Can you change a Meizu battery?
 

I'm considering getting a Meizu, because I'm starting to get weary of problems with inferior quality players. Only problem with the Meizu is the battery, which is not meant to be user replaceable. What I'm wondering is, is it possible to open the player yourself and change it, and can you stick an aftermark iPod battery in this player, or something you can easily find on eBay? I dont want to rely on Meizu still being around 3 years later when the battery dies. I dont believe in the idea of "disposable mp3 players", that many Ipodists ascribe to.

As long as the new battery has the same voltage and fits in your player(duh!!) you will not have any problem

michiganjfrog, I have opened my M6 with a small plastic tool that came with a replacement iPod battery I purchased for one of my other players and it was quite an easy task but not something you would want to do oftern as i would imagine the small locking tabs would become worn and the cover loose. The battery is not a standard replacement size or shape as I think they have them made at specific dimensions for the player.

http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/1...5284112nu8.jpg
http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/5...5239320oq5.jpg

My understanding is that new batteries can be ordered from Meizu and a 3 + year life span is touted by them which I think is quite a realistic expectation. I also think that Meizu will be around for many years to come.

Thanks a lot for the sharp photos. I know the batteries can be ordered from Meizu, but with talk of iRiver folding their mp3 division due to the competition from Apple, I'm less sure that Meizu will be around in 3 years. Even if they are, I'm quite sure I dont want to spend $50-60 to replace a battery plus cost of shipping Meizu to HK, so the hawkers of aftermarket batteries on eBay sits better with me.

I'm still not clear on whether I can use just any ol' battery in the Meizu. One opinion seems to be that I can, the other that its not a standard size/shape and I probably will not be able to find a battery suitable for the Meizu.

Q. But if the voltage rating is the same, and a generic aftermarket battery for the iPod fits the space in the Meizu, will/wont that work? Or is the space unusually shallow or small that the iPod batteries just would never fit?

Q. As an alternative to the Meizu, I've also started taking another look at the 2GB iRiver Clix. (Its 25hr battery life vs. 20 for the Meizu is an attractive feature). So if anyone has any opinions on Clix vs. Meizu M6, please share them!

This is the only user comparison I have seen on the two players.

http://www.meizume.com/showthread.php?t=168

The battery dimensions are roughly 43x43x4.5 (millimeters)

Thanks for the dimensions on the battery and the comparison article. I had actually read that article earlier today, because I did a whole lot of intensive research on these two players, and even watched videos of both players under use. I concluded that in this case, the Clix won out. If it were for myself, I would probably take the Meizu for its superior sound quality, if nothing else, since thats my priority. But the player is for my GF, who above all, needs something that is easy to use.

The Clix it appears, is easiest to use. It has something most mp4's dont: a dedicated no-nonsense volume button. The vol. on the Meizu is anything but intuitive, from what I read. It doubles as other buttons, and as with the some of the nano clones, the Chinese somehow think its great fun to change the keys you use to adjust the volume, depending on which menu mode you're in (music/movies/etc).

The touchpad makes scrolling on the Meizu faster, but I've heard complaints of overscrolling (a problem I found using the Apple nano), and you cant adjust the Meizu scrolling speed. Also, its easy enough to not get what you want on the first tap with the Meizu. And you can't use the Meizu with gloves, which in Canada's winter, may not be such a convenient thing.

Others complain about the Clix being slow, but on a 2GB unit where you're only looking at sub-genres (ie. artist) its probably not that long to locate a song. Better than a nano clone anyway. The Meizu is well built physically, because half the casing is metal, but there are numerous reports of bugs, whereas the Clix seems like a more reliable unit, overall, perhaps beacuse its more mature in the marketplace. And I'm sure its gonna be more reliable than my Glacier, at least.

I'm still unclear as to how practical or feasible it is to put a 2hr movie on the Meizu, and expect decent quality and proper audio/video synching. I discovered, to my surprise, there are a lot of problems in doing this (I would have thought with a player that has a screen this good, video would have been one of the things they get right on the first go). Seems they're sill in the beta or alpha stage wrt video. They admit their own proprietary version of VDub doesn't work as good as the regular version, and I avoid using VDub like the plague for its enormous complication, processing time and space it requires on my drive to process videos. The Clix has MP4 support, thats a popular standard for iPod, which means I may not even have to convert videos. And even action movies like X-Men look very nice on the Clix.

I was talking about Meizu not being around in 3 years well, iRiver may not be around either, at least as far as MP3 players are concerned, if the rumours abounding of them falling to the competitveness of the iPod are true. And the batteries for the Clix are no more available on eBay than for the Meizu. But I learned both players have external battery pack accessories, which means in 3 years, or whenever their batteries die, you can still use the player with AA batteries. Means you have to carry a bulky battery box of 4 more batteries around your neck (2 in the case of the Meizu), but there's an aspect of convenience to good old AA's too. They're dang easy to replace, at least.

michiganjfrog, look forward to seeing a Clix review :)