Meizu M3: Chinatown's video nano rival

By Nate Lanxon on 29 March 2007, 11:09am

If you're one of the select few who doesn't consider Apple to be king of MP3 players, but you still find the nano's sweet supple body appealing, why not cast your line of sight towards Meizu's new flash-based video and MP3 player, the M3. It's fundamentally a nano, but with video playback and support for desirable open-source and lossless audio and video formats.

The slim little M3 will quietly inhale your favourite FLAC and OGG-format music and swallow your most prized XviD video clips. At the touch of a tiny button, it'll project them into the periphery of your senses for hour after lossless hour.

Okay, we might be going overboard, but Crave is always pleased to see manufacturers supporting open-source codecs -- they're free to implement for crying out loud.

The only real downside with the M3 is that it only comes in 2GB, 4GB and 8GB versions. This isn't nearly big enough for a library of lossless audio or DVD-quality videos, which is what the XviD codec is capable of producing. But still, it's a nice-looking piece of kit.

The M3 is currently waiting for the next sailboat out of China, due Stateside in the next two or three months. We should get it shortly afterwards. Forecast US prices for the 2GB, 4GB and 8GB models are $65 (£35), $80 (£45) and $120 (£70) respectively, but no doubt us Brits will end up paying at least half as much again, because we're suckers for being ripped off. Sigh. -NL