The Meizu MX2 launch party finished a few hours ago at the Watercube in Beijing, and while we though we know everything about the flagship Meizu the Zhuhai based company still managed to surprise us!
The Meizu MX2 is the 5th phone and the 4th Android powered device from the Chinese company, and it easily looks to be the best they have put together!
Meizu MX2 Specification
We had contradicting reports in the run up to the MX2’s launch. Some sources claimed the new Meizu would get a quad-core Exynos 4412 CPU, while other suggested a dual-core Orion unit would be used. Well the official Meizu MX2 specifications are as follows!
The MX2 will be powered by a Samsung Exynos 4412 1.6Ghz CPU, 2GB RAM and a 533MHz GPU. Storage options will range from 16GB, 32GB , 64GB and like the Meizu MX the new phone won’t feature a SD card reader.
As we expected, the screen is a 4.4 inch unit with 1280 x 800 resolution and gets a PPi of 347, but instead of being bordered with a 2.2mm bezel as many previously thought the edges will measure a slightly thicker 3.15mm.
Meizu are very excited about the steps they’ve made with improving battery performance and claim the MX2 will boast an impressive 330 hours standby time, 6 hours of video playback or 46 hours of music playback! If true, this is a huge improvement over the Meizu MX and M9’s poor battery performance.
Meizu MX Camera
Meizu have decided to stick with an 8 mega-pixel rear camera on the MX2, but have worked on improving performance by equipping the sensor with 5 high quality optical lenses, back illuminated sensor and powerful LED flash.
Gizchina News of the week
Software improvements have also boosted the image capturing capabilities of the MX2 too and the new phone is now capable of taking 9 photos in 1.5 seconds on burst mode and can capture 1080 video at 30fps in video mode!
Flyme 2.0
Not all the changes mentioned at the launch were hardware based though, and Meizu announced that the latest version of the Android based Flyme ROM boasts 3452 updates to make this version the most powerful and functional they have released to date.
The biggest change to Flyme 2.0 is the integration of the new Flyme cloud service which allows Meizu owners to save their photos, videos, apps and documents while on the go. There are also a lot of great notification updates as well as lock screen shortcuts built-in to the new ROM.
Another feature Meizu showed off is their ‘Smartbar’ which are on-screen navigation controls which take the place of the chin buttons found on the older MX and other phones
Meizu MX2 availability and pricing
Another big surprise is that Meizu will be entering the Russian market and the MX2 will go on sale in Russia, Hong Kong and China from the middle of December (not the 1st January 2013 as rumoured).
The MX2 will go on sale in retail stores with the entry-level 16GB model starting at 2499 Yuan ($401), a 32GB model costing 2999 Yuan ($481) and a ranging topping 64GB model retailing at 3999 Yuan ($642).
Meizu MX2 Launch Video
Meizu MX2 Photos
There was plenty more news and feature news announced this evening and we will try to cover it all in the coming days!
so expensive! You can get a nexus 4 for less than that.
Hahahaha Meizu you can’t be serious with that price
It is really expensive! The Nexus 4 with 16GB is $349 only. With professional support and a couple of years of guarantee. And also lack of SD card reader “feature”… About lack of SD card support:
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Google-SD-Card-Nexus-Smartphone,18841.html
Meizu has great support too. Isn’t $349 with a contract too?
I think $349 is Google Playstore price of the phone. The real retailer price is about $630. I asked my country LG store and the said the range price possibly $600 to $630. And the $349 is basically only for specific countries, my guess are: US, UK and several Europe countries.
meizu mx in russia cost like 600$ ….. thats for 16 gig version . price on thge mid of year, thats when i was wondering to buy that phone. sooo new 1 will be same or even more in the price range. + you will have to waite like a month for repair if something happands. thats what i got as an answer when i was calling to a “meizu branch in russia” i better buy s3 cost a few $ more )
My understanding is the MX wasn’t officially launched in Russia but the MX2 will. These means pricing will be much closer to Chinese prices and they will also have set up official stockists and repair shops.
Real, buy something another, not Meizu, this is not for you!
Seriously, and online resellers are going to charge 100$ premium . You can get a unlocked Note 2 with that kind of price
Yep, this is a huge problem. Perhaps Europe will get an MX2 launch later in the year?
€311,-
If you take a look at the specs, the price isn’t that bad. Hope it will be sold in Europe with EU guarantee, Huawei took the step to come over to the EU. I certainly hope to see this Meizu MX2 in stores here.
I think it looks pretty awesome for the money. Even my wife (a firm Meizu hater) couldn’t help but be impressed! Role on mid December!
Agree with you!
Looks like a great phone, but quite similar to the Miui Mi-2. Nothing really surprising. Here’s a 1-by-1 comparison:
http://www.gsmarena.com/compare.php3?idPhone1=5142&idPhone2=4928
I would go for the Miui Mi-2. Mainly because of the famous and gorgeous MIUI ROM and for the announced battery upgrade. (about 3.000 mAh, eventhough the case will become thicker as a result)
By the way, Andy: You didn’t publish the dimensions yet:
124.9 x 64.9 x 10.2 mm (4.92 x 2.56 x 0.40 in)
I just read at engadget that the battery of the MX2 is non-replaceable…That’s an extra point in favour of Xiaomi’s Mi-2.
