Chinese phone manufacturer Meizu revealed their MX smartphones late last year. Powered by dual-core processor, the Meizu MX was released in the market in January 2012. However, the company also promised that they would roll out a quad-core version of the same phone in the future.

Previously Meizu MX Quad-core was rumored to be arriving in May, prior to Samsung Galaxy S3 launch. However, it didn't get a release date as speculated. Only recently, the company has officially confirmed that the new smartphone will arrive on June 30 on the retail shelves of China and Hong Kong with a new name 'MEIZU MX 4-core.'

According to the company's press release, the smartphone will be launched in collaboration with carrier PCCW and instead of 16GB, MEIZU MX 4-core is coming in 32GB and 64GB models. The two models would be available roughly for $475 (32GB) and $633 (64GB). The company has dropped the price of the dual-core model to $380, effective immediately. But at the same time Meizu has pointed that more updates would also be coming soon.

As for the form factor, the phone looks exactly the same as its predecessor on the outside. However, internally, the handset’s processor has changed. In addition to this, one of the big selling points of the handset is that it will be shipped with a new UI Flyme OS 1.0, Meizu's customized Android skin that will be running on top of Android 4.0. Meizu promises custom Flyme messaging apps and a "heavily improved camera app" with the same.

Further, it has also got a phone-finding service and cloud storage in addition to standard Ice Cream Sandwich updates. Listed below are all the main specification of Meizu MX 4-core:

Key specs

Display and Dimensions: Sporting a 4-inch ASV display with 960 X 640 pixels of resolution, the MX 4-core has a pixel density of approximately 292 PPI. Further, the handset is just 139 grams in weight and has a dimension of 121.3 × 63.3 × 10.3 mm.

Operating System: As mentioned above, Meizu MX 4-core runs the latest Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich OS with Flyme OS 1.0 skin on top of it.

Processor: This is the most important element of the smartphone as Meizu MX 4-core is powered by Quad-core Exynos A9 CPU with 32 nm HKMG technology, accompanied with Mali 400 MP GPU. It's the same chip which powers Samsung Galaxy S3. The 32nm HKMG technology means there is up to 20 percent reduced CPU consumption. According to Meizu, the MX Quad-core CPU is 60 percent faster and GPU is 50 percent faster compared to the previous MX.

Camera: Meizu MX 4-core will come with an 8-megapixels camera and include features such as LED Flash, Auto focus, Panorama mode, Smile sensor, WDR, Geotagging and video recording capability of 1080 HD videos at 30fps. It would also have a front facing VGA camera (0.3 megapixels only).

Memory: MX 4-core will come stacked with a 1GB RAM to keep things running smoothly and will be offered in two models: 32GB/64GB onboard storage. However, there would be no microSD card slot support for memory expansion.

Connectivity: On the connectivity front, the handset will come with 3G HSPA+, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR and 3.5mm stereo audio jack.

Battery: Meizu MX 4-core is loaded with Li-Ion 1700mAh standard battery. Details on the battery life have not been revealed by the company.

What about Competition?

It can be logically assumed that, with Meizu's plans to release the MX 4-core smartphones only in China, they are clearly producing first-rate hardware at this point, and if they find success in China, they may in the future be encouraged to release their handsets across the globe.

Hence, many tech experts are comparing the new Meizu Quad-core handset to the likes of Android heavyweights including Samsung Galaxy S3 and HTC One X. It was only last month, when a benchmark test was conducted by GSMArena.com with AnTuTu, according to which the new Meizu handset surprisingly scored higher than the S3 and One X.

The GSMArena.com report noted that, despite sporting exactly the same Exynos 4 Quad chipset as the new Samsung Galaxy S3, the latest Meizu MX 4-core scored 12,140 at AnTuTu, beating the Galaxy S3 (11,878) and thrashing the Tegra 3 version of the HTC One X, which managed to score just 9,989.

The test also revealed that the Meizu MX Quad-core managed to outpace the new Samsung flagship in the CPU and memory speed segments of the benchmark. However, the results were not completely surprising as the Meizu's processor is clocked at a 1.5GHz, while the Galaxy S3's is clocked at 1.4GHz.

However, the Galaxy S3 did fight back to win the graphics segment. The Galaxy S3, which is also powered by a Mali 400 MP GPU, allows better handling of multi-core scheduling and performance scaling within the graphics system. Hence, the powerful GPU performed well in making the Galaxy S3 winner in terms of graphics during the benchmark test. On the other hand, the low performance of Meizu MX Quad-core in the category was attributed to the handset's low graphics capability.

Nonetheless, it shouldn't stop Meizu from releasing MX 4-core smartphone in other parts of the world.