14 DAY TRIAL // Right on schedule, Chinese smartphone maker Meizu has rolled out a new model coming out under the Blue Charm sub brand.
It’s called the Blue Charm Note (or M1 Note) and comes in a choice of fun, matte colors that will hopefully cast a ray of sunshine on your life. It also reeks of iPhone 5c similarities, in terms of design. You can see that yourself in the gallery.
The smartphone brings octa-core power
The handset arrives with a 5.5-inch display offering 1080p (1920 x 1080 pixel resolution) with 403ppi and is powered by a 64-bit Octa-Core MediaTek processor clocked at 1.7GHz.
The chip is made up of eight Cortex-A53 64-bit CPUs with Mali-T760 GPU, so in theory the handset shouldn't have any problems with handling whatever you throw at it.
The display is of the IPS variety from Sharp /AUO and comes equipped with Corning Gorilla Glass 3 protection.
The company says that the display allows a max brightness of 450nits plus a reduction in reflection of 75% so sunlight readability shouldn't be pretty great.
Meizu has fitted the handset with 2GB DDR3 RAM and either 16GB or 32GB of internal storage, depending on your specific needs.
In the photography department, up in front resides a 13MP rear camera with LED Flash and 5P lenses which bundles a Samsung sensor. The snapper enjoys f/2.2 aperture.
As for the front, we have a 5MP secondary camera with OmniVision 5670 sensor, 4P lenses, f/2.0 aperture and 69-degree wide viewing angle.
The Blue Charm Note offers dual SIM functionality (like any smartphone coming out of China these days) and takes advantage of the company’s proprietary Flyme OS 4 (which is based on Android 4.4 KitKat).
Sorry, there's no Lollipop on board of the Blue Charm Note
We guess that at some point a software update will be issued, which will bring the OS into the Lollipop realm, but at the moment we have no idea when that will happen.
Other selling points of the Blue Charm Note consist of 4G LTE, 3G HSPA+, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n (dual band, Bluetooth 4.0 and GPS.
The handset’s dimensions are 150 x 75.2 x 8.9 mm / 5.9 x 2.9 x 0.3 inches and while this isn’t the sleekest device out there, the Meizu Blue Charm Note is quite light, breaking the scales at just 145 g / 0.31 lbs.
Last but not least, the smartphone is supported by a respectable 3140 mAh battery, so it should last you a fair number of hours.
The Meizu Blue Charm Note is currently up for pre-order in China in Blue, Green, Pink, Yellow and White. The 16GB variant can be yours for approximately $160 / / €130, while the 32GB one costs $190 / €155. The handset will start shipping out December 30.
The smartphone is aimed at younger budget-conscious customers in China, so that explains the low price tags.
