Hello guys.
I currently own a Zenfone 2 ZE551ML running CM13.
I fell in love with the ZE552KL (I wanted to buy the Zenfone 3 deluxe version but its way out of budget)
I can acquire the ZE552KL for fairly cheap but what's setting me back from getting one is the possibility of not having Lineage OS support since I don't like the bloated ASUS ROM although there is a custom debloated version in here.
Also the ZF2 was an X86 phone and the community support was quite big, so I assume that the successor with a Snapdragon will have an even bigger community
The question is: Can I buy it and expect a RR or LOS ROM in the future or not ?
This is a big issue, at the moment we do not have custom rom yet. I hope Lineage OS will support our device, I tried it on my Nexus 7 2013 and it is really good.
Possibly, possibly not. Keep in mind that ROM developers are hobbyists developing ROMs in their spare time. It just so happens that there isn't a very large developer community for the Zenfone 3 compared to the Zenfone 2. The Zenfone 2 had a huge amount of publicity behind it - really decent specs for a really great price, in an age where budget phones were getting really good, but still had slow low-end processors. The Zenfone 2 got covered by every major tech website, and was largely received pretty well by enthusiasts. And thus, it had a decent dev community. Issues with the Zenfone 2 started to crop up before long though, and the hype died down pretty much as fast as it came in. Nowadays the only reference you'll find to the Zenfone 2 on forums and around the internet was that it was a phone with great specs, but terrible quality assurance, even worse software, and very bad update support to boot. Because of all this, the enthusiast crowd that the Zenfone 2 aimed to cater to mostly drifted away from the ASUS brand over to OnePlus, Motorola, and Xiaomi - just to name a few. It's a shame, since the Zenfone 3 mostly fixes the problems the Zenfone 2 had and is actually a really nice phone. And it's unlikely that ASUS is going to get the enthusiast crowd back - at least not any time soon. The Zenfone 3 is just not priced competitively in most markets. In the U.S. for example, the phone costs almost as much as the OnePlus 3T, a device with tons of developer support and much higher specs. In some markets it's priced better (it's a steal here in Canada), but it won't be enough to draw back the enthusiast crowd for the foreseeable future.
As it stands now, the user base of the Zenfone 3 is relatively small. With most of the enthusiast market gone (they fled the ASUS brand after the disaster that was the Zenfone 2), all that's really left is a small group of dedicated fans. So far all the ROM development for this phone have been lightly modified versions of the stock ROM, and there is no sign of any other ROMs being in development right now. Unless you can deal with the stock ROM - which, for what it's worth, has gotten much better in Android Nougat - I wouldn't recommend this phone if you're hoping for custom ROM support. Maybe this'll change in the future, but for right now, I wouldn't place any bets on there being any more custom ROMs released in the foreseeable future.
I was reluctant to buy the Zenfone 3 given that there are no custom ROMs available yet. I was also was very interested in a phone from OnePlus or Xiaomi, but the price difference was just too high. However, I just could not find any other phone with the specs that I wanted without spending at least $150 more (in Canada).
Although I am hoping for LineageOS for the Zenfone 3, I find the stock software tolerable. My old Zenfone 2 was the first phone that I have had that I could live with the stock ROM. The Zenfone 3 is marginally better and the battery life is the best I have experienced (even compared to my work iPhone).
One the one hand, I want to encourage people to get this phone (the more users, the more likely custom ROMs will be made). On the other hand, I am reluctant to recommend this phone as there is no certainty that LineageOS will ever be made for it.
BTW. The NewEgg deal on eBay is really good. To me, hands down the best value phone currently in Canada.
What made think of buying a Zenfone 3 is the fact that if I settle for an used it it will cost half of the One Plus 3
Sent from my Asus ZenFone 2 using XDA Labs
PedroCaseiro said:
What made think of buying a Zenfone 3 is the fact that if I settle for an used it it will cost half of the One Plus 3
Sent from my Asus ZenFone 2 using XDA Labs
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That's probably not a bad deal then, again if you can tolerate ZenUI. The hardware is much improved over the Zenfone 2, the build quality is suddenly amazing. Specs in the ZE552KL actually are about the same as in the Zenfone 2 ZE551ML though when you look at pure performance. Battery life is great, and the camera suddenly doesn't suck either. The fingerprint reader is fast, too. The lack of NFC is unfortunate, and the camera app is still pretty much unchanged from the Zenfone 2 (so, slow in other words). Still, I'd say for the price it's pretty good, and certainly a better phone overall than the Zenfone 2.
