switching from the Jiayu G3, which had better call quality. You won't probably notice anything out of place. I'm also using a more recent baseband than the stock one, from a Zopo phone using the same chipset (here, flash with cwm or copy modem.img to /etc/firmware then chmod 644) which seems to have improved things, but maybe it's just placebo.
All in all it's a pretty great phone. I installed the latest LewaOS from early June and it's super smooth, and beautiful. A bit bloated, but nothing that can't be remedied by deleting a few apks from /system/app.
---------- Post added at 11:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:31 AM ----------
PS - as for community support, there's an excellent thread on the Russian 4pda forum, split into a discussion thread and a firmware thread. You can use google translator and understand most of it, and there are links to all the drivers and ROMs in the firmware thread.
To download software just register, again using google translator. The only apparently difficult part is entering the captcha, but in practice you don't need to type cyrillic characters, just enter the sum of the two numbers displayed.
Another useful thread might be the one I started on the Italian androidiani forum, just search google for "newman k1 androidiani", in the first post I have collected a few useful links. Again, google translator allows you to grasp what you need.

I recently received my Newman k1. It is a very good phone, all works well. The only problem are the speakers:they're not bad, they're just not loud enough.
I have not missed any call because of it, anyway. Sorry for my bad English.
Sent from my Newman K1 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

You can tweak audio levels from the engineer menu, search on google there are lots of threads on how to do it as it's the same process for all mediatek phones.
Sent from my Newman K1 using Tapatalk 2

ludoo said:
You can tweak audio levels from the engineer menu, search on google there are lots of threads on how to do it as it's the same process for all mediatek phones.
Sent from my Newman K1 using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Give if you want more info or link
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 4 Beta

Ηi Ludoo
you use this application https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mobileuncle.toolbox below to increase the volume and if so can you give us the prices;

paiktaras said:
Ηi Ludoo
you use this application https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mobileuncle.toolbox below to increase the volume and if so can you give us the prices;
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Prices for what???

ludoo said:
Prices for what???
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
sorry for my bad english, units I meant

google "mobileuncle volume levels"...

anyone have the newest lewaos rom from lewaos forum?

Brief Newman K1 and Affiliates
paiktaras said:
Ηas anyone bought this phone so we can have some general presentation?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
:good:Newman K1/K1A/K1W in black, white, black/white
MTK6589
Depending on whre you buy it from they ship either the K1, K1A (labled as K1W), and as K1A panda under the name "Newsmy" Panda
K1 has 5 inch screen / K1A/W is 5.3 inches, though they share the exact specs, so any mods for one goes for the other. From what i had translated on their CHINESE forum, http://bbs.newamn.mobi, one is referred to the K1 area for flash, tweaks, ROMS, etc. Google does an OK job translating, you can get the general idea, but those Chinese characters, Whew! Pre-rooted from http://merimobiles.com (all their items are pre-rooted).
Onto the phone as a device for use, its a great device to start out with for tweaks and adjustments. The 5.3 screen is large enough to clearly see, The LEWA ROM is very smooth and though some say bloated, any apk's can be removed. Just do your research before making any adjustments.So yeah, smooth ROM out of the box. Simple font, based on android 4.2.1 though some options are in different places. Sound wise, it needs work, the headphone level is loud enough for inside listening but low enough to get drowned out by NYC traffic. As stated on other threads, this can be fixed..http://http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2248396. The screen can easily be scratched, it is thinly coated, and might do well with a DIY method or a screen protector. The memory leaves to desire however. They market it as having 1 g RAM//4gb Rom but its only a 2 gb ROM of which 1.5 is taken up by the OS. An external SD is a must, just got to Settings>Storage> and chose save to SD and SD for internal memory. You should be fine then.CAMERA is 8 mp main/ 2 mp front. Camera quality is good on this phone. Clear crisp, natural looking pictures in daylight. Flash is too bright.Audio is good quality, suitable for most, though not Sony. It will run on T-mobile/ATT in the USA but only at 2g speeds through EDGE/GSM/GPRS. If your texting and phone calls, your fine and may be settled. If its internet browsing, then its a bit slow to load. I use a VOIP program with Google voice to make free calls over WIFI. WIFI and Bluetooth connectivity is excellent. GPS locks in within 1 minute max, though better positioning may be had by a window. MTK 6589 chips are known for their poor GPS signals, and though even though its not a 6589T chip, it still works fine.
Any further questions, please ask...

If you could ask One Plus to concentrate on 1 thing, what would it be?

As OnePlus is a smaller company, it's understandable that they may not have the resources to fix all of the bugs, release security updates and work on the Android Nougat update all at the same time.
If you could ask One Plus to concentrate on 1 thing, what would it be?

