I was an avid user of custom ROMs for my Android phones when vendors used to stop providing updates or included too much bloat with their releases. However that stopped when I got a Moto X4 which was for me the right balance and it performed well.

Recently I upgraded to a Xiaomi Redmi Note 10 Pro due to the amazing price for the specifications it detailed and it didn’t fail to deliver. However, I found using MIUI an issue, while it was fluid and performant I found it too bloated and there were UI quirks with some applications which were frustrating.

This lead me to take the plunge back into the scene to see how I could go about installing Custom ROMs which lead me back to XDA, and after some research posting this. I got a really helpful answer directing my to the Pixel Experience Wiki page explaining how to get into an unlocked state.

The process was fairly simple although required waiting a significant amount of time for the device to be able to be unlocked, presumably to deter people from doing so.

After unlocking the bootloader I found a site explaining how to flash TWRP, an Android recovery I was familiar with. Once flashed I downloaded the latest version of ArrowOS for sweet with GAPPS and that was it, finally on a zero bloat, minimal ASOP ROM for this amazing device.

Improving the camera experience

The Stock camera experience for ArrowOS was less than ideal and looked for a better solution. I knew there were several options available. Including:

  • Gcam Mod - Modification of the well known Google Camera for other ROMs
  • ANXCamera - Port of the MIUI camera for ASOP based roms

I went with a GCam mod and configuration from a thread on Reddit from mastorofpuppies who also detailed their whole experience migrating.

Closing thoughts

I’ve been using this ROM for over 6 weeks and it’s been amazing once I ironed out the problems I had above. The performance is solid and the battery is as good as on stock.

Further reading