Gadgetory

the meizu mx4 despite some issues in translation from the chinese market turned out to be a pretty solid device with quite a bit to offer but with a pro version meizu has upped the ante in just about every aspect does it provide a real upgrade not just from the original but for the budding user well let's find out because it's Josh regard from Android authority what's going on everybody and this is my review of the meizu mx4pro the mx4pro takes on the same aesthetic of the original with a look that is a bit like the iPhone 3GS of old right down to a home button found on the bottom front but this time around it is quite larger mostly due to a 5.5 inch screen this phone is just outside the realm of comfort in one hand those small bezels on the sides of the screen certainly help its case as already stated the home button up front is the main Edition here and has a great tactile feel push it down and you'll be able to wake up the phone but underneath the surface is a fingerprint scanner that we'll get into in the hardware segment curves on the side include the volume rocker on the right side though the power button is at the top there's just no way around it for most Android users the top located power button takes a little bit to get used to the back is removable and sports a nice non-glossy feel underneath the cover you won't be able to replace the battery though and ports for the headphone jack in the microUSB charging port are on the top and bottom respectively with the latter also accompanied by a bottom facing speaker unit and all of this is held together with a nice silver lining via a metallic frame ultimately this is a phone that isn't too flashy but still manages to have a look all of its own in the hand the smooth plastic does have a tendency to slip about which sometimes exacerbates the accentuated curves of the mx4pro I didn't have that many issues keeping my grip on the phone but a little extra care was taken when trying to perform the hand gymnastics needed to get around the screen I will look at just how much the pro brings to the table begins with the display that is actually beyond quad HD as meizu has done in previous iterations the aspect ratio of the display is just a little bit off kilter and thus a bit more resolution in the shorter edge can be squeezed in as a result 1440p essentially becomes 15:36 P this small bump up in resolution is certainly not really felt in regular usage but the pro manages to be on par with the many other quad HD displays that we're seeing in current gen smartphones that being said however this display is quite a nice performer despite the muted aesthetic of the default blimey OS theme the colors still look pretty vibrant and stand out due to some good contrast what the theme does really well to showcase is the sharpness of this display as 546 pixels per inch do well to accentuate the edges of fly me spics Allart where I had an exceptional time with the device was during gameplay as even the older textures and colors of Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic were made quite enjoyable on the mx4pro viewing angles all looked good and in broad daylight I had few complaints and with Gorilla Glass 3 covering this panel there should be better protection against typical scratches Mesa has returned to their original supplier for processing packages Samsung and in the pro they opted for the pretty tried-and-true Exynos 5 octa that is backed by a Mali t6 28 and 3 gigabytes of RAM I had few issues with the performance of the mx4pro as the fly me OS showed really nice movement through its elements and apps multitasking proved to be a good experience despite its more simplistic interface but tapping in and out of two applications over and over again was a very quick experience again my main enjoyment came from gaming here as Knights of the Old Republic was nice and smooth at the default settings I pushed the graphics performance further by maxing out the settings but even then the game was still playable it was at normal settings however that the game never missed a beat to start off the hardware section will talk about the speakers found on the bottom while we always harp on rear or side mounted speakers compared to front facing units Mesa has managed to make the sound experience on the pro quite compelling sound is not only more than adequately loud the soundstage is actually quite robust bringing richness and body to mids and lows where plenty of other speaker units simply fail and with a hi-fi enhancement option available in the settings the same great sound experience is available when plugging a pair of headphones in the good news continues with the fingerprint reader under the front home button this is a press type or Vader meaning you just have to rest your finger on top what makes the suite are so good however is the fact that you can wake the phone with that same button press down wake the phone keep your finger in place and the phone is unlocked meizu claims that you can go from prone to working in about half a seconds and while I haven't actually timed it it certainly feels pretty fast you can also set fingerprints to unlock apps and other portions of the phone ultimately it's a very reliable fingerprint reader and I know that because for a few days there I actually forgot what my unlock pattern was during that time I just kept using my thumbs to easily unlock the phone and that was more than good enough what was actually a bit of a sore spot for me was in the connectivity now I completely understand that a phone from a foreign market might have some trouble connecting to the mobile networks here in the West but using my t-mobile and AT&T SIM card simply did not get me faster than 3G internet on here and even then connectivity was spotty at best I'm sure that versions of this phone that are made for the West will definitely fare a lot better that was just my experience with this particular phone and in battery I also had a pretty uneven experience a phablet sized 33 50 milliamp hour battery is in the mx4pro and while it should be able to make the phone last quite a while I simply didn't really have that experience now to begin with having mobile network connectivity issues made it tough for me to have real day-to-day usage on here and be able to test the battery life on there but I still had some interesting incidents mainly overnight when I had this phone