For me this is easy. Video stabilization is broke at the moment.
Once they fix this, the Android N update would be nice. :angel:

For me. I think videos stabilization is acceptable honestly speaking its not that bad. We can co-op with it as being an average user. And for those of them who wants best in class video quality you better invest in something way better as the camera on oneplus is far better then the competition. And there's practically no drawbacks at all, imo. Speaking of which you won't get better than this in just a budget of Rs. 28k or $400. As the given market standard you have to spend almost double for samsung Sony and triple for the apple devices. So taking the compatibility and user experience in consideration. I think i can pick a oneplus 3 on any day. So in my opinion. OnePlus for the given moment should only concentrate on the nougat update. So that oneplus's flagship get some reputation of providing good and fast updates as doing so will enhance the market reputation and add another reason to get oneplus 3 asap. As if they provide an update within this quarter they will have a hefty amount of time to concentrate the video stabilization. As it is usable but there's nothing better than the best. ?

Random soft reboots of phone, especially when using Bluetooth + GPS like waze
Sent from my ONEPLUS A3000 using Tapatalk

Support

Front Camera quality, it just sucks. You go to a zone with a bit of a low light and the noise is unacceptable. OPO's front cam was miles better than this crap.

Faster WiFi chipsets , or nougat 7.1

7.1

Better digitizer glass

Camera , image quality and UI interface is really lousy. I always accidentally switch photo mode to video mode when try to zoom in or zoom out .
Sent from my ONEPLUS A3000 using XDA-Developers mobile app

I would ask for a stock camera app that all Roms could use.

Better camera than iPhone and Pixel

No doubt.........Android 7 update. Everything else in this phone is ok according to its price.

Rom flashing to be a lot safer & easy. Not like now, Twrp or firmware needs to be reinstal almost on every time you flash a new rom.
Better LTE, phone signal, camera.

Fix not users issue :highfive: like stabilization

I would love to see improvement of built in apps like gallery, music, shelf, launcher, camera, clock and enabling FM radio. More tweaks and cool useful features.
I.e: alarm clock that plays your favourit FM radio instead of tone / editing a ringtone in music app...
Sent from my ONEPLUS A3003 using XDA-Developers mobile app

Im happy with everything on my OP3, everything works super well imo.
A well built Android 7 would be great.

As the author of this poll I'm surprised by the results. In other places, there are people that moan that the OP3 is a buggy unsupported mess.
By most users opting for the N update, it proves the device is generally solid and the issues are the minority not the majority of users.

rais.asif786 said:
Better digitizer glass
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Why?

I don't really care about V7. I'm more concerned about them screwing up Oxygen OS by making it into Hydrogen OS.
Software wise i just want regular security updates and big fixes. Once they have that down they can worry about messing up the UI and adding useless features.
Pipedream, replace your stock recovery with twrp and stop making me reinstall it after updates.
On the hardware front I just want an SD card. I don't need it obviously but I would prefer it.

Little rant to get it out of my chest...

Disclaimer: This is rant, a civilized one, if you disagree with me, you are welcome to illustrate me but offenses are not appreciated.
This phone is great, but it refuses to be acceptable as a daily driver.
Developers are the best people in the world, they do what they do with no return at all sometimes, but the software (the lack of a good kernel base) makes it really hard to enjoy. I could never get more than 4.5 hours of SOT on any ROM, whereas stock would give me at least 5.5; however stock software is a bad joke for the Android base and the camera output is nerve wracking...
The CDLA headphones are a must, no one likes the dongle and it seems that (due to broken kernel) no dev was able to figure out this one (clarifying again that I don't blame them). So my options are to get used to carry the dongle or to the crack and pop from the CDLA ones... hmmmmmm......
I see the exact same story as with the Amazon phone, on its time, the Amazon phone had a really good thing going here in XDA, but the bootloader was never unlocked and the momentum was lost. I had to let go on my Fire phone....
For the LePro3, many great options are at hand at the same price, I'm looking heavily right now at the LG G5 from the $200 custom rom on eBay, WAY BETTER camera (like 10X times better), about the same battery life if you compare custom ROM of LePro3 vs stock of LG G5, and I have to admit that although I dislike LG's interface, it is tolerable.
Also, the LeEco servers (including the one that supports OTAs) has been down for at least 3 days (that I have tried myself), like seriously, we know the company is nearly in bankruptcy although still having customer support working, but the fact that security updates have halted and servers are down, tells me that there is something wrong going on.
At $200 dlls that I got the phone for, it is still not worth it for *me*.
My Moto Z play was $450 with a hasselblad camera mod that I was able to sell to get $100 in return, so for $350, I would still take yet another Moto Z Play at the current price, with way lower specifications, than taking a LePro3 for $200.

Help yourself and download these apps
Power Toggles
ACDisplay
Simple Control
Fingerprint Quick Action
Pixel Launcher
Modify the DPI to 300 via ADB
Download Google Camera (2.7) , Phone, Contacts etc from APKMirror
I am enjoying all the benefits from stock ROM plus emulated stock Android experience. =D

I bought this phone at what I thought was a steal for the hardware I was getting. I knew the company was unknown in the US and would likely not support the phone for long (if at all). I've flashed many Roms and played with this phone more than any other than perhaps my Nexus 6. Its a great phone overall with pretty decent developer support. I regret nothing.

