Did the M8 lose its appeal?

I just felt like throwing this thought up ever since that april fool's joke...

Seems like Meizu really dropped the ball with the m8 on timing... Now that there are enough iPhone competitors/clones/wannabes, the m8 really seems just like "any other" touchscreen smart phone. Don't go listing off all the unique feature lists of the m8, I know them already. It seems more like a "Duke Nukem Forever" type issue than a "this has x features, while this has y features" issue.
(By Duke Nukem Forever I mean the vaporware that has been in production for 10+ years that everyone now refers to as a joke rather than a serious game development)
The drawn out product development and early announcement of the M8 really killed the near launch hype IMO. I think that at this point Meizu probably is on plan F (yes, the plan after plans a, b, c ,d and e fail) for the m8. Kinda sad.

Well, as june is the date for the 2.0 iPhone firmware and rumors are getting stronger that the 3G iPhone will get to us then as well, we'll have to see how Meizu holds up. I mean, it does lag more than a year behind in terms of community support and custom app development. And Meizu lacks support from companies like Yahoo and Google and has less experience releasing such products.

I got the Touch because I was sick of waiting and I didn't regret it. There are lot's of interesting (web)apps to install on it and the entire thing runs smooth enough after jailbreaking it. I didn't mention other companies though, which have started releasing the anti-iPhones (and Meizu competition) as well of course.

On a sidenote, I sometimes forget about the government regime in China. They're not really building up more trust or something with all the stuff around the Olympics and with their attitude against the protests.

The M8 is well overdue. Everybody knows this. It has simply taken far too long. Nevertheless, to me it still seems like a good option. I have said it many times before but the M8's feture set is simply different from the iphone. The extra features your getting (usb-otg, 720x480 screen, unlocked, xvid/losless codec support, removable battery etc) with the M8 is what appeals to people about it. Comparisons can always be made with the iphone but they are in many ways a waste of time. Most people are not interested in the M8 for the features it shares with the iphone, they are interested in it because of the features and options it has that the iphone does not (and probably never will). Admitedly the 3g iphone is around the corner and 32gb capacity models too. These options will no doubt be very tempting. But the situation remains the same, the iphone will still not have the features that interest many people about the M8. Capacity is also not as much of an issue when you have usb-otg. Besides the 3G M8 will be coming later and Meizu has always trailed behind apple in the development process anyway (due to far far lower R&d budgets, inexperience, poor release date estimates, less engineers etc). Everyone knows that a cheap clone is a waste of time as they are all low quality and will never match the build or components/software which will be used in the M8.

Personally, at the moment, I am not interested in compromising and buying an iphone and still having to convert audio/videos, still having to unlock every firmware version, still having to use itunes, still not being able to share files over bluetooth, and all the other restrictions it comes with, when I know the M8 will come out with most of the features I have always wanted in a phone. This may change if the M8 is not recieved well or is pushed even further back or something far superior comes out. Nevertheless it is still no.1 on my list. People may choose to differ with me as it is really a matter of opinion and dependent on what features you think you need/want in a phone. However if you had lost interest in the M8, you probably would not still be posting here about the M8 but would have gone and bought an iphone by now. But again as I have said before, the real test will be how well the M8 works. I definitely still have a strong interest in the M8 and I doubt a 3G iphone will change my mind if the M8 drops in August and gets good reviews.

i really want to buy a new phone but none of the phones on the market really gives enough new stuff for me to buy them (i have a nokia n73). i was thinking about buying an iphone but i decided not to because of all it's restrictions and the fact it doesn't have features that are standard for phones for 3-4 years now. so yes i will be waiting for the m8 and buy it after i have read some reviews. i really hope meizu's samsung cpu will be good because i would like to have a phone that's fast just once.

yea i agree with the opening post... meizu has really lost it now... but then again, i've already waited this long, i'll just keep waiting. nothing is out or that will excite me anyways, so i guess the waiting game is the way to go.

i've aslo been waiting for m8 for more than 1 year.
iphone is qite cheap in china now,but i still think m8 is worth waiting, im a zealot of meizu, i hear that it might be released in May in china, but more people say that it won't appear untill the Olympic Games...
m8...my m8......come on !

