Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

If Xiaomi's MIUI is the functional ceiling of Android custom UI, I believe no one will deny it. But too much functionality has a side effect: bloated. Since the beginning of MIUI12, there has been a lot of controversy about the development logic of MIUI "I want all". To tell you the truth, the author still does not understand the setting of adding animal calls to the ringtone.

So from MIUI13, Xiaomi began to carry out large-scale system optimization work. Throughout 2022, we can significantly observe that rice noodles complain much less about MIUI. In the upcoming MIUI14, Xiaomi will put the "razor project" as the focus of development, vowing to find the lightning-fast MIUI.

So what updates have been made to MIUI 14, which is known as "determined to be new"? Next, we will try it with the internal beta system on Xiaomi 13 Pro. It should be noted that because we still have the first version of the internal test system, so many functions are not very comprehensive, so in this article, CTOnews.com tries to test some new features that can already be seen.

In the logic of the simplified razor plan, there is a famous "Occam razor" principle, that is, "if it is not necessary, do not add entity". MIUI 14 also refers to this principle in the process of drastic streamlining, so it calls this large-scale streamlining of the system the "razor project".

The first step in the razor project is to compress the system firmware. As the system is constantly updated, there will certainly be more and more redundant code, which leads to larger and larger system packages. For example, the previous Windows system can be recorded on the largest 4G CD, but the Windows11 era can no longer be engraved. The expansion of the system is an irreversible process, but MIUI 14 has made a lot of efforts to slow it down.

We compare the factory systems on Xiaomi 13 Pro and Xiaomi 12 Pro: the firmware footprint of Xiaomi 12 Pro MIUI 13 system is 16.97GB, while the MIUI 14 footprint of Xiaomi 13 Pro is reduced to 15.48GB, which is reduced by about 10%.

Another big advance in the razor program is to maximize the application that can be unloaded. In the past, it was often complained that there were too many Android customized UI pre-installed software, and many of them could not be uninstalled. Later, under the supervision of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the uninstall was opened hesitantly, but the uninstall button was hidden in the system submenu. You know, in addition to the basic functions of the iOS next door, almost all pre-installed App can be uninstalled. This gives many domestic users the inherent impression that Android is not as clean as Apple.

This time, MIUI 14 not only greatly liberalized the permission to uninstall pre-installed apps, but also did better than Apple. Officials say all but the eight most basic apps can be uninstalled. Even for very basic applications such as photo albums and download managers, you can safely uninstall your own as long as you can find a third-party alternative to App.

Let's take "Music" App as an example. This built-in music cannot be uninstalled in MIUI 13. But in fact, most of us still use third-party App such as NetEase QQ to listen to music, which is purely to take up resources. So in MIUI 14, we can uninstall it! In the past, complex operations that had to be done with ROOT or ADB are now directly delegated to rice noodles. I think this is what MIUI has engraved in the genes since the beginning of its development.

MIUI 14 has new controls not only for itself, but also for third-party applications. If we open the notification bar of our elders' mobile phones, we will definitely find that this has become a hotbed of resident advertisements. Many rogue App enables resident notification by default and cannot be crossed yet. Some software will use this crooked way to "keep alive", which will not only slow down the running speed of the phone over time, but also hinder the push of normal notifications.

Today, in MIUI 14, all third-party notifications are treated equally and can be crossed out like ordinary notifications. However, some App that has been running in the background for a long time may be automatically restored, so we can manage it separately in the notification center.

↑ GIF Motion Picture Demo

In addition to these simplified actions, MIUI 14 also adds low-frequency application compression, duplicate file cleaning and other functions, but it is not yet installed. But even in terms of its existing characteristics, Xiaomi has made up its mind. In the past, the first step for me to get a Xiaomi phone was to freeze a lot of system applications with ADB, and then freeze a bunch of less commonly used apps. Now this requirement has been solved by MIUI 14 once and for all.

Photon engine re-evolution animation and UI design, MIUI 14 has not changed much, this time the photon engine evolution is mainly reflected in the underlying program. MIUI14 greatly optimizes the architecture and scheduling mechanism to "operate" the underlying kernel of Android to make the system perform more smoothly. Objectively speaking, the current mainstream Android UI has been optimized very well in these core scenarios, but in practice, MIUI 14 feels smoother and drops fewer frames.

