I鈥檓 considering getting a Xiaomi 14 Ultra and I can get it pretty cheap with Chinese rom. I heard it鈥檚 not that hard to flash it and put in a Swedish/global rom. anyone with real experience? or do I keep the china rom and live with it?
If it allows you to unlock the bootloader, flashing isn鈥檛 really that difficult anymore. What really matters is how well the device in question is supported by the custom ROM and the community. If you can find one that鈥檚 officially supported by lineageOS, for example, they have good documentation and guides to walk you through it. If the ROM is less popular, you might end up in Telegram channels asking for assistance.
The most important thing you can do is research what you鈥檙e planning to flash. Check XDA, find Telegram, Matrix, or Discord channels (which I know is extremely annoying), look for other people that have attempted to do this and note what issues they seem to have had.
With Xiaomi, you鈥檙e looking at a two week or more wait to unlock the bootloader. I wouldn鈥檛 recommend it.
Plus, part of unlocking is setting up a Mi account, accepting third party cookies, and syncing your data to their servers. Xiaomi are a shitshow
If you are going to spend this much money on a phone to flash, get yourself a pixel and add graphene to it.
Yep. Honestly, Xiaomi is my go-to to recommend to people looking for a budget hackable device. But if you have $700 on hand then Pixel is a way more sensible choice
That鈥檚 the way to go
If you鈥檙e only interested in flashing the European version of MIUI/HyperOS then yes, it鈥檚 very much straightforward and I can see this device is supported.
If you however want to install a custom rom (LineageOS based) then it鈥檚 bit more complicated.
Xiaomi is one of the most annoying to unlock. you need to create an account with them and wait like two weeks or more.
They changed their bootloader unlock policy. Avoid like the plague.