Jose-MXL said:
Disclaimer: This is rant, a civilized one, if you disagree with me, you are welcome to illustrate me but offenses are not appreciated.
This phone is great, but it refuses to be acceptable as a daily driver.
Developers are the best people in the world, they do what they do with no return at all sometimes, but the software (the lack of a good kernel base) makes it really hard to enjoy. I could never get more than 4.5 hours of SOT on any ROM, whereas stock would give me at least 5.5; however stock software is a bad joke for the Android base and the camera output is nerve wracking...
The CDLA headphones are a must, no one likes the dongle and it seems that (due to broken kernel) no dev was able to figure out this one (clarifying again that I don't blame them). So my options are to get used to carry the dongle or to the crack and pop from the CDLA ones... hmmmmmm......
I see the exact same story as with the Amazon phone, on its time, the Amazon phone had a really good thing going here in XDA, but the bootloader was never unlocked and the momentum was lost. I had to let go on my Fire phone....
For the LePro3, many great options are at hand at the same price, I'm looking heavily right now at the LG G5 from the $200 custom rom on eBay, WAY BETTER camera (like 10X times better), about the same battery life if you compare custom ROM of LePro3 vs stock of LG G5, and I have to admit that although I dislike LG's interface, it is tolerable.
Also, the LeEco servers (including the one that supports OTAs) has been down for at least 3 days (that I have tried myself), like seriously, we know the company is nearly in bankruptcy although still having customer support working, but the fact that security updates have halted and servers are down, tells me that there is something wrong going on.
At $200 dlls that I got the phone for, it is still not worth it for *me*.
My Moto Z play was $450 with a hasselblad camera mod that I was able to sell to get $100 in return, so for $350, I would still take yet another Moto Z Play at the current price, with way lower specifications, than taking a LePro3 for $200.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
rivethead23 said:
I bought this phone at what I thought was a steal for the hardware I was getting. I knew the company was unknown in the US and would likely not support the phone for long (if at all). I've flashed many Roms and played with this phone more than any other than perhaps my Nexus 6. Its a great phone overall with pretty decent developer support. I regret nothing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have to agree with rivethead23 I got the Pro 3 and immediately flashed the Turbo Destroyer rom on it and have never had any regrets
I also bought an LG G6 and I found it was no upgrade to the Pro 3 and ended up returning it.
My advice is to Flash the Turbo EUI 21S v20 rom and Nova launcher with Nova Google companion and you get the best experience from this device

rivethead23 said:
I bought this phone at what I thought was a steal for the hardware I was getting. I knew the company was unknown in the US and would likely not support the phone for long (if at all). I've flashed many Roms and played with this phone more than any other than perhaps my Nexus 6. Its a great phone overall with pretty decent developer support. I regret nothing.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Pretty much this.
I'm using the phone on stock 26s, pretty heavily customized though: Magisk, Xposed, Viper, GravityBox, Tasker, stock android/Google apps like Dialer Contact Messages Calendar Keep Hangout Gmail etc., Nova Launcher with companion, PlayerPro and VLC, Brave browser... I removed all Chinese bloatware, and stock apps I don't need anymore like Contact, Message, Music, Video, Browser, Launcher, LIVE, lots of LeEco apps, etc. Disabled all stock extra memory optimizations to let Android deal with memory. Splash and bootanim without Chinese. Etc.
It works really great, battery is still really good (I often have 5 or 5.5 hours SoT at the end of the day), I customized a lot of things to make it exactly how I wanted it. So far, the best device I owned, and one of the cheapest...

ZeblodS said:
Pretty much this.
I'm using the phone on stock 26s, pretty heavily customized though: Magisk, Xposed, Viper, GravityBox, Tasker, stock android/Google apps like Dialer Contact Messages Calendar Keep Hangout Gmail etc., Nova Launcher with companion, PlayerPro and VLC, Brave browser... I removed all Chinese bloatware, and stock apps I don't need anymore like Contact, Message, Music, Video, Browser, Launcher, LIVE, lots of LeEco apps, etc. Disabled all stock extra memory optimizations to let Android deal with memory. Splash and bootanim without Chinese. Etc.
It works really great, battery is still really good (I often have 5 or 5.5 hours SoT at the end of the day), I customized a lot of things to make it exactly how I wanted it. So far, the best device I owned, and one of the cheapest...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Is 26s an official update? I've only received 21s ota on my x727

darkmuck said:
Is 26s an official update? I've only received 21s ota on my x727
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's the latest Chinese stock ROM for x720.

ALSO RANT:
Well the issue is with android itself, there is no real AOSP phone, i don't get why manufaturers just don't put AOSP on phone and be done with it, i guess target for android phones are geeks, at least this kind of android phones. I wanted dual sim phone, but now i think i will manage some woraround and go ios, as bad as it is, OS is much more polished and unified.
Even Moto with almost stock android still does not get direct google updates, it is just bad design.
BTW i use pro3 as daily, i get 8 + hours SOT with stock firmare, i managed to get ACR to work quite good, DND to work quite good, but still, default apps, like browser does not work, google integration is crap, even with launcher 3, missing pulldown is a joke and google services crash quite often so ... meh, but still better then my gs4 with new battery and lineage
Oh and also the ambient light sensors sets screen too dim for me at night, until now I had opposite problem with all the other phones i had.
I also have galaxy s7 at hand to use and in my opinion samsung android is even worse.
The main issue is there is really no Android OS, no phone with AOSP, which is only real Android OS, only ****ton of phones with more or less molested OS.
BTW my budget was 1100usd for a phone, i still chose pro3 and I still think, despite it's flaws, for me, it is best choice, which is sad, but it is reality, we can't change it, reality is reality. I will try z2 force with battery pack if they sell it officially in Czech, but I don't expect much.

