The Meizu m1 note will soon be joined by its smaller sibling this week, but before the launch of the m1 mini let’s take a good look inside the m1 note in this teardown.
For the Meizu m1 note, Meizu opted for a unibody manufacturing process. This keeps the price of the phone to a minimum, but also ensure a high-quality, sturdy feel in the hand.
This white version of the Meizu m1 note harks back to the origins of the Meizu Mx series. The white rear and black screen is often called the ‘Panda’ in China.
Looking at the front of the m1 note we find a 5.5-inch FHD display, 5 mega-pixel front facing camera and trademark Meizu Halo home navigation button. We can also make out the new volume control buttons in this picture too, being separate buttons to increase of decrease the volume rather than a rocker control. The m1 note marks the first ever time Meizu have used a 16:9 ratio on a phone.
Meizu have done a great job to give the Meizu m1 note a minimalist design. Although the phone only costs 999 Yuan in China ($160) you would think it costs significantly more judging by the standard of design and build. The rear of the Meizu m1 note has a 13 mega-pixel Samsung camera, dual LED flash and Meizu logo. This photo also shows the SIM tray (for dual SIM) on the side and we can just make out the speaker and USB locations in the base. Meizu say the polycarbonate body features a UV coating that gives shine and protects the case from stains.
To start the teardown, two screws are removed from the base of the M1 note.
With the screws removed the screen assembly can be pulled away using suction cup on the screen of the phone.
Lift with care as the screen is attached to the main chassis with delicate connectors. Using to much force here could break them. A screw and plate keep the connectors in place.
With the screw removed the connect and be levered up from the rear of the phone.
The screen assembly uses a 16:9 ratio panel with a resolution of 1920 x 1080 for Full HD viewing.
Still on the inside of the polycarbonate shell is the magnesium chassis.
Screws need to be removed before gently prying the lightweight chassis from the polycarbonate shell.
Once we remove we can see the real guts of the Meizu m1 mini including the large battery, motherboard and USB.
Removing the battery comes next.
Meizu worked with long time partners Sony and Samsung for the battery in the Meizu M1 note. The cell inside the M1 note is a 3140mAh unit.
The motherboard is the next to be removed from the chassis.
The rear of the PCB has the main camera, and flipping it over reveals the Mediatek MT6572 processor and dual SIM tray.
Even for a low-cost smartphone, the Meizu m1 note has some extremely impressive attention to detail even on the inside.
The processor in the Meizu m1 note is one of the new breed of Mediatek processors. The MT6752 is based on Cortex A53 and A7 cores to build an octacore chip. The MT6752 in the m1 note is a 64bit processor running at 1.7Ghz with intergrated Mali T760 GPU running at 700mhz.
Other details include a Mediatek MT625V power management chip. Mediatek MT6169 RF module.
Skywards multi-mode multi-band power amplifier module.
Dual SIM
USB, microphone, speaker, and antenna components are all on a smaller separate board.
Speaker cavity.
Camera and button components. The main camera is a 13 mega-pixel CMOS unit from Samsung while the front camera is a OV5670 5 mega-pixel sensor.
Some of the internal components include dual SIM tray and headphone jack.
Interestingly the dual SIM tray on the Meizu m1 note has a loose plastic head. Many reviewers believe that this is a quality issue, but actually it is part of the design and allows for a better fit in the frame.
The magnesium alloy chassis of the Meizu m1 note is extremely light-weight at only 16g. This helps to keep the overall weight of the phone down to only 147g, one of the lightest for a 5.5-inch FHD smartphone. You will notice that the upper and lower sections of the chassis are plastic, this is to help boost the signal strength and prevent interference.
Finally here is the polycarbonate shell of the Meizu m1 note with all the components removed. The inside is machined to save weight and increase structural rigidity.
Final Meizu m1 note component view.
