Price cuts coming to Meizu M9

The Chinese smartphone market is getting very competitive, with local companies quickly adopting Android, and multinational companies such as Samsung, LG and Motorola releasing better and cheaper smartphones. This puts Meizu in a terrible position, with their aging flagship Meizu M9 device quickly losing market appeal.

Previously, Meizu CEO Jack Wong promised that the company wouldn't lower the Meizu M9 pricing, and said that if that were to be the case, Meizu would reimburse all users who have purchased at the old price.

This time however, Jack Wong has stated that the Meizu M9 will indeed see a price cut, and that the company can't afford to refund the difference to all previous customers. For promising this earlier, Jack wrote on the company BBS that he felt great shame.

The details surrounding the price cut have yet to be announced, and the original BBS thread has since been deleted.

Update (2011-09-19): The new price is 2009 RMB (without memory card), which is approximately $314 USD.
Update (2011-09-20): The price of the refurbished M9 has also been lowered to as low as 1600 RMB! That's about $250 USD.

I suppose everyone saw this comming even before the M9 was released. This happens to all phones. So it's natural, and can't quite understand this refund thing You always have to pay more for the same thing if You want to get it instantly, after it's being released.

^ exactly, but he promised it earlier, it is a strong loss of face situation for JW.

If only there was some kind of easy gift which JW could offer to existing users, then maybe we could all pardon him from this "shame".
Hang on.... I know......

In other news... Jack Wong enters politics as a candidate for the next election. Supporters are saying "the way he lies and betrays is second to none, he'll be a great leader" and "I'm rooting for you, now root my phone please". Critics aren't so positive, claiming that "his incompetence at satisfying the needs of his people will surely bring the country down like an avalanche of ignorance".

Jack Wong enters politics as a candidate for the next election...

The irony is not lost.....

I think we should be looking at system-wide "root and branch" reforms...

Originally Posted by pvandenh

If only there was some kind of easy gift which JW could offer to existing users, then maybe we could all pardon him from this "shame".
Hang on.... I know......

If only, if only....

It would be nice to get to the root of the matter, then perhaps we all could move forward in a new spirit of mutual respect...

I think they should grasp this a business opportunity to market the M9 as a budget development platform, completely unlocked. At the moment there isn't the need for dual or quad core phones, as the software to take advantage of the extra power simply doesn't exist (yet). So the time to strike out in a new direction is NOW. With the MX supposedly on the way, what better way to get developers, both domestic and abroad interested in Meizu devices, and developing for them, than to offer this still highly capable device as a blank canvass for innovation?

I don't need a refund, I need working GPS...

I have working GPS but root would be really nice, still have some hopes for getting it from JW

@ mr han: and unlooked bootloader too!!!

the time is coming to opening the m9 for survive it self worldwide.
not open like ibm with pc specification 1981, but open for development.
don't forget, android-os growing up and growing up more and more as open source.
many companys make his money with open source (sell hardware, sell services and other things).
the open source community is very very big around the world. and if somebody need help, normaly come very fast too.

Originally Posted by Straylight

I think they should grasp this a business opportunity to market the M9 as a budget development platform, completely unlocked. At the moment there isn't the need for dual or quad core phones, as the software to take advantage of the extra power simply doesn't exist (yet). So the time to strike out in a new direction is NOW. With the MX supposedly on the way, what better way to get developers, both domestic and abroad interested in Meizu devices, and developing for them, than to offer this still highly capable device as a blank canvass for innovation?

This is actually very smart, especially considering that Meizu really wants their own MStore to be successful. They're even planning to offer (I forgot if it was 1 or 10 million) RMB as credits to boost sales on the MStore again.

Originally Posted by Straylight

I think they should grasp this a business opportunity to market the M9 as a budget development platform, completely unlocked. At the moment there isn't the need for dual or quad core phones, as the software to take advantage of the extra power simply doesn't exist (yet). So the time to strike out in a new direction is NOW. With the MX supposedly on the way, what better way to get developers, both domestic and abroad interested in Meizu devices, and developing for them, than to offer this still highly capable device as a blank canvass for innovation?

Most developers wouldn't buy this phone for that purpose. They always get the official Google phones because they're guaranteed to work.

The software is taking advantage of the extra power. The app doesn't need to allocate threads to different processing cores to benefit form those extra cores. The fact that the entire app can be allocated it's own core by the OS already gives it an advantage.

Ok, but Devs also need to program for those of us who aren't novelty slaves, and intend to keep our perfectly good, single core phones for a fair while yet. I'll contend that in a year's time there will still be more of these in use than dual/quad core devices, particularly with the current economic situation - the latest smartphone may not be high on everyone's priority list right now.

There's also the high res. screen to be considered, as yet there aren't many devices that can boast this. So I think the M9 could sell in high volumes if MZ chose to market it with minimal profit margin, and an open system.

The fact that the entire app can be allocated it's own core by the OS already gives it an advantage.

