The Nubia Red Magic 3 Review: A 90Hz Gaming Phone With Active Cooling
by Andrei Frumusanu on September 27, 2019 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Mobile
- Smartphones
- ZTE
- Nubia
- Snapdragon 855
- Nubia RedMagic 3
System Performance
As part of our Snapdragon 855 device performance overview article, we noted that the Red Magic 3 was actually amongst the top performers out there. Reason for this could be the 90Hz display and correspondingly more aggressively tuned performance configurations of the phone, or simply a more up to date software stack.
In PCMark, the Red Magic 3 actually ended up as the top performing phone amongst current Android phones, slightly edging out the Galaxy S10 in the overall score performance.
In the web browsing test, the RM3 ended up average and in line with most other S855 devices.
Again, much like on the OnePlus 7 Pro, our benchmark numbers can’t really convey the increased perceived performance that the Red Magic 3’s 90Hz screen gives over regular 60Hz counterparts. Especially on a screen this size, it’s something that’s immediately noticeable and greatly improves the fluidity of things.
Ironically enough, the 90Hz biggest advantage is in non-gaming content as most games still have FPS limiters. Here, the RM3 is quite a joy to use and definitely a big plus to the user experience.
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stephenbrooks - Friday, September 27, 2019 - link
The irony I've noticed is the higher-end the phone (or laptop) is, the faster the battery seems to drain. Presumably because of high-spec components.oRAirwolf - Saturday, September 28, 2019 - link
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_AraEj24 - Friday, September 27, 2019 - link
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Aradidn't pan out
webdoctors - Friday, September 27, 2019 - link
The future is streaming, even consoles in the living room are headed towards cloud streaming. With 5G and wifi everywhere on the horizon, its nuts to try to lug a highend SoC into the mobile arena.If an Nvidia Shield TV with 3 GB RAM can do streaming no reason you need such a high end SoC for a streaming gaming phone. They could build a proper streaming gaming phone and have it with much better battery life and lower cost.
peevee - Friday, September 27, 2019 - link
Streaming sucks, streaming over wireless sucks more (hint: large and unpredictable latency).peevee - Friday, September 27, 2019 - link
Plus of course ongoing subscription costs.abufrejoval - Friday, September 27, 2019 - link
Streaming doesn't have to be from the cloud: Your gaming desktop in the next room might do just as well.I use that for kid's LAN parties, where I put notebooks on the dinnertable to avoid lugging the gaming towers to the "hot spot".
And yes, cables, even 100Mbit/s, beat WiFi any time of the day even for local streaming (e.g. Steam remote play).
Of course, a certain degree of masochism is required to game on a phone when you can have a proper screen (or simply younger eyes).
PeachNCream - Friday, September 27, 2019 - link
I used to do quite a bit of streaming via Steam from a desktop PC that I had running headless and crammed into a corner near my cheap ISP router. It was wired at 100mbit. The other end was an Atom n450 netbook running Linux on WiFi and its NIC topped out at 54mbit. It was pretty good for stuff like Fallout 3 and Skyrim. Latency was decent even when there was other usage of the local network for things like Youtube streaming or web surfing (the gaming desktop was the only thing not on wireless so phones and other laptops were being used by family members). I wouldn't want to play a twitchy shooter type thing over it, but for pretty much anything else it worked really well. I think in the intervening three or so years, things have probably gotten better but I can't test that since I no longer have a gaming PC, just some casual stuff that runs natively under Linux on my laptops. I haven't even had Steam installed in the last couple of years since entertainment is slowly shifting over to my phone these days. There just isn't much need for PC gaming or streaming between PCs.FunBunny2 - Sunday, September 29, 2019 - link
"With 5G and wifi everywhere on the horizon"Real 5G???? outside of sports stadiums, not going to happen. hell, it can't even get into a stick built house. you'll need a rooftop antenna to capture the signal. just watch.
"Verizon uses a window or roof-mounted 28GHz antenna to grab the 5G signal, which is distributed via WiFi from a home router indoors."
here: https://www.lightreading.com/mobile/5g/verizons-fi...
IOW, Real 5G ends up being little different from phone pole fiber.
peevee - Friday, September 27, 2019 - link
You have missed the most important spec of a mobile phone - wireless protocols/frequencies supported.It is not an iPod after all.