Oh my I thought I was the only one with the headphone issue

Hmm my Le Pro 3 is coming soon... But I'm more likely to just sell It while it's new and make some $$$ of it. Seeing this rants and all... AOSP/lineage is a must for me, same as Oreo.
Just gonna buy OP5 to replace my Bacon. Maybe that jelly pentile so not exactly FHD, POS display won't be so bad...

FunkyRasta said:
Hmm my Le Pro 3 is coming soon... But I'm more likely to just sell It while it's new and make some $$$ of it. Seeing this rants and all... AOSP/lineage is a must for me, same as Oreo.
Just gonna buy OP5 to replace my Bacon. Maybe that jelly pentile so not exactly FHD, POS display won't be so bad...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
These rants are about things that we would like to have on the device and are inevitable, like the fact that we knew that there was no headphone jack and that the CDLA headphones are not perfect on custom software, we knew it and still took the chance, not the phone or dev's fault.
Other than that, the phone is amazing, you should give it a go, I don't think you can get too much money out of it, this is the wrong phone to re-sell for higher.
Also, you have a very specific example from other people in this thread, which is, you might like stock software which gives you the best battery life for the device.

Jose-MXL said:
These rants are about things that we would like to have on the device and are inevitable, like the fact that we knew that there was no headphone jack and that the CDLA headphones are not perfect on custom software, we knew it and still took the chance, not the phone or dev's fault.
Other than that, the phone is amazing, you should give it a go, I don't think you can get too much money out of it, this is the wrong phone to re-sell for higher.
Also, you have a very specific example from other people in this thread, which is, you might like stock software which gives you the best battery life for the device.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I pretty OK with using adapter, no problem with me. I ordered it from China so when it gets to Europe it is worth more. I certainly would not lose money on it.
The only things that worry me are uncertain future of Oreo on this device and overall stability. I currently manage over 4 hours SOT with my OnePlus One.... Why this thing with 4070 Mah (thousand f-ing more) does 4.5 H or slightly more ? With newer SoC, screen etc. Stock software is a no-go for me. Android 6.0 is a no-go for me. So I rely on custom ROMs and dev support. At least dev support here is great!

Coming from Nexus and Nexus 5x, I was used to having so many roms and kernels. Getting LP3 was a big big jump and I did not like it in early days when no roms were available.
Now with more than enough roms and solid kernels, I do not miss anything. Omni Rom gives me 9 hrs of screen on time for my usage. It does not feel/act different than roms I used before.
The only problem was the camera performance. But with Google Camera port, that is no longer a problem now.

Suggestion for the next phone after Zuk Z2 Plus

There was a small discussion in the AEX 6.7 thread started by @mcalistri asking for a suggestion to replace his Zuk Z2 Plus with another one. His suggestion was Pixel 3A and Nokia 7.2. I too asked if the OnePlus 6T is a good option. @selvarajrajkanna and @GopalKaul answered both of us and suggested K20 Pro and Pixel 3A. Since it is not good to discuss this in AEX thread I'm continuing that discussion here.
My suggestions and the summary of the discussion:
- OnePlus 7 (but the development is not in a good position; I read a few threads there. Also the 7T is on the way so buying a new one would not be a better idea I think)
- OnePlus 6T (if you want to stay on stock rom because oxygen os is good. - suggested by selvarajrajkanna. I found a few pre-owned 6Ts and also my friend has one, that's why I suggested it)
- Pixel 3A (have better camera and if camera is the only priority - suggested by selvarajrajkanna and mcalistri)
- Redmi K20 Pro (suggested by GopalKaul and selvarajrajkanna because it has latest chipset, 3.5mm jack, bigger battery, etc.)
- Nokia 7.2 (suggested by mcalistri)
- Poco F1 (if on a tight budget - suggested by GopalKaul)
Also please tell if you have any other good options or suggestions in this list. I'll update this post if anything relevant is posted. Our Z2 Plus started with 6.0 and went through 7.0, 8.0 and 9.0 without any serious performance issues. So I think Android Q will also work flawlessly. But if any Z2 Plus owner who like to replace it with another one and also expect a legend like Z2 this post may/should help. Thanks for taking the time to read this long post. ?

