Her GadgetMatch

Meizu Pro 7 Review: Twice the fun

Published

August 14, 2017

Isa Rodriguez

I took one look at the Meizu Pro 7 and I knew I wanted to try it out. You see, unlike other folks at GadgetMatch who look to specs and features as basis for wanting to try a phone, I look at form factor and novelty. A phone with a secondary AMOLED display was obviously right up my alley.

But, what good does a secondary display do? How does it work? Does one actually need a second display and if so, when will one ever need it? I spent a few days with the Pro 7 in an attempt to answer all these questions.

Secondary AMOLED screen

Meizu’s secondary display is a cute little panel on the back of the phone (which I will, from here on, call “cutie screen”). It’s around the size of a big person’s thumb or a lipstick tube — but just right for displaying time and phone notifications with a certain pizzaz.

Girl holding Meizu Pro 7 with back screen alerting with a notification

Yeah, this pizzaz

The screen isn’t always on; you can activate with a double-tap. Initially, the display will show you the time, but a swipe right will give you the temperature in your location and another swipe will display the pedometer. When turned on, phone actions like charging will also randomly show on the cutie screen with different animations.

My favorite function, when it comes to this display, would be its selfie capability. A swipe up will activate the rear camera and the cutie panel turns into a display! Swiping will switch through the three modes available: blur which is the bokeh mode, beauty mode, and original. A tap on the screen triggers the shutter after a countdown of three seconds. Think of all the selfie possibilities!

Unfortunately, the camera view on the cutie screen doesn’t support video — a shame since this was something I was looking forward to using; just think of all the vlog possibilities if this were doable! I also wanted to customize the standby screen animation or wallpaper, but the phone wouldn’t allow me to do that, so I was pretty much stuck with the serious-looking preset clock face and a blank screen on downtime.

As expected, I did enjoy the extra selfie screen — it helped with framing, and selfies were generally easier to take, though you can’t really see much detail on such a teeny screen. Size does matter at the end of the day, at least for selfie screens!

The cameras

The Pro 7 is equipped with a 16-megapixel front-facing camera plus a dual-cam setup at the back with two 12-megapixel shooters. These numbers are never really indicative of how good a camera is so you know what that means: shootout!

The selfie camera is, of course, equipped with a beauty filter that may be toggled according to your filter preference. Unlike other selfie smartphones, the Meizu Pro 7 only has one beauty mode setting that you’re stuck with — no separate toggles for skin smoothening, face thinning, or complexion. Not that I’m complaining; the filter does its job.

[sciba leftsrc=”http://www.gadgetmatch.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/GadgetMatch-Meizu-Pro-7-Review-Sample-Photo-20170811-06.jpg” leftlabel=”Front camera with filter” rightsrc=”http://www.gadgetmatch.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/GadgetMatch-Meizu-Pro-7-Review-Sample-Photo-20170811-05.jpg” rightlabel=”Front camera without filter” mode=”horizontal” width=””]

Of course, if that’s not enough for you, the phone also has a built-in beauty edit feature which allows you to make certain changes to your selfies — just make sure not to go overboard!

Meizu Pro 7 photo and beauty edit samples

Don’t over do the editing, it can turn really bad, real quick

The rear dual-camera setup allows for monochrome photos and a bokeh mode. By experience, however, the front-facing camera does a better job with the beauty filters, as the rear camera filter is too subtle for my taste.

Though the Pro 7’s camera does well overall, it doesn’t seem to do too well with low-light shots. Sample shots in low light with the Meizu Pro 7

Here are other sample shots of my fabulous life (ha ha ha!) taken with the Pro 7:

: Meet my doggies!

: Random night out

: More of my doggies!

: What’s for lunch?

: View from the GadgetMatch HQ

: My plant babies

: Black and white

: Another black and white photo

The Meizu Pro 7 boasts a monochrome function owing to the dual-cam setup, though I was not really impressed by it — especially after seeing other brands do it better.

Look and feel

I’m pretty particular about how a phone looks and feels in my hands. The Meizu Pro 7 has a sleek aluminum back and a good weight to it; this makes it feel pretty premium.

Meizu phones run on the Flyme operating system on top of Android, and this particular one runs on Nougat, which means a distinct phone interface. But, the most peculiar thing about the Pro 7 — and Meizu phones in general — is the fact that there is only one home button on the phone’s front that’s used for most commands. This one physical button to rule them all, equipped with a fingerprint reader, is something that may need a little getting used to.

