7'

Good news Xiaomi Mi 4 owners: Windows 10 is coming later this week

Yash GargDecember 1, 2015

The Xiaomi-Microsoft collaboration is finally starting to bear fruit. After Xiaomi announced that there would also be a Windows-powered version of the new Mi Pad, it has been learnt that another pre-existing Xiaomi device will get support for the Windows 10 operating system.

If you’ve been following Xiaomi’s proceedings from this year closely, you will probably have read at one point that the Mi 4 was going to support Windows. That is finally happening.

Gizchina News of the week

Join GizChina on Telegram

According to Xiaomi, the Mi 4 will get its first Windows 10 ROM later this week, starting December 3rd. The release, as we understand, is going to be public and anyone with an Mi 4 should be able to flash the Windows 10 ROM on their phone.

Xiaomi already invests a large chunk of its finances into development of MIUI — its own version of Android — so it is hard to tell what exactly Xiaomi will be getting out of this partnership. But a problem of plenty that its users will be faced with isn’t something they’re going to complain about, certainly.

Disclaimer: We may be compensated by some of the companies whose products we talk about, but our articles and reviews are always our honest opinions. For more details, you can check out our editorial guidelines and learn about how we use affiliate links.

About the author

Yash Garg
Yash is a blogger by profession, builder of things by passion and foodie by birth. You'll usually find him talking about technology, music, travel and the game of cricket on the streets of Pune when not busy writing or speeding his way through the country! Read more on retro handheld gaming on RETRO91
You can learn more about Yash, add him to your Google+ circles or follow him on Twitter to stay connected!

- inquirercet
  December 1, 2015
  - balcobomber25
    December 1, 2015
    - inquirercet
      December 1, 2015
      Does it come with dual boot out of the box? Because I was just replying to the hypothetical dual boot stated by the original post of this thread.
      - balcobomber25
        December 1, 2015
      - the MI4 comes with dual boot somehow.
        it has 2 boot partitions and both runs MIUI out of the box.
        I’m not sure if each partition has the whole / (root) or just the data folder (i haven’t checked yet)
        but I would guess yes since once i deleted a system file that caused a bootloop, so i had to boot from the second partition (through the recovery tool) and the file was there.
        MI4 has a Fastboot feature (power button + volume down) to pick the OS (which can be two different version of MIUI)
        for the recovery tool you use the power button + volume up.
        that’s why it takes so much space.
        So to answer to your question…
        yes, MI4 comes with dual boot out of the box
        December 2, 2015
        Reminds me of my Mi 2s days. There used to be this recovery that was needed to enable ‘true dual boot’. I had both CM and MIUI running on the phone. It was the bomb back then
        balcobomber25
        December 2, 2015
Akimitsui
December 1, 2015
- Akimitsui
  December 1, 2015
Guaire
December 1, 2015
Make a Mi5 Windows model and bring it to my country. I will give it a try.

balcobomber25
December 1, 2015
I have been using Windows 10 Mobile for about a month now, overall it is a lot better than Windows 8 but the app gap is still noticeably present. It’s a step in the right direction but until developers take it serious it still just a niche product for hardcore Windows fans.
- Guaire
  December 1, 2015
  To closing the app gap, they need larger market share IMO and they won’t get that with Lumia phones.
  Next generation flagships will be out in a couple of months, but they just released overpriced 950 and 950 XL with the infamous SD810.
  - balcobomber25
    December 1, 2015
    Will be interesting to see how the 810 does in Windows. Lumia phones are actually selling very well in Asia, but they do need more third party support (besides Blu and HTC).
    - Adam Irvine
      December 2, 2015
      The 810 will do just fine on Windows as Microsoft will just underclock it I guess like One Plus did and Microsoft will easily get away with it because Windows Phone has always been more fluid and responsive than Android even on much lower spec devices. It’s either very well optimized or it doesn’t do half the things Android does in the background (or both) lol
      - balcobomber25
        December 2, 2015
        One of the few good things about Windows mobile is how well it runs on lesser hardware. Windows doesn’t rely on a virtual machine like Android does and it also has virtually no background processes running, when you close an app in Windows it shuts down, most Apps in Android continue running in the background (especially Google services) which kill performance and battery life. A SD810 powered windows phone with 2GB of RAM will probably have comparable performance to a SD820 powered Android phone with 4GB of RAM.
        VMortens
        December 2, 2015
        That’s all facts, except the battery part. In Android, with couple of tricks you can reduce battery use close to nothing, if needed. Setting stiff mobile band, switching off data, wifi on demand only and auto-brightness and my Elife E7 was able to last ofr 3 days. With Lumia 920 my wife uses, doing same things and switching the Saving Mode, doesn’t change a thing – still lasts for a day only.
        balcobomber25
        December 2, 2015
        The battery part I mentioned is a fact, keeping those background services always running will kill your battery. My comment wasnt about whether or not you can or can’t reduce battery life, it was about the effect of background services. Using the steps you outlined will save battery life, but that had nothing to do with my comment.
MaxPower
December 1, 2015