In real terms, what does this gain? A few more FPS? A little less homescreen lag? People simply aren't using their handheld devices in the same way they'd use a PC in my view. The load times of everyday apps are not long enough to warrant the overhead in system RAM and processing power. A restricted platform also forces Devs to code in the most efficient way possible, which is never a bad thing.


EDIT: 500th Post! (I really need to get a life!)..

I understand the point you're making, but devs would definitely opt for an older dev phone over the Meizu M9. The M9 uses a non-standard resolution, and has no guarantee that it'll ever be unlocked. Even if it is unlocked, there's probably no one who'll bother to port Cyanogen across to make it closer to the stock ROMs using the latest release versions.

Even if Meizu played their cards right, the fact that it's a Chinese brand will turn majority of devs away -China isn't known for quality, and it's going to be hard to change that perception. Meizu hasn't exactly proved differently.

Originally Posted by Straylight

Ok, but Devs also need to program for those of us who aren't novelty slaves, and intend to keep our perfectly good, single core phones for a fair while yet. I'll contend that in a year's time there will still be more of these in use than dual/quad core devices, particularly with the current economic situation - the latest smartphone may not be high on everyone's priority list right now.

There's also the high res. screen to be considered, as yet there aren't many devices that can boast this. So I think the M9 could sell in high volumes if MZ chose to market it with minimal profit margin, and an open system.

Even if Meizu played their cards right, the fact that it's a Chinese brand will turn majority of devs away -China isn't known for quality, and it's going to be hard to change that perception. Meizu hasn't exactly proved differently.

Well, unless they've been living in a cave for the last 20yrs, most people will know that the majority of consumer electronics have been and are produced in the far east. Yes MZ have had QC issues, but I'd hope these have been addressed by now. Companies like ZTE have also started to make inroads into the international market, so if, as you say, Meizu play their cards right, I think they could have a chance.

As it happens there is a port of CM7 for the ZTE Blade...

Originally Posted by Straylight

In real terms, what does this gain? A few more FPS? A little less homescreen lag? People simply aren't using their handheld devices in the same way they'd use a PC in my view. The load times of everyday apps are not long enough to warrant the overhead in system RAM and processing power. A restricted platform also forces Devs to code in the most efficient way possible, which is never a bad thing.

There's a lot to gain. The Meizu M9 does tend to lag often, especially when web browsing. Play with a Galaxy S II, and then the M9. The difference is amazing.

Multiple cores isn't just about performance, it's also efficiency. If tasks can get done faster, that means more time that the cores can be switched off to save power, or even the entire CPU clocked down to a low voltage state. The new processors are power efficient, which is important since battery technology advances very slowly.

A restricted platform doesn't necessarily mean the devs will code more efficiently. Developers don't have time to optimise their code as well as possible. They look at the code, find the performance bottlenecks, make those areas faster and then ship. It could still be 10% slower than an optimum equivalent. The issue is time. Developers don't have infinite time (as least, not the mortal ones). My app has been optimised, but only because I have no pressure to get the product out. There's also the fact that people were complaining about performance, and my novice self kept missing the real problem area, so I ended up optimising everything anyway.

It doesn't take an expert to look at the Android Marketplace and notice how much unoptimised garbage is on there. A lot of devs just don't give a crap (which is unfortunate, but you can't force them). Out of the devs that do care, many of those don't know how to optimise. Inexperienced developers go straight to optimising individual lines of code, making trivial performance differences, and then declare their app 'optimised'. Algorithms and experience is what counts. A fast algorithm written sloppily can be orders of magnitudes faster than the slow algorithm with silly tweaks here and there.

That's the issue, crap software exists, and we have to deal with it. The faster hardware inspires the good developers to create amazing products, instead of stripping off functionality to maintain fluidity.

The Meizu M9 will never be a good developer phone. Whether it can be a good consumers phone, I don't know. But IMO, it looks like Meizu already blew it.

Originally Posted by Straylight

Well, unless they've been living in a cave for the last 20yrs, most people will know that the majority of consumer electronics have been and are produced in the far east. Yes MZ have had QC issues, but I'd hope these have been addressed by now. Companies like ZTE have also started to make inroads into the international market, so if, as you say, Meizu play their cards right, I think they could have a chance.

They're produced in China, but not always designed there. Companies such as HTC and Samsung demand their products be built to specification, and pay for the quality. Meizu seem to be more lax.

I think what we're seeing is the first steps of China going from being the world's factory, to them becoming more innovative in their design, and I agree the transition is anything but smooth. This is another reason why I think that MZ should be encouraging domestic Devs to engage in development and customisation of their phones, because they're really going to need them in the future.

Ok, for now the M9 may be little more than a curiosity in the western market, but with the right strategy that presence may be enough to build a decent reputation upon.

About GPS issues:

For me the last update solved the problem, now it fix fast and very precise. Hope this help.

Sent from my M9 using Tapatalk

Oh my, a price cut. To think, I was considering going for something else. A price cut for this would probably win me over completely.

I wonder when it'll be cut, and I wonder how much it'll be by.