basically on standby as you can see here it drained the battery overnight now it's something that happened more times than not and I thought that it was because I had abs running in the background but even when I fixed for that I still had a couple of instances where the phone would be dead in the morning when I left it maybe around 75% I will say that more recently this hasn't been an issue but it happens more times than is negligible otherwise I have been able to get a solid day out of the pro before getting down to single digits but we have to remember that this is without the high speed internet as a factor a powerful 20.7 megapixel rear camera provides very solid performance in the mx4pro large pictures are par for the course here as the front facing camera sports a little more power to at 5 megapixels the app provides a number of different modes and settings mostly found by swiping side to side on the viewfinder modes from panorama to slow-motion video to even a fully manual mode are available settings in the auto mode include HDR which does a pretty good job of improving color output on a shot though without the higher saturation this effect is essentially what night mode produces the macro mode proved fun to use though I found it a little odd that the auto mode doesn't automatically activate the macro focus based upon the shot basically if you aren't able to get focused on a close subject just swipe over to macro and then you'll probably be able to get it done and for self-portraits there is the beautify mode Asian market phones are so known for here's a shot of me normally and then a shot of me as you can see via screenshots showing that all the settings are at max videos in 4k can be captured and they look mostly good though a lack of stabilization might make them finicky at times and slow-motion video can be captured at 720p resolution at a speed of 100 frames per second export it out to 25 frames per second picture quality was actually quite good for the mx4pro as details were very well captured and colors looked appealing when you could capture them correctly I say this because I found exposure and white balance and auto mode to be a little bit jumpy you have to be sure that what you want to get is what you see in the viewfinder nonetheless when you can get a good shot off you can be certain it's going to be pretty good even in low-light situations the camera manages to bring about a pretty nice result and if you needed a boost the HDR and night modes will do well to enhance the scene just keep your hands as steady as you can when doing so my only real gripe with the camera was a bit of a slow auto focusing time the pros certainly isn't the worst performer here but it also isn't the best either and finally in software we get the fly me OS a different take on Android that is a bit more simplistic than its more well known competitors what you see is what you get in this interface as there is no app drawer and all icons does have to be arranged in folders for organization you may have noticed by now that there are no capacitive keys on this device and this is because contextual softkeys appear when needed in applications to go backward the home button is your friend the notification drop-down has a slew of different options available and in the settings area different panels are used to navigate the many options the only real hidden area in fly me is the recent apps interface which is accessible via a swipe up from the bottom of the screen thankfully though all of this is customizable via a theme engine that as me as it was so nice to point out will be mostly in Chinese for the moment speaking of translations there are a few holes in the text of the device as obviously there was room to fit the many elements of Chinese characters but when translated into English the phrases might be too long for these menus and also some of the literal translations themselves can be a bit uneven that all being said I actually enjoy what I see in the fly me OS it might be really simplistic but then again that's something I do tend to like in operating systems the soft keys on the bottom in that contextual bar remain one of my favorite parts but another bright spot was in the keyboard where you could actually swipe down from one of the letters in order to get to the numbers and symbols easily rather than just holding down I never felt overwhelmed by the elements though that could change if you have too many applications installed when converting the price from Asia the phone comes in around 400 dollars so we wouldn't be surprised if the Western retail price would be closer to about 500 dollars unlocked it's not a bad price point but plenty of other phones in the Asian market have compelling experiences to offer and can Rock similar or even lower price tags in this new year it remains to be seen just how much better the phones get in a market our Western viewers may not be so familiar with at the moment and for that notion the meizu mx4 serves as a good example of what growth we're seeing out of China even just a couple weeks ago at CES 2015 we saw a few new high quality but affordable iterations from Chinese companies and the trend looks to be on the rise meizu is in the thick of that with a phablet offering that manages to be powerful but accessible at the same time its design choices aside the shell is just a casing for all of the power that is found underneath a quad HD display good performance an enjoyable soundstage and an above-average camera all make the mx4pro a package we do hope to see in the West pretty soon being fully outfitted for Western markets would certainly alleviate the problems I had with my particular units well it might not stand out that much but dig a little deeper and you'll find yourself a fun and powerful phone in the mx4pro as always thank you guys very much for watching and I hope you enjoyed this review of the meizu mx4pro it's larger version of the original brings even more power underneath and it happens to be an enjoyable experience because of it it is a pretty good phone but we don't know when it's going to come to the west but you can stay tuned and see if it does here at Android authorities so don't forget to subscribe to our Channel and drop us some likes on our videos and remember to head on over to Android 30.com once you're done with all of that because we are your source for all things Android