Related
I'm looking to replace my Moto G 2nd Gen with a phone which offers decent performance (light gaming and apps) and at least 1 or 1.5 days of battery backup. I have been closely reading OP2 XDA Forums and OP Community for a month and found a lot of issues related to fingerprint sensors, lags and heating.
Could you please tell me if things are improved in Oxygen OS 3 ? I also don't mind flashing custom ROMs, if they are stable.
I have read about the overheating issues in SD 810. Does it make the OP2 too hot to handle it with light gaming and normal apps (Mail, Maps, Chrome, etc.) usage? Or do you recommend settling down to the newly launched Zenfone 3 with some sacrifice in performance?
Thanks for the responses!
Edit: My budget was $250. I have stretched it to $300 now. It would be great if you could give your opinions considering the price. Also, I feel that 6 GB RAM is an overkill for a smartphone and the battery life of OP3 in the reviews doesn't seem to be impressive.
Yeah it's definitely worth buying if you are looking to upgrade. The phone still would easily outperform many phones in the market. With the sort of development oneplus two is getting now easily it'll be future proof (atleast with custom roms) for another 2-3 years. Most problems are fixed by oxygen 3 and custom roms. I have no issues with throlling, finger print, etc. Marshmallow roms seems to have increased the performance of the phone. And 4gb ram is still enormously enough to kill all the tasks. Considering all this being said if you have the budget choose nexus 6p or even oneplus 3 now.
P. S: if you buy you got to flash AOSPA.
kirankumar1991 said:
I'm looking to replace my Moto G 2nd Gen with a phone which offers decent performance (light gaming and apps) and at least 1 or 1.5 days of battery backup. I have been closely reading OP2 XDA Forums and OP Community for a month and found a lot of issues related to fingerprint sensors, lags and heating.
Could you please tell me if things are improved in Oxygen OS 3 ? I also don't mind flashing custom ROMs, if they are stable.
I have read about the overheating issues in SD 810. Does it make the OP2 too hot to handle it with light gaming and normal apps (Mail, Maps, Chrome, etc.) usage? Or do you recommend settling down to the newly launched Zenfone 3 with some sacrifice in performance?
Thanks for the responses!
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I would said yes one - two months ago, but as the Oneplus 3 has been announced and is now out for buying, I would say no. In term of development, the Oneplus 3 is far away from the 2, as Cyanogenmod is already ported to it (4 hours after release).
I can't see any point sticking with the Oneplus 2. Go for the 3, this is my advise .
I would go for the OP2, the 3 doesn't seen much of an upgrade for the price
Enviado desde mi ONE A2003 mediante Tapatalk
Bought the OPT a few weeks ago and its an awesome machine, with 3.0.2 is great, great battery life, very snappy and i have had no issues related to over heating or fingerprint scanner, and if i think that my Note 4 scored 54000 odd on Antutu and my OPT scored 76000 (stock) odd which shows its massive performance potential, plus it's well built too and the camera is a real surprise, it's really good.
Sent from my ONE A2001 using Tapatalk
Definitely, no.
I am selling it.
Go for a OnePlus 3
Hard to recommend op2 when op3 is out now. 2 gb ram more, far cooler processor, better build quality (subjective!) and a much better camera.
Thanks everyone for your opinion. I have ordered OP2 yesterday. Let's see how it turns out to be
[AUTHOR'S NOTE: I'm having trouble trying to decide whether to post this in the ZenFone 3 threads or here in the ZenFone 5 threads because I am looking at this from the perspective of a 3-year ZenFone 5 user. If this post is supposed to be in the ZenFone 3 forums, by all means, please move my thread. Thank you!]
Title is technically too much of a gist right now.
I'll be recursive on this one... Is the ZenFone 3 worth it? I've had my share of joy with the sheer potential of this phone while being extremely affordable for its class. I've also had my share of disappointments like ASUS intentionally shipping "defective" motherboards along with them (You know... The bootloader-freezey thingy?), the mediocre battery capacity, the worse than mediocre service from ASUS, and the inexperience of developers with the x86 platform (I own an A500CG model).