niyonsv said:
There was a small discussion in the AEX 6.7 thread started by @mcalistri asking for a suggestion to replace his Zuk Z2 Plus with another one. His suggestion was Pixel 3A and Nokia 7.2. I too asked if the OnePlus 6T is a good option. @selvarajrajkanna and @GopalKaul answered both of us and suggested K20 Pro and Pixel 3A. Since it is not good to discuss this in AEX thread I'm continuing that discussion here.
My suggestions and the summary of the discussion:
- OnePlus 7 (but the development is not in a good position; I read a few threads there. Also the 7T is on the way so buying a new one would not be a better idea I think)
- OnePlus 6T (if you want to stay on stock rom because oxygen os is good. - suggested by selvarajrajkanna. I found a few pre-owned 6Ts and also my friend has one, that's why I suggested it)
- Pixel 3A (have better camera and if camera is the only priority - suggested by selvarajrajkanna and mcalistri)
- Redmi K20 Pro (suggested by GopalKaul and selvarajrajkanna because it has latest chipset, 3.5mm jack, bigger battery, etc.)
- Nokia 7.2 (suggested by mcalistri)
- Poco F1 (if on a tight budget - suggested by GopalKaul)
Also please tell if you have any other good options or suggestions in this list. I'll update this post if anything relevant is posted. Our Z2 Plus started with 6.0 and went through 7.0, 8.0 and 9.0 without any serious performance issues. So I think Android Q will also work flawlessly. But if any Z2 Plus owner who like to replace it with another one and also expect a legend like Z2 this post may/should help. Thanks for taking the time to read this long post. ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In reality I have not suggested any devices ?
Nokia could be a good choice for what I remember about its Zeiss Camera lenses, I could appreciate it on my Nokia Lumia which now it's gone to paradise.
I honestly am tempted to take the pixel 3a but I live in Brazil and here it is more expensive due to the importation taxes.
The K20 if I'm not wrong, is a bit strange to my eyes because it has a lifting camera jumping from the outside of the chassis.
The choice is not so easy also because the old Zuk-Z2 is working extremely well

niyonsv said:
There was a small discussion in the AEX 6.7 thread started by @mcalistri asking for a suggestion to replace his Zuk Z2 Plus with another one. His suggestion was Pixel 3A and Nokia 7.2. I too asked if the OnePlus 6T is a good option. @selvarajrajkanna and @GopalKaul answered both of us and suggested K20 Pro and Pixel 3A. Since it is not good to discuss this in AEX thread I'm continuing that discussion here.
My suggestions and the summary of the discussion:
- OnePlus 7 (but the development is not in a good position; I read a few threads there. Also the 7T is on the way so buying a new one would not be a better idea I think)
- OnePlus 6T (if you want to stay on stock rom because oxygen os is good. - suggested by selvarajrajkanna. I found a few pre-owned 6Ts and also my friend has one, that's why I suggested it)
- Pixel 3A (have better camera and if camera is the only priority - suggested by selvarajrajkanna and mcalistri)
- Redmi K20 Pro (suggested by GopalKaul and selvarajrajkanna because it has latest chipset, 3.5mm jack, bigger battery, etc.)
- Nokia 7.2 (suggested by mcalistri)
- Poco F1 (if on a tight budget - suggested by GopalKaul)
Also please tell if you have any other good options or suggestions in this list. I'll update this post if anything relevant is posted. Our Z2 Plus started with 6.0 and went through 7.0, 8.0 and 9.0 without any serious performance issues. So I think Android Q will also work flawlessly. But if any Z2 Plus owner who like to replace it with another one and also expect a legend like Z2 this post may/should help. Thanks for taking the time to read this long post. ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you want to try a new phone after the Zuk Z2, try buying either Pixel 3, or even 7 is a very good option[seeing the development of other one plus phones, 7's development should soon emerge]

akshay pro said:
If you want to try a new phone after the Zuk Z2, try buying either Pixel 3, or even 7 is a very good option[seeing the development of other one plus phones, 7's development should soon emerge]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
IMHO we should consider first the device as it we find it from the factory, with its default software and O.S., I mean we should consider if it can or can't be ROM customized as second requirement.
For example, for my personal user case, I purchased my ZukZ2 with Chinese ROM, than the decision to flash a custom ROM on it has been almost mandatory.

akshay pro said:
If you want to try a new phone after the Zuk Z2, try buying either Pixel 3, or even 7 is a very good option[seeing the development of other one plus phones, 7's development should soon emerge]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks. I can get a OnePlus 6T phone (pre-owned, 6-128, still in warranty) for about 75% of that of a new OnePlus 7's price. So, which one would be better? OnePlus 6T or 7? Or any other?

mcalistri said:
IMHO we should consider first the device as it we find it from the factory, with its default software and O.S., I mean we should consider if it can or can't be ROM customized as second requirement.
For example, for my personal user case, I purchased my ZukZ2 with Chinese ROM, than the decision to flash a custom ROM on it has been almost mandatory.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks. My thought is just opposite. I like almost-stock-ROMs with additional features and the factory OSs never attracted me except for some of their features or something. I flashed the custom ROM the day I got Z2. Before buying it I searched about many devices in XDA which had better custom ROM development support. Also Z2 was a device with almost high-end spec then and I got a huge discount then. That's why I'm looking for a device identical to Z2 of that time.