No. 720x480? Yes, I'll be waiting. Good things come to those who wait, and obviously we have some impatient people here.

I wouldn't call waiting for 15 months with still no finished product, impatient people when they back off. Do think it's normal to make people wait this long? If not, I wouldn't call them impatient at all.

IMO they should have just start working on the m7 first....go with what you got....i mean it's what they produce....mp3 players...atleast in this they know what they're doing...so introducing one after the successful m6 would have been more of benefit to them...

Originally Posted by DusL

I wouldn't call waiting for 15 months with still no finished product, impatient people when they back off. Do think it's normal to make people wait this long? If not, I wouldn't call them impatient at all.

Agreed...I am no longer waiting specifically for the m8...
However, I am still waiting for any smartphone that meet my needs (reasonably cheap, not simlocked nor coming with a contract with a specific carrier, 16GB+ of storage or SD card slot, small device with a screen as large as possible (i.e. no physical keyboard, or a sliding one if it does not make the device too thick), and at least HVGA resolution, preferably VGA or better, a CPU able to play video on this screen (without compromising battery life too much, its a phone and must have at least 2 day of normal usage, 1 day of heavy usage).
Also needed are Tri-band gsm, USB (preferably OTG), wifi/bluetooth, and an open platform with a lot of free applications (PIM applications, ebook reader, offline wikipedia and GPS navigation are a must).

At this moment, there is no device fitting the bill...and with the informations I gathered, it still seems that the m8 will be the first one out. But with the (huge) delay, Iphone 2.0 or some new HTC model (that should be unveiled early May) may beat it, m8 is not the clear winner it was when announced more than 1 year ago.

i dont know about every one else but im lovin this thing even though its not even out. hmm, id actually like to know the ball park price...... eh whatever, ill buy it anyway. i think that meizu's m8 has a better look than the iphone. i think that meizu might get some new ground if they come out with the m8 mini.

damn that would be cool. the m8 looks good from the pictures and one video that i have seen, but come on........ a mini m8 would be sick and it would kick apples iphone to the curb. hmm, i wounder if a mini m8 is possible?

"I wouldn't call waiting for 15 months with still no finished product, impatient people when they back off. Do think it's normal to make people wait this long? If not, I wouldn't call them impatient at all."
Considering the features and price of the Meizu, I would think that people would be patient.

Like I said earlier...
Feature set comparisons need not apply to this thread. This is purely about the development cycle versus marketing and hype time. Meizu should have never said anything about the existence of the M8 until it filed it's patent. This way the hype machine wouldn't have died, resurrected as a zombie, got its legs blown off, and is reduced to crawling on the ground.

15 months isn't a long development cycle by any means, but waiting 15 months for a product after first news is kinda ridiculous for something that isn't revolutionary or unique.

Originally Posted by SteveMB93

"I wouldn't call waiting for 15 months with still no finished product, impatient people when they back off. Do think it's normal to make people wait this long? If not, I wouldn't call them impatient at all."
Considering the features and price of the Meizu, I would think that people would be patient.

Looks like we're disagreeing on that. I don't think it's normal, I don't care what kind of product it is. 15 months is an enormous time to make someone wait, and we're still getting sketches from Meizu company. For damn sake, I thought we were past that stage after CeBIT, of getting sprinkles of information about a unfinished product.

For now, the M8 has lost it's appeal to me. I'll still follow the news from time to time but i'm not going to expect miracles when this thing comes out. The m6 was a nice product, but far from revolutionary as well.

@footemps; in agreement with you

I have to agree with footemps, 15 monthes is not very long for a product development cylce, Meizu just made a mistake by announcing it way to early. They may have just underestimated the amount of time it would take and had not properly accounted for inevitable complications. I was getting very restless prior to them showing the 1st prototype at Cebit, because at that time their was no hard evidence to suggest it actually existed. But now I know it is definitely in progess I don't really mind waiting until August. Obviously I would have preffered it sooner but I still think it will be a good option if released on time. At the end of the day people who don't want to wait can always buy something else and forget about the m8 for the moment.