Yes, it’s looks like the Miui Mi-2. But if you google something about Meizu MX. You’ll know who is the “copycat”.
NONONO!! You forgot one BIG point in favour of Meizu: the availability !! It is impossible, even for Chinese guys to buy that phone, not to mention us, from outside. I agree, mi2 may have a better processor, but as long as I would get it when that processor is already considered old, then that is not good at all.
I quit from fooling around like a stupid trying to get mi2. Mx2 will be my next phone, it is way more available!
That’s true! The MX2 will be available in store across China, Russia and HongKong way before most of us will get our hands on a Xiaomi M2
Interesting point about the availability. In The Netherlands we have a saying: “Better one bird in the hand, then 10 in the sky”.
So there can be some great phone’s out there, and apparently some of you agree with the “plus points” for Xiaomi Mi-2, but if you can never ‘hold it in your hand’….
I’m not so much impressed by Meizu, but I think there price is very reasonably priced, because its meant for the Chinese market mainly.
However I think the design is not so much different then from the competition, like Huawei, Xioami and Huawei at least got an SD card slot.
The CPU chip in this phone isn’t impressed either, its not bad, and yes it wins from Tegra 3 and in benchmarks a little better then the Huawei Quadcore, but the price is also higher.
Hi Andi,
A few questions about Meizu, at least based on your old M9.
1. Is it true that Flyme UI not allow to have widget on home screen? Some of my friends said that Flyme is based on iPhone skin, and UI, If it is true, this is a deal breaker for me since, I basically use widgets a lot and I mean really A LOT 😀
2. based on your experience, how you rate Flyme? Annoying? Useless? Good? Bad?
3. If you compare to others: how you rate these UI from best to worst: Flyme. MIUI, Touchwiz, Sense?
Thanks, sorry for the long post 😀 I just back to civilization with steady internet connection, glad to be back.
I can only go off the M9 and an MX Meizu sent me to test earlier in the year. I like Flyme it’s great, however your friends are right you can’t have widgets, unless this has changed with the MX2.
Flyme, MIUI,Sense,touchwiz
Hi, Andy,
i think the price is reasonable for such a device.
At the moment i own a Meizu M9, and its the best phone i ever had.
Most people never heard of Meizu.
“A chines phone, cant be good”
Probaly brainwashed by apple and samsung.
Cant wait to have mine in my hands.
Do you know already a “exact” release date, instead of mid december?
Or do you expect a delay?
(like the Xiaomi M2)
Best regards, Aegis
It’s true that Meizu often experiences shortages because they cannot keep up with demand, but at least you know it’s because of their own manufacturing capacity.
Xiaomi claims their revenue is over 150 million USD per month and their phones are manufactured by Foxconn, the world’s largest OEM with annual revenue over 100 billion USD and a million or so employees…yet somehow, some way, Xiaomi can’t make enough phones to satisfy the single market they operate in??
Yep they do have shortage’s but never on the scale of Xiaomi, and yes they manufacture the phones themselves. Hardware quality really is good, it’s the bugs in Flyme which spoil the phones. Hopefully the MX2 will be good from the go!
It’s not the scale of Xiaomi’s shortages, it’s their mysterious inability to offer enough phones despite their swimming in cash and contracting with an OEM almost the size of a small country. Hmm…
Yes, I can’t understand this strange philisophy of Xiaomi either.
I do understand the principles of influence (check Robert Cialdini for example), and Scarcity is sure one of them.
But Scarcity doesn’t mean you make it virtually impossible for consumers to buy your products. Especially if your products are wanted so much…
The accusation passing around Xiaomi circles is that, in fact, the Mi2 phone is impossible to build, market and sell for the price they are asking…not even close. Therefore, Xiaomi only releases one small batch at a time while waiting for component prices to drop over the long term. That’s a pretty serious (and unprovable) charge, but let’s see after six months, nine months, twelve months if suddenly there are more Xiaomi phones for sale.
guys u comparing the wrong end. xiaomi has a shortage as unlike meizu, they use foreign brand chips like qualcom and sony. hence as they re a wee company selfsame producers honour their contracts with eg samsung or apple FIRST as theu buy more quantity and have established a business relationship which xiaomi simply lacks cause its a newish company. their team is flying around the globe to make shipments and commitments with their chip manufacturers.
they also do not really make profit and the phone is mostly assembled around Beijing.
Meizu does not use a huge amount of foreign branded kit and hence has less probs with competing with the global heavyweights in procuring those parts.
I had a string of m9 which was a fine fone till meizu decided to fuck up with flyme. it rendered my fon worthless and i am not willing to act as beta tester again as that what all the m9 folks were which kept up to date os wise. Also the 2 ecosystems do not work properly together. Hands-down, miui has a much more vibrant and lively global developers community. something meizu lacks.
i m looking forward to get my xiaomi box back which has been taken from market due to legal streaming issues, sohu, pptv, tudou etc are only allowed to stream content on computers, while the box would stream them on a TV set which breaks the rules.
If they fixed that it will be all running ok