We have done a small test here and continuously opened 16 commonly used App on Xiaomi 13 Pro, including 2 large horizontal screen games. As a result, the animation remained smooth during the opening process, and there was no BUG even in the frequent horizontal and vertical switching. Finally, check the survival situation, all 16 apps also survived.

Click ↑ to view the test video

In addition to smoother animation, MIUI 14 also introduces more interesting desktop components based on MIUI 13. We can grow flowers, grass and pets on the desktop, which is quite like a desktop pet on a computer. In addition, most mainstream app icons now come in four sizes, which can be combined as freely as Huarong Road. However, these features are not online yet, and after waiting for push, everyone will be free to volatilize their ideas.

End-to-side privacy is true privacy. Xiaomi has been promoting privacy protection since MIUI 12, and each major version will have new privacy features online. This time, the main attack is "end-to-side privacy". The so-called end-to-side privacy means that the data that can be operated locally is carried out locally as far as possible, and if not uploaded to the server, the server will not be uploaded.

For example, in the photo album of MIUI 14, you can directly extract the text from the picture, and this OCR technology is completely local, and in our test, even if the Wi-Fi is turned off and the SIM card is unplugged, it can be recognized normally. And the recognition efficiency is so high that it can be copied and pasted like ordinary text.

However, in addition to text recognition, speech recognition has also been devolved to the user side to a certain extent. For example, Xiaoai translator App has a real-time subtitle function. In MIUI 14, this feature has become the world's first end-to-side real-time Chinese subtitle. Without networking, you can transcribe videos, meetings, recordings and other sounds in Chinese and English, and translate them into Chinese in real time. This is quite useful for groups who like to follow dramas or need transnational meetings.

These are the current several open end-to-side privacy features. In addition, the new version of Mijia can also cooperate with the Xiaomi intelligent central gateway in the local area network, which can control home smart devices through mobile phones, screen speakers or televisions without going through the cloud. This can not only improve the speed of control, but also ensure family privacy.

Interconnection, further from MIUI + to Xiaomi Miaoxing Center, MIUI interconnection mechanism is becoming more and more mature. Four new interconnection features have been added to MIUI14. Although the change is small, it will improve the experience a lot. The first is to improve the speed of transferring files to each other. In the past, files rely on the general Wi-Fi data transmission channel, the speed will be limited, but also affect the picture quality. Nowadays, when mobile phones and computers transfer files to each other, they will generate a high-speed interconnection bus, which can be said to be very fast. It only takes about 10 seconds to transfer a 1G file, which is more than twice the speed of wired transmission.

↑ GIF Motion Picture Demo

Headset circulation is also a good new feature. In the past, when we switched Bluetooth headsets between two paired devices, we often had to reconnect in the settings interface, which was not very intuitive. In the flow center of MIUI 14, we can drag the headphone icon directly and switch freely between the phone and the tablet.

↑ GIF Motion Picture Demo

There are also two new features, but because all devices need to be upgraded to MIUI 14, we can't test them for the time being. One is that the computer and the tablet share the keyboard and mouse, and the other is that the phone pops up the input method automatically when the TV needs to be input. It can be seen that the purpose of these transfer functions of MIUI is to allow us to use the most convenient equipment to control other devices in the family, reducing the time it takes to move our hands around. If laziness is the driving force of human scientific and technological progress, Xiaomi must raise both hands to agree.

Conclusion: less is more, I have to say, MIUI 14 has not changed much compared to MIUI 13, and its core changes are in places that need to be used carefully. In the use of this period of time, the author can feel that the occupation of MIUI 14 is less and the animation is smooth. MIUI has been leading the way for many years, and as long as this smooth and stable foundation is continuously strengthened, you can hold on to the position of Android customized UI in your head.

In addition, Qualcomm has gradually emerged from the haze of fever recently. It can be predicted that in the next mobile phone market, the Xiaomi 13 series will continue to take the lead with its strong core and simple and smooth system. As for the mobile phone experience, CTOnews.com has also made a picture and text review, welcome to read.

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