I would defenately go to k20 pro

niyonsv said:
Thanks. My thought is just opposite. I like almost-stock-ROMs with additional features and the factory OSs never attracted me except for some of their features or something. I flashed the custom ROM the day I got Z2. Before buying it I searched about many devices in XDA which had better custom ROM development support. Also Z2 was a device with almost high-end spec then and I got a huge discount then. That's why I'm looking for a device identical to Z2 of that time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Stock OS as the pure Android running on a Google Pixel phone, from what I've heard have everything we need to forget about custom ROM.
Our device, thanks to its hardware is still pretty good to offer brilliant service for years to come.
The maior lacks, I IMHO can resume for Z2 are:
1 - A not superlative camera, beside its hw specs which are not the top of the market, probably has not been achieved the very best in terms of firmware and software to manage it at a better level.
2 - A not superlative sound in terms of loudness
Regards,

I don't see any reason to change the device.
Charge the ROM, chahe the screen guard and change the cover or add a skin.
That's the new device for you.

manishgkasera said:
I don't see any reason to change the device.
Charge the ROM, chahe the screen guard and change the cover or add a skin.
That's the new device for you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
:laugh:

-Deleted-

manishgkasera said:
I don't see any reason to change the device.
Charge the ROM, chahe the screen guard and change the cover or add a skin.
That's the new device for you.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's how I used my Z2 bro. It has a unique design (all phones where curved then) and it always stayed different from others. But there's one thing that I changed thrice and it was a bit more costly - battery. Also my phone is becoming slow and slow each day. Tried different ROMs, reduced number of apps. The phone is not performing well too. It is taking ages to click a photo. Also the earpiece speaker now started distorting, I've to use headset always for talking. There are other reasons here and there, so I think it is better to change my phone. That's why I asked for suggestion.

I'm also looking for an upgrade to this phone. I bought the ZUK about 3 years ago with the intention of only keeping it for under 12 months. But I ended up sticking with it since I couldn't find a suitable upgrade at the time. After a lot of use it seems the ZUK is starting to show signs of slowing down. It's taking time to open apps and the storage is incredibly slow as prooven by benchmark testing.
Unfortunately my choice for a replacement is limited because I get eyestrain and headaches when looking at AMOLED screens with PWM flickering. The Asus Zenfone 6 looks perfect with an IPS panel, but it is too expensive at £450 here in the UK. The upcoming Realme 5 Pro seems good with SD712, 6GB RAM and 128GB UFS 2.1 storage for a much more reasonable £190. But I worry about whether this phone will recieve good custom ROM support. There's also the Redmi Note 7 Pro with SD675 but it has a horrible ugly U-shaped notch. Maybe the upcoming Redmi Note 8 will also be decent.

I'm a bit surprised about hear some buddies have the need to replace the battery in their ZukZ2.
My battery, after years of usage looks like brand new, it doesn't presents any sign of longevity.
Furthermore I can't understand how the device appears running slower! We have not any mechanical disk inside it, neither a Windows XP is running here! If your device is slow then try to clean flash after performing a factory reset.
Sirs, are you violenting yours smartphones? Are you using it extensively with gaming and repetitive charging during usage?
May be you should have been more respectful and conservative using the phone now you have to pay the bill!

P650SE said:
I'm also looking for an upgrade to this phone. I bought the ZUK about 3 years ago with the intention of only keeping it for under 12 months. But I ended up sticking with it since I couldn't find a suitable upgrade at the time. After a lot of use it seems the ZUK is starting to show signs of slowing down. It's taking time to open apps and the storage is incredibly slow as prooven by benchmark testing.
Unfortunately my choice for a replacement is limited because I get eyestrain and headaches when looking at AMOLED screens with PWM flickering. The Asus Zenfone 6 looks perfect with an IPS panel, but it is too expensive at £450 here in the UK. The upcoming Realme 5 Pro seems good with SD712, 6GB RAM and 128GB UFS 2.1 storage for a much more reasonable £190. But I worry about whether this phone will recieve good custom ROM support. There's also the Redmi Note 7 Pro with SD675 but it has a horrible ugly U-shaped notch. Maybe the upcoming Redmi Note 8 will also be decent.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I haven't heard of this AMOLED flickering issue till now. Is it a serious issue to consider?

mcalistri said:
I'm a bit surprised about hear some buddies have the need to replace the battery in their ZukZ2.
My battery, after years of usage looks like brand new, it doesn't presents any sign of longevity.
Furthermore I can't understand how the device appears running slower! We have not any mechanical disk inside it, neither a Windows XP is running here! If your device is slow then try to clean flash after performing a factory reset.
Sirs, are you violenting yours smartphones? Are you using it extensively with gaming and repetitive charging during usage?
May be you should have been more respectful and conservative using the phone now you have to pay the bill!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But I changed the batteries thrice, all from Lenovo official service center. I always go to stock ROM between each ROM changes, and clean flash between each updates. It's a bit time consuming sometimes but I know its better. Only a very few times I dirty flashed.
I used it for gaming only in the first year of purchase, now I'm not interest in that, that's why. Also I was always respectful to my phone, since it is the only device I have.
The phone is speedier with old stock ROMs and nougat ROMs, but not that speedier than then. So if I need to use newer version of ROMs and apps I should switch to a newer phone rather forcing Z2 to do all new stuffs.
I remember only a few phone models were capable of taking photos with GCams and Z2 was there in the list right after getting camera2API. Also it took and processed photos very fast. But now it is taking a lot of time even to click a photo.

