The Redmi 3S Prime is more or less a compact version of theRedmi Note 3, and that’s a good thing. It has the same metal body with a matte finish and is curved all around. Definitely an excellent update over the Redmi 2 series, but come to think of it Xiaomi has played safe with overall design language.At the front, a glass panel covers the entire face of the smartphone including the display, capacitive Android navigation buttons, the proximity and light sensors and the front facing camera. There is a clean slit for the earpiece which sits above the display. A raised chrome lining surrounds the front which should help in reducing damage when the smartphone is kept facing down.Going around the smartphone, the volume and power button are placed on the right, while the hybrid SIM card tray is on the left. At the bottom is the microUSB port( no Type-C yet) and microphone while on the top is the audio jack, an infrared blaster and the secondary microphone.The only significant difference between this and the Redmi Note 3is the placement of the primary camera at the back. It is placed on the top left corner along with the LED flash ( the camera on the Redmi Note 3 is more centrally placed) , while the fingerprint scanner sits in the center, with the loudspeaker below.It is quite an ergonomic handset as the curved edges offer a nice grip and feel to the smartphone. It doesn’t feel very heavy either, evenafter packing a gigantic 4, 100mAH.In all fairness, there are hardly any smartphones in the market today that offer such an impressive buildquality. While the smartphone is compact, it has grown a bit when compared to its predecessors. The display measures at 5-inches and utilises an IPS LCD panel with a 1280×720 HD resolution; this means a pixel density of 294 PPI. The resolution might not sound that impressive, but the PPI is high enough to qualify as a Retina display. Sharpness and colors are appealing, and even viewing angles are quite good.The display impressed us with its brightness as well. Sunlight readability was a lot better than many a smartphone selling at a similar or slightly higher price. The overall tone of the display is slightly towards the cooler side, but that can be adjusted as you get an option to turn on the ‘Reading Mode’ which basically adds a warm filter over the display.One can also fine tune it by adjusting in the ‘Colours & Saturation’ options, where the white balance as well as colour saturation can be adjusted. At its price, the Xiaomi Redmi 3S Prime is quite a feature packed smartphone. Yes, it looks small and that is exactly why we appreciate Xiaomi’s efforts in stuffing the smartphone to its limits. There is a 5-inch HD IPS LCDdisplay which looks neat and inside, there is a new Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 octa-core processor which is clocked at 1.4GHz. You also get 3GB RAM and32GB of internal storage. The storage can be expanded further using a microSD card of up to 256GB in size. The camera department comprises a 13MP f/2.0 aperture camera with PDAF and an LED flash and at the front there is a 5MP unit with an f/2.0 aperture.The rest of the features include 4G LTE support, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth v4.1, GPS, infrared blaster port, FM Radio and microUSB port. The handset runs on Android 6.0 Marshmallow with MIUI 7 and rounding it off is a mighty 4, 100mAh battery which is a tiny bit larger than the Redmi Note 3. The only thing missing is Wi-Fi 802.11 ac support, that shouldn’t be a big deal at this price.and other good features. ??????????.
