It is possible that you many not really know who Huawei are.

Well, they are one of the worlds most established telecoms technology companies with their hands in many areas, including, telecoms networks, modems, dongles and now smartphones.

The Chinese telecom giant has been showing their wares at the CES show over in Las Vegas, and has produced two high end Android based smartphones.

Both coming under the names of the Ascend P1 S and The Ascend P1.

The thin model is called the P1 S, and is a ridiculously skinny 6.68mm thin, putting this smartphone firmly in the size zero, puking up when no ones looking mould.

So will Apple and Samsung now feel the need to make their models even slimmer?

I for one hope not for a few reasons:

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• Battery life is currently compromised the slimmer you go. Sod the weight and thickness make my device work longer.
• I like a certain heft in my pocket, it makes me remember when it is there or not. Going too thin will reduce that “feeling” and perhaps make the device more susceptible to being broken.
• I see no part of the mobile consumer base sitting round moaning….”I love my phone, I really do, but i wish it was only 6.5 mm thick,”
• Whereas, I do see people going, “hurry up with those directions my battery is about to die…..of fuc*!”

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So for those reasons, I really could not care less about this device being so thin.

*caveat

It has to be said that the phones will be running on 1670mAh and 1800mAh batteries that are supposed to have an improved life of some 30%.

This could be great if they added this to the devices battery life from the base we expect now, but, will they just make them last as long as current competitors taking onto consideration the reduction in size, time will tell on all those levels I suppose.

So let us take a closer look at the actual phone and what it contains….”gubbins” wise, as we say up North.

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• Dual-core Texas Instruments OMAP 4460 Cortex-A9 processor running at 1.5GHz
• SGX 540 graphics engine
• 4.3-inch, 960-by-540 Super AOLED qHD display
• UMTS/GSM 3G and HSPA+ 4G
• 1670mAh and 1800mAh
• Dolby Mobile 3.0 Plus 5.1 surround sound
• 8-megapixel, 1080p HD
• 1.3 megapixel front-facing camera that supports video calls
• The camera will offer: panoramic image-stitching, in-camera image editing, low-light enhancement, and improved close-up images
• Bluetooth 3.0 HS
• 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi
• 4GB ROM
• 1GB RAM (expandable to 8GB with a microSD card)
• PDF and PowerPoint editing
• HDMI
• Dual-microphone noise reduction
• Dual LEDs for the rear facing camera

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So after careful analysis of the specs above, I am actually quite excited about this device.

It has some potentially intriguing new features that could perhaps set it apart from other similar devices, particularly in the imaging department, a really good camera and photo lovers device and one that tackles the rather poor video features of some smartphones, with options that go above and beyond many in its class.

Here is a great example of the photo technology that will be working inside this device.

Problem:

Need to take a shot of a group of drunken friends (I only know this type) and want to make sure no one has there eyes shut.

Solution:

Get your Huawei Ascend P1 S and point and shoot at subjects, let it take 5 burst shots, and then let it miraculously stitch the subject faces into one shot so they all have their eyes open and look at their best….nice….if it works.

Cost and release date of the Huawei Ascend P1 S?

This device is rumored to be coming with a $400 price tag, and should be available in April in pretty much every global market, this will include:

Europe, China, Asia-Pacific, North America, Australia, and the Middle East.]

Summary:

Huawei are not messing about here, this device is a serious contender when you look at what it can do. It could be a very interesting year for this company and this release, so we will be keeping an eye out in general.

What do you think of the device?

Have you ever heard of Meizu?

Probably not, unless you live in, or come from, China or Hong Kong, and then you may well be aware that this manufacturer of rather sexy looking smartphones has just added another device to its range.

Who are Meizu?

Established in 2003, Meizu’s founder has been a keen tech lover for all his life, the company ethos quoted below shows the intriguing take they have on the corporate technology world:

In some ways, people are like computers with the similar configuration. Running at full capacity likewise, the computational load of those keeping a single task is far beyond that of those multitasked, ending and starting processes continually. Only when people remain devoted, we may suppress complicated interference, strive for our devotion consistently, and create greater value and wealth. The constant devotion is the dream!

So why was Meizu created?

Meizu was created for the dream. Devotion, perfection, concentrative and long-term pursuit shall bring out exceptional dream works of commercial products. Everything about Meizu shall transcend conventionality and imagination!

Now call me facetious but I genuinely love to read slightly “off” English translations of big corporate statements, they sound so cute dont they!

So why MX?

In keeping with the aspirational blurb above, the reason Meizu called the phone MX is actually because it is using the first two letters of the Chinese word for “Dream”, “Meng Ziang”.

Android based smartphone for Chinese market:

The new Meizu smartphone will be running Android and will feature a Exynos processor, with 1GB of RAM and 16 GB of storage capacity. The display is a decent sized 4 inches with a resolution of 960×640. It has an 8 megapixel camera that also offers panoramic shots. They also offer their own version of the Apple iCloud in FlyMe, though it does state on their website that this is only currently available in mainland China.

Queues of people waited for its launch:

In scenes reminiscent of popular Samsung and Apple product launches, there were queues of people waiting outside stores in some of the major cities in Hong Kong and China, all waiting to get their hands on the new Meizu MX device.

In fact the smartphone is so popular that it is genuinely seen as a fully blown iPhone rival in China and Hong Kong, and with specs to match, we can see why. I for one am always quite excited when a relatively new player enters a market with something worthwhile.

I wonder what Meizu’s plans for smartphone launches further afield are?