One of the main reasons why I want to move up is because 8GBs (only 4GBs usable) is becoming too small for my needs now. I'd stay with my ZenFone 5 for a lot longer if only I could use custom 6.0 ROMs so that I can adopt my 64GB MicroSD card (which is technically a waste because as it is right now, Android 5.0 just isn't being too friendly with them. Root mods like those from Xposed can only do so little. My best option is to go 6.0 with the Adopted MicroSD support).
SIDE QUESTION: Is the reason for me switching phones just plain silly?
If you could definitely recommend the ZenFone 3, I'd bite it. If not, anything better, perhaps? All opinions welcome!
i speak as well form the perspective on a zf 5 user ( victim with the freezing issue) to me the zf5 was a complete flop with its many flaws to which the list will never end ..................the zf2 was a bang to the buck mid ranger device well worth to the money (based on my friend who has the 64 gb deluxe version) and then come the zf3 which just blows up with a massive price tag of 300+$ for what it it looks on the outside it might look reasonable but under the hood it has quite a slow processor for the price i mean 625 sd should come around the place the zf2 did in price not higher ...... in my opinion you might want to drop the zf3 and go for xiaomi note 3 pro which is more better in terms speed and durability than the zf3 has (speaking from the 4ft drop test by tech trinkets for zf3 and the scratch, bend and burn tests by jerryrig everthing for xiaomi)
Considering I can sell my RN5PRO to atleast 120€, should I go for RN7?
It's only 200€, so there are 80€ difference..
Honestly I have to give my RN5pro away to a family member (since her phone is broken). It's not such a noticable upgrade, sure the bezels are thinner and the camera is better (especially in low light).
Hard decision to make but if you are a camera enthusiast (and you don't want to spend 500€ on a phone like I do) then just go for it! Otherwise (in case you are an average user) I really wouldn't since RN5pro is still amazing and offers a lot of modding support.
Nah, don't do it. Still an amazing phone.
Despite mixed opinions, I still think that if you can control your budget, get the RN7. But take your workload to context, f.i gaming - get the RN7,bit's a great deal, normal task and want to have custom ROM - keep it since supporr for RN7 is limited 'till now, rather than waiting, save up some more for the Mi 8 or others :fingers-crossed:
Doesnt make sense, As SDM660 is nothing but an overclocked CPU / GPU of SDM636.
with this upgrade you will just get a more modern phone and nothing more.
I like technology and smartphones and so the other day I bought the Redmi Note 7 for 161 euros, even though I already had the Redmi Note 5 Pro Whyred.
The Redmi Note 5 is a great phone and with the Pixel Experience it guarantees an excellent user experience, but I never really thought of using it as a daily driver, basically because it has a really poor camera compared to other phones.
Instead, I find the room of the Redmi Note 7 really good and so I'm really excited about this phone and for me it was worth the upgrade!
Redmi Note 5 pro has 636 whereas Note 7 has 660, It's not a major upgrade from redmi not 5 pro to note 7 But SD 660 has better performance and graphics for gaming.
Kheppy said:
Considering I can sell my RN5PRO to atleast 120€, should I go for RN7?
It's only 200€, so there are 80€ difference..
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Yes it's a good upgrade.
I don't know if I'm right to post it here, but I have one single doubt before choosing between Le Pro3 or something like Redmi 7 (that is really slightly cheaper). I was looking at this device's xda forum and found some people reporting that their phones got suddenly hard bricked. I wanna know how common is this issue. Could I buy it or probably some unexpected death will haunt my phone usage?
No, stick with Redmi. Too many risks involved with this one in particular. It wasn't released outside of China. The x720 and x722 are total bang-for-your-buck devices though. If you can get them for like $120 USD or something, then go for it
mrdaltro said:
I don't know if I'm right to post it here, but I have one single doubt before choosing between Le Pro3 or something like Redmi 7 (that is really slightly cheaper). I was looking at this device's xda forum and found some people reporting that their phones got suddenly hard bricked. I wanna know how common is this issue. Could I buy it or probably some unexpected death will haunt my phone usage?