niyonsv said:
I haven't heard of this AMOLED flickering issue till now. Is it a serious issue to consider?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well it only affects a small minority of people, I heard about 10% of users can experience these symptoms with AMOLED panels. It just means you are more sensitive to the flickering than other people. Sadly, the only way to find out is to purchase an AMOLED phone and try it for yourself. That's what happened with me.
mcalistri said:
I'm a bit surprised about hear some buddies have the need to replace the battery in their ZukZ2.
My battery, after years of usage looks like brand new, it doesn't presents any sign of longevity.
Furthermore I can't understand how the device appears running slower! We have not any mechanical disk inside it, neither a Windows XP is running here! If your device is slow then try to clean flash after performing a factory reset.
Sirs, are you violenting yours smartphones? Are you using it extensively with gaming and repetitive charging during usage?
May be you should have been more respectful and conservative using the phone now you have to pay the bill!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was of the understanding that flash storage can degrade over time in smartphones. I probably didn't do mine any favours by constantly flashing ROMs and copying files to it over the course of 3 years. I did some storage benchmarks and I'm only getting 33MB/s sequential write speeds. Random write 4K is even worse at 1.3MB/s average. Surely that's not normal.
https://files.catbox.moe/e1wu3r.png
Can anyone compare against my scores? The app is called CPDT Benchmark in the Play Store.
In regards to battery performance, mine still gives about 4 hours of SOT but that is disappointing when it used to last for 7 hours and 30 minutes. I always allow my phone to run completely out of battery which I heard isn't good for for in the long-term. So perhaps bad charging habits have caused more degradation.

niyonsv said:
But I changed the batteries thrice, all from Lenovo official service center. I always go to stock ROM between each ROM changes, and clean flash between each updates. It's a bit time consuming sometimes but I know its better. Only a very few times I dirty flashed.
I used it for gaming only in the first year of purchase, now I'm not interest in that, that's why. Also I was always respectful to my phone, since it is the only device I have.
The phone is speedier with old stock ROMs and nougat ROMs, but not that speedier than then. So if I need to use newer version of ROMs and apps I should switch to a newer phone rather forcing Z2 to do all new stuffs.
I remember only a few phone models were capable of taking photos with GCams and Z2 was there in the list right after getting camera2API. Also it took and processed photos very fast. But now it is taking a lot of time even to click a photo.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I really don't know why you had to replace your battery trice, I think it is a very seldom occurrence, nor I can say it happened due your usage, most likely it could be due you purchased a defective device.
About slowing down after time, I agree about the SSD consideration made by our buddy participating to this discussion because I recently red something about SSD since I'm going to replace my laptop HDD but also this kind of issue I believe it's happening seldom in smartphones.
I won't to cause frustrations writing that I've not noticed any slowness on my Zuk Z2 so far, just a little bit when I flashed Nameless kernel which was an EAS kernel.
Now on AEX 6.7 I'm using the default kernel which is giving to the Z2 an extremely fast responsiveness and smooth usability too.
I think I will try to run the SSD performance test suggested by our buddy (sorry I didn't wrote your name to mention it but you sent interesting comments indeed).
I'm sure that there are not many users affected by problems you are facing about slowness and battery, or better, it would be interesting to make a survey here on XDA to know how many people have such problems on their ZukZ2.
Best regards,
---------- Post added at 01:05 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:54 PM ----------
P650SE said:
Well it only affects a small minority of people, I heard about 10% of users can experience these symptoms with AMOLED panels. It just means you are more sensitive to the flickering than other people. Sadly, the only way to find out is to purchase an AMOLED phone and try it for yourself. That's what happened with me.
I was of the understanding that flash storage can degrade over time in smartphones. I probably didn't do mine any favours by constantly flashing ROMs and copying files to it over the course of 3 years. I did some storage benchmarks and I'm only getting 33MB/s sequential write speeds. Random write 4K is even worse at 1.3MB/s average. Surely that's not normal.
https://files.catbox.moe/e1wu3r.png
Can anyone compare against my scores? The app is called CPDT Benchmark in the Play Store.
In regards to battery performance, mine still gives about 4 hours of SOT but that is disappointing when it used to last for 7 hours and 30 minutes. I always allow my phone to run completely out of battery which I heard isn't good for for in the long-term. So perhaps bad charging habits have caused more degradation.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Very much interesting comments!
I think I will try to run the SSD benchmark but before I would like to ask you why you say that your results are bad?
Did you compared with another ZukZ2 user running similar environment?
About the battery we also have to take in account the adjustment we could have done to applications (running in background or not) the screen stby after X seconds, the charger we use, in fact there are plenty of chargers around that are not good for our battery but that are being used normally.
In any case your SOT looks very normal to me.
Regards,

