Buying an Mi 8 in China - can I use it regularly in Europe?

[NBrroning]

Hey Folks,

I'm soon gonna be in china on vacation. Therefore I have the chance to walk to an Xiaomi-Flagship--Store and buy the Xiaomi Mi 8 right away in china.
Almost everywhere a discussion pops-up in which people are talking about the Global-Rom, the Global-Version etc.. To be honest I don't get if there are any problems at all (some people say, that although they didn't buy an europe-version, they can use every app etc and that there are no problems, while others say that It won't be possible to use every service... pretty confusing)

Will I have to face difficulties if I buy the Xiaomi in China? I assume that its going to be the chinese-version. Does that mean, that some apps won't run or will it be possible to update it (officially) and everything will be alright?

Thanks in advance - best regards
N

 

[morfei1]

You can use it, but you have to manually install Google play services on the Chains version if you need them and keep your bootloader locked, or you can unlock the bootloader and go either with xiaomi.eu or the official global.

My mi 8 is Chaina version with unlocked bootloader and xiaomi.eu and I'm using it without any problems.

Thanks to the xiaomi.eu team!

Sent from my MI 8 using Tapatalk

 

[Aybabtu]

+1

 

[NBrroning]

thank you for your answers so far.

alright, that means, that unlocking the bootloader, flashing it with the xiaomi.eu -Global-Rom works perfectly and does not have any effects on the guarantee?
Is there any official plattform where I can download the "official global-version"?

cheers

 

[Visa44]

You'll lose the guarantee by unlocking the bootloader.

 

[Black_Eye_Panda]

You definitely will be able to use Chinese Rom in Europe. However, as others had said, you will have to install Google serives on your own. Also, be aware that Chinese rom comes with many pre-installed apps that caters to the Chinese market, some of the apps will be able to removed and some are not. There are also many ads that embeded into the system apps. Additionally, if you use Google appls, there might be duplicate apps that serves the same purpose. For example, Google Photo apps and Xiao Mi Gallery App (a system app you can't uninstall normally).

Thus, it is recommended that you unlock the bootloader and install a official Global or Xiaomi.eu Rom that is more friendly and clean. You can unlock the bootloader with the official Xiaomi program (requires 360 hours waiting time, no way to speed it up) or USB debug and do it yourself (I haven't try it, so I don't know this method works).

Unlike what @Visa44 said, I don't think unlocking, rooting, and flashing a custom rom will effect xiaomi guarantee in anyway. To my knowledge, xiaomi is among the very few Chinese (or otherwise) phone company that supports flashing (another one being OnePlus). Mi8 is my first Xiaomi, so I haven't actually test it, but a search on baidu confirms that xiaomi supports unlock, third party roms. Anyway, in case they don't support, just flash the official rom and relock the bootloader before going in for support.

 

[NBrroning]

Hey there

thank you for your answer!
Am I right, that dies new topic changes almost everything you said before?!

Best regards

 

[Black_Eye_Panda]

Hey there

thank you for your answer!
Am I right, that dies new topic changes almost everything you said before?!

Best regards

Sorry, but I have no idea what you just said.

 

[NBrroning]

http://en.miui.com/thread-3831680-1-1.html

Sorry, I forgot to attach the link.
Well, when I understood it correctly, there won't be any chance to run the Xiaomi Mi 8 on Global-Version, in case I bought it in China with the CN-Version.

morfei1 You said, that you're running your device on Global-Version. Is that still possible?

Thanks!

 

[Black_Eye_Panda]

http://en.miui.com/thread-3831680-1-1.html

Sorry, I forgot to attach the link.
Well, when I understood it correctly, there won't be any chance to run the Xiaomi Mi 8 on Global-Version, in case I bought it in China with the CN-Version.

morfei1 You said, that you're running your device on Global-Version. Is that still possible?

Thanks!

Um... this is new to me and I have no idea. I have a CN version Mi8 and has .EU version rom on it right now and it runs fine. I can't confirm if the newer products have this restriction on them or now.