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I completely agree with @sk8223
Absolutely the Le pro3's with the Snapdragon 821 or 820 processors are a fantastic phone without a doubt. The problem is that some of those bargains at $120 and actually refurbished units and I have heard stories about the quality not being as good as the original.
Meanwhile the Redmi Note 7 Pro comes with a Snapdragon 675 and an excellent camera, modern bezels and if you buy the global version the software is excellent.
Yes, there are many great Roms for the Le Pro 3. However, the Le pro 3 will always be stuck with using an old kernel 3.18, and unfortunately updating kernel any further is a monumental task that is simply not going to happen. So in my opinion, I also feel that you are much better off with a New Redmi Note 7 pro
Biggest issue with the LePro3 is the usb port burning out and the battery wearing out. Both are replaceable but it's an involved process that requires a heat gun to remove the screen.
The parts are cheap though. I got the usb board for $5, a replacement battery for $20 and replacement screen for about $17. These are cheaper than iPhone parts!
Other than that, 4 GB of Ram and Snapdragon 821 cpu is great.
Have any Le Pro 3 owners switched to a Note 7? My Le Pro 3 Elite is working fine but I have been thinking that the Redmi might be a worthy upgrade.
I've owned the Pro 3 x727 since release. The USB port and battery are fine, it can still hit 8+ hours of SOT. Would I suggest the Pro 3 to someone in 2019? No. It's easy to find nicer phones at a similar price. For example, the 3a was going for ~150 after trade in.
Some newer phones have better thermals- which allows them to maintain their peaks longer. If you play games this is obvious. Let's say you're playing PUBG @60fps and recording, the Pro 3 will heat up and throttle. That 60 will soon turn into a stuttery mess.
Then you have to consider sensors. Pro 3 lacks a wide angle and telephoto lens. Thus, limiting the type of images a user can capture. In addition, 64GB doesn't provide much room, at least not for me.
The Note 7 has an SD slot, modern design, and a taller display. Seems like a no-brainer.
One thing I would keep note of it whether the redmi has the band's you need for lte. I know it depends on the cell provider and carrier. But a lot of these international version phones tend not to have the same extended bands needed for indoor coverage in the US
So I am willing to buy a new phone and the Mi A2 (4gb/64gb) and Redmi note 7(3gb/32gb - the one with SD 660 and 48mp camera, a.k.a. Redmi note 7s in India) are almost identical in price in my region .They both fit perfectly into my budget and are great devices. So I am confused about which one to choose. Hence I request you guys to help me in deciding which one to buy.
note 7. bigger battery, bigger screen, has headphone jack, ir blaster and microsd card slot (mitigates the smaller storage on the n7), also newer so will get updates for longer.
xiaomi android one has been notorious for buggy updates too...:silly:
The Note 7 might not get updates for longer since the A2 is an Android One device with guaranteed updates of two major versions. I went for the Note 7 anyway since it has a headphone jack, gcam support, and an amazing camera for the price. I fully expect great things from custom roms by the time Xiaomi stops updating the Note 7
I used Mi A2 before and now 7s
7s advantage
1. Better LCD screen
2. Better Battery
3. Head phone jack
4. Better camera
5. Gcam
6. Better built
7. MIUI
8. Availability of custom ROM ( close to Android one Roms )
A2 advantage
1. Android one
So except Android one RN 7s is better and there are pixel experience roms to match the android one Rom on A2
Cheers
Karthi
smallmj said:
The Note 7 might not get updates for longer since the A2 is an Android One device with guaranteed updates of two major versions. I went for the Note 7 anyway since it has a headphone jack, gcam support, and an amazing camera for the price. I fully expect great things from custom roms by the time Xiaomi stops updating the Note 7
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android one doesn't mean anything in terms of update duration. all oems are supposed to abide to 2 years of android version updates and 3 years of security updates from when the phone is launched, of which xiaomi does well with most of its phones. it's really just a simple rule of whichever phone is newer gets updates until a later time.
I'm watching the comments and can see where this is going. Btw do you guys think the difference in storage and ram should be considered while making the decision cuz its 4gb/64gb (a2) vs 3gb/32gb (rn7) for the same price?