Back in September this year, POCO unveiled one of its most exciting devices dubbed POCO X3 NFC So far, the handset is the only “original” device released by the company this year. However, it was a good way for the firm to establish its name in the market. The device is one of the best value for money smartphones released this year. It comes with a gorgeous 120Hz display, a powerful Snapdragon 732G SoC, a 5,160mAh battery with 33W fast-charging and if the name didn’t spoil that for you, NFC.
POCO is aware of the power of its smartphones in the custom ROM community. For that reason, it promised to publish the Kernel Sources for the handset in the launch day. For reasons that are beyond our comprehension, the company failed to comply with this promise. The company moved on with the release of the POCO X3 in India. The Indian variant came with a bigger 6,000mAh battery and dropped NFC. On the Indian variant launch, POCO didn’t make any promise regarding the Kernel Sources.
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The Kernel Source code will allow developers to bring stable Android 11 custom ROMS
Back in the last week, we complained about POCO’s lack of transparency regarding the release of the Kernel Sources. Yesterday, to our surprise, the company decided to finally publish the Kernel Sources for the duo of handsets. The source code brings the unified code and files for both the Indian (Karna) and global variant (Surya) of the POCO X3. Now, POCO has successfully complied with GPLv2 and the source code will also benefit the aftermarket community that will be able to build custom ROMs for the handset. So far, the X3 already has a set of Android 10-based AOSP Custom ROMs and there are even Android 11-based ROMs.
POCO promised to provide three years of support for the POCO X3. We don’t know whether the company refers to major Android updates or security updates with this. Of course, the device is part of Xiaomi’s plan for the MIUI 12-based Android 11 update. However, if MIUI isn’t your cup of tea, be glad to know that the custom ROM community will now flourish with custom ROMs and Kernels thanks to the Kernel Source availability.
The release of the kernel source code comes just a few days ahead of POCO’s next big launch. On November 24, the company will release the new POCO M3. Apparently, the device will come with an original design. Perhaps, it will be a new value for money device, but this time targeting a lower price tag.