 

[morfei1]

http://en.miui.com/thread-3831680-1-1.html
morfei1 You said, that you're running your device on Global-Version. Is that still possible?

Thanks!

Yes, I did at first. I bought my Mi 8 - Chaina version with Global Stable Miui 9 and unlocked bootloader. Since, I was not OK with the camera quality and some other problems/bugs I decided to move to Global closed beta MiUi 10 via MiFlashtool. The problem with it was that I was not able to update it the regular way via menu, because it is closed beta and I'm not part of it.

The problem of the Global version is, if your bootloader is unlocked your play store is not sertificated for Mi 8 and you are not able to use Google Pay, Netflix and some other apps.

This way I came to xiaomi.eu. I installed twrp 0711. I started with the miui 10 8.8.16/24/30 and now I'm on Miui 10 Stable.

My Mi 8 is super smooth, Google play sertificated, Google Pay is working, I'm able to install and use Netflix. Camera quality is good enough but can be better. I use all the features of the xiaomi.eu that are not present in the Global version.

Best regards!

Sent from my MI 8 using Tapatalk

 

[NBrroning]

alright, that sounds good - so far. Is there another (official) statement if Xiaomi will restrict to flash the ROM-Version on newer phones?
I mean I often read, that people flash their phones and they work out well (as you said). I don't want to buy the chinese-Version, if there will be problems because Xiaomi won't allow to flash those versions...


Is there anyone who bought a Mi8 in China/Asia which hase installed the Global-Versions as you bought it?

 

[Gatsu]

I can buy a chinese versione and unlock bootloader, no problem.

 

[Darkion]

I bought mine from China and I live in the Netherlands, no issues so far. I unlocked the bootloader the moment I got the phone and straight away installed Xiaomi EU rom. I totally recommend this phone!

 

[NBrroning]

@Darkion that sounds perfect. I bought mine (Chinese-Version) a few days ago and would like to know if I should at first update the phone, or if there will be problems (somwhere I read about downgrades won't be possible anymore or something like that). How long did your unlocking take? I mean people say something between 72 and 720h of waiting-time...

 

[frofa]

there are two major things to consider:
* Warranty. Formally, you have warranty, of course. But in real life, just forget warranty if you buy your phone in China, unless you live there, speak the language and can deal with the procedures. I buy Chinese phones regularly, they are cheaper, and I - until now - never needed warranty repair. I simply live with the fact that there is a risk associated with it. In other words: If you can't live with the fact that your phone comes WITHOUT warranty, better buy a phone in your own country.
* LTE band 20. Chinese versions do usually not support band 20, which is often used in Europe. While you CAN use the phone e.g. in Germany, it won't have LTE in areas that are only using band 20. This is a significant limitation!

 

[Darkion]

@Darkion that sounds perfect. I bought mine (Chinese-Version) a few days ago and would like to know if I should at first update the phone, or if there will be problems (somwhere I read about downgrades won't be possible anymore or something like that). How long did your unlocking take? I mean people say something between 72 and 720h of waiting-time...

Take my advise and stay away from official updates, they introduce more problems than they solve. Yes, new official ROMs/updates for Mi8 have anti-rollback so be careful. Make sure you don't downgrade.

Since the phones are bought from China, they are technically without warranty. I would suggest that you install xiaomi.eu ROM and never go back to official ROMs (and definitely don't switch back and forth between them, or downgrade!) because many people hard brick their phones while doing so, mostly because official ROMs re-lock bootloader. Xiaomi.eu ROMs are not the same as global official ROMs (Xiaomi.eu is better!)

I didn't have to wait to unlock my bootloader because I used to have a mi4 long time ago, and apparently having a very old Mi Account has its perks, so I unlocked my phone the moment I got back from the shop!

 

[NBrroning]

Ok, there is an update from myself. Ich was able to flash the phone yesterday (after a 720h block) with the newest xiaomi.eu-ROM and till now everything works fine.
Google as well as every other app I used before works well.
I can't tell if googlepay or any other financial-app works, because I'm not using them actually!



thank you!