July/August will be very expensive for me as it will be around the time when the M8 will drop, the asus eeepc atom and other atom based cheap ultraportable laptops and the pandora open source gaming device. I'm looking to do a clean sweep on them all so i'm gonna have to start saving!!

It's pretty normal, 15 months of development. It is now april though, which will make it 19 months total. Also, if i recall correctly, they did NOT rip the iphone because they were already working on it for a while when they released the first shot in january '07. So add a few months on top of that. Anyway, they were probably short on insight when they announced the m8, it potentially taking 19 more months to release. Or they actually thought they could pull it off in 8. That doesn't really boost that much confidence.

@sere83: yes i heard of pandora, what does the open source have as impact? I think the NDS and PSP have a pretty solid grasp on the market, wondering what this pandora has to offer.

Originally Posted by DusL

It's pretty normal, 15 months of development. It is now april though, which will make it 19 months total. Also, if i recall correctly, they did NOT rip the iphone because they were already working on it for a while when they released the first shot in january '07. So add a few months on top of that. Anyway, they were probably short on insight when they announced the m8, it potentially taking 19 more months to release. Or they actually thought they could pull it off in 8. That doesn't really boost that much confidence.

8 months is still too long for a good hype. They aren't microsoft and the m8 isn't halo 3. If I were to do it, I would have done my initial info release 4 months before release date. Then I'd try and keep the hype up from there.

Originally Posted by DusL

It's pretty normal, 15 months of development. It is now april though, which will make it 19 months total. Also, if i recall correctly, they did NOT rip the iphone because they were already working on it for a while when they released the first shot in january '07. So add a few months on top of that. Anyway, they were probably short on insight when they announced the m8, it potentially taking 19 more months to release. Or they actually thought they could pull it off in 8. That doesn't really boost that much confidence.

@sere83: yes i heard of pandora, what does the open source have as impact? I think the NDS and PSP have a pretty solid grasp on the market, wondering what this pandora has to offer.

check the website out, all the info is there >>> OpenPandora.org - The Cortex A8 Powered Handheld Linux Console

looks amazing, it will have the most processing power of any hand held gaming sytem ever made. It will be mainly used for emulating loads of older sytems (nes,snes,megdrive etc) and they are saying that full ps one emulation may be possible. Developers will be able to make applications, emus and games for it too. It will also be able to play video and music etc and has an 800x480 res 4 inch touch screen. In addition it will have wifi and run on linux and support many open source applications and also other popular apps like firefox web browser and VLC media player. They say it will have around 10 hrs battery ,dual sdhc slots and usb host too! It's almost a computer! More directed towards the homebrew community rather than people looking for a simple polished gaming solution like psp/ds etc. The capabilities are endless though considering how powerful it will be.

There have to be people developing for the Pandora too Or to be more precise companies. Big companies. Something like EA etc. Otherwise no one will give a f* about the thing. And most powerful hand held gaming system? Are you sure? The PSP is somewhere around PS2 graphics IIRC, ok, emulation is tougher to do, but what counts in the end is what the user gets to see. If I want to emulate NES games etc. on the go I just start my NES/SNES emulator on my old mobile phone, that one works pretty fine. No need for the Pandora.

it is said to have a dual core architecture >> ARM® Cortex™-A8 600Mhz+ CPU
& a 430-MHz TMS320C64x+™ DSP Core. I think this exceeds the psp's power. There will certainly be people developing for it but mainly on the emulation side of things, I think they will have difficulty attracting big companies to make actual titles for it though, it will be aimed at the homebrew community. To be honest, the main reason I am interested in it is not actually to do with it's gaming abilities. I want it for the customisable media playback functionality, large high res touch screen, cheap expandable storage, linux applications and web browsing capabilities. It will be like having a cheap portable umpc! If I wanted a gaming device I would probably get a psp.