P650SE said:
I was of the understanding that flash storage can degrade over time in smartphones. I probably didn't do mine any favours by constantly flashing ROMs and copying files to it over the course of 3 years. I did some storage benchmarks and I'm only getting 33MB/s sequential write speeds. Random write 4K is even worse at 1.3MB/s average. Surely that's not normal.
https://files.catbox.moe/e1wu3r.png
Can anyone compare against my scores? The app is called CPDT Benchmark in the Play Store.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Here is my CPDT benchmark result which looks quite aligned with your, so I think that SSD performance has nothing to do with the slowness of the responsiveness of your Zuk Z2.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.Saplin.CPDT
Regards,

mcalistri said:
Here is my CPDT benchmark result which looks quite aligned with your, so I think that SSD performance has nothing to do with the slowness of the responsiveness of your Zuk Z2.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.Saplin.CPDT
Regards,
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry, the result of my benchmark is not visible externally so I'm attaching the screenshot here.
Regards,

Looking to buy the A3 in 2021. Thoughts?

Hey there
A bit late to the party here. I am looking to get a A3 to replace my current phone. I have a POCO M2 PRO as my current phone, however i am VERY dissatisfied with it. Look into the A3 cuz its the only small phone i was able to find. Lemma know if this is a good idea. Oh and if you know about any small/compact/comfortable phone that doesn't break the bank, let me know in the comments.
peace✌

If you are going to flash a rom on it right away then go ahead, using this phone stock is like alpha testing.

Berserker_boi said:
Hey there
A bit late to the party here. I am looking to get a A3 to replace my current phone. I have a POCO M2 PRO as my current phone, however i am VERY dissatisfied with it. Look into the A3 cuz its the only small phone i was able to find. Lemma know if this is a good idea. Oh and if you know about any small/compact/comfortable phone that doesn't break the bank, let me know in the comments.
peace✌
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I also bought this phone in 2021 based on the very same reasons as yours. This is the only phone I could find with decent dev support (easy to unlock, root, custom roms to choose etc.), size (I was using an Xperia X Compact, so size is still an issue for me but there wasn't any smaller with comparable features.) and specs. I unlocked and flashed los with microg even before putting my sim card. (And the sad story is this is the second one I bought bucause I lost the first one second day )

Using stock since fall 2019, works great until today, would buy again.

Go with another one.

In my experience, a11 stock is very good. 2 days without full charge and 8-9 hours of SOT. Smooth and fast. The secret is optmize the app configuration. Remove useless app. But first... Don't use official Facebook app. Obviously it's my opinion and my experience. But i'm quite sure that the user with bad experience. Are user with bad use of your device. And my phone stats can confirm what i say

Berserker_boi said:
Hey there
A bit late to the party here. I am looking to get a A3 to replace my current phone. I have a POCO M2 PRO as my current phone, however i am VERY dissatisfied with it. Look into the A3 cuz its the only small phone i was able to find. Lemma know if this is a good idea. Oh and if you know about any small/compact/comfortable phone that doesn't break the bank, let me know in the comments.
peace✌
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In my opinion, if I had to change my Mi A3 now, I'd go with a Motorola Moto G 5G Plus, which has more or less the same A3 stuff, with a better display, 5g, better battery but it's also slightly bigger and heavier.
The only thing I don't know is about the software, on the xda page there are very few threads and nobody's talking about major problems with software, I might give it a try if I get sick with Xiaomeme software updates

Phil_gloves said:
In my opinion, if I had to change my Mi A3 now, I'd go with a Motorola Moto G 5G Plus, which has more or less the same A3 stuff, with a better display, 5g, better battery but it's also slightly bigger and heavier.
The only thing I don't know is about the software, on the xda page there are very few threads and nobody's talking about major problems with software, I might give it a try if I get sick with Xiaomeme software updates
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That motorola has an IPS screen with SD765, so not really comparable
But I think this 720p AMOLED screen is crappy (EVEN if it makes this phone faster), but you cannot find a decent 1080p at the smallish 70-72mm width that's not costing an arm and a leg (Sony Xperia 5).
Wait 7 days for the new Poco.

I think that mi a3 is one of the best mid range phone... So i will change it... Only for an high range phone... Probably a pixel... Or a top xiaomi... Also oppo seems very good phones...

wetito said:
In my experience, a11 stock is very good. 2 days without full charge and 8-9 hours of SOT. Smooth and fast. The secret is optmize the app configuration. Remove useless app. But first... Don't use official Facebook app. Obviously it's my opinion and my experience. But i'm quite sure that the user with bad experience. Are user with bad use of your device. And my phone stats can confirm what i say
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
How were you able to get good battery life on stock Android 11? Please help me. The battery life sucks on Android 11 on this phone.

Sometimes the ota updates are not successful. So an hard reset can solve much problems. I don't use fingerprint and always on display because drain a lot of battery... I have disabled much of Google apps that are not indispensable for my use... I have limited the background use for some apps... With this optimization i'm very satisfied. But are specific s for my use (social+music streaming... And sometimes YouTube vanced). I hope my post can help you (i'm italian so my English is not perfect)

Best buy of the week! I'm seriusly considering to sell my mia3 at this prince to buy it! Is's an old model... But not the hardware