The Pro 7 also has a USB-C port and headphone jack. Of course, the second display screen is a beautiful, unique touch.

Performance

Unlike the Pro 7 Plus powered by a MediaTek Helio X30 processor, the Pro 7 is powered by a Helio P25. Now, my non-techie friends, stay with me: All you need to know is that this phone is comparable to most new midrange smartphones in the market today (Examples: OPPO R11, Moto Z2 Play, ASUS ZenFone 3 Zoom).

On the other hand, the Meizu Pro 7 Plus’ X30 processor puts it on the same range as most flagship smartphones now (Examples: Xiaomi Mi 6, OnePlus 5, HTC U11 which all run on a Snapdragon 835). Though there are Meizu Pro 7’s equipped with the X30, you’d be hard-pressed to find one, since they’re only available in China.

This shouldn’t be a problem at all because as it stands, the Meizu Pro 7 gives a pretty smooth user experience for my needs — I’m a fairly heavy smartphone user, though my apps aren’t that demanding. On this phone I could have 15 to 20 apps all open in the background without issue, although some of them refresh when I reload the app. Our specific Pro 7 has 4GB of memory and 64GB of storage, for reference.

With a capacity of 3000mAh, the battery on this thing is good, too. It goes from zero to 100 percent in around an hour and thirty minutes, and it lasted me a whole day’s use (8 to 14 hours depending on my needs). Turning the second AMOLED screen off does very little difference to battery time, but as I mentioned earlier, that cute second display only does so much at this point, so I wasn’t really expecting a significant difference.

Is this your GadgetMatch?

The Meizu Pro 7 is a definite show-stopper because of the extra screen. Though I did expect much from the cutie screen, I was a bit let down by its limited capabilities. But, that definitely doesn’t mean I was not impressed by it, nor am I giving up hope that the secondary features will be improved on in the future. *cough*second screen video selfie mode*cough*

Do I need the second cutie screen? My answer: Does it matter? Meizu played this well; there were no sacrifices made for this additional display, and that makes it a welcome feature whether you’d want it or not. And really, at the end of the day, you could always just turn it off.

For what it’s worth, the Pro 7, even without the cutie screen, is a pretty decent phone. As of writing, international pricing has not been released, but if priced the same way as in China at CNY 2,880 (US$ 425), it’s definitely a phone you should consider.

[irp posts=”16822″ name=”Meizu Pro 7 and Pro 7 Plus go official with secondary display”]

Her GadgetMatch

Dyson’s latest bundle is the power couple your floors have been waiting for

The answer to the wet-and-dry cleaning problem most of us have quietly accepted as just ‘life’

Published

April 22, 2026

Carolyn Ramoran Hamilton | Almost Diplomatic

There’s a particular kind of domestic frustration that doesn’t get talked about enough: the moment you finish vacuuming, look down at your gleaming hard floors, and realize they still need mopping. Two tools. Two routines. One slightly deflated sense of accomplishment. Dyson, apparently, has been paying attention.

For a limited time, the brand is bundling two of its machines into a single, rather attractive package — the Dyson WashG1™ wet floor cleaner and the Dyson V8™ Slim cordless vacuum — positioning them as the complete answer to the wet-and-dry cleaning problem most of us have quietly accepted as just life.

Meet the pair

The WashG1™ is Dyson’s take on the wet floor cleaner, designed to wash hard floors in one streamlined pass rather than the traditional drag-and-splash method that mostly moves grime from one end of the room to the other. No buckets, no wringing, no staring at a suspiciously grey mop head and wondering when exactly it stopped being useful. It’s the kind of appliance that quietly earns its counter space — and then some.

Compact, cordless, and deceptively powerful: the V8™ Slim for when the mess is small but your standards aren’t.

The V8™ Slim, meanwhile, is the lighter, nimbler sibling of Dyson’s cordless line. Useful for the crumbs under the dining chair, the dust gathering behind the shelves, and every other small, daily chaos that a full-sized vacuum feels excessive for. Cordless and compact, it’s the machine you’ll actually pick up instead of sighing and walking past the mess.

Together, they cover the full floor care spectrum: the V8™ Slim handles the dry sweep, the WashG1™ follows with the wash. It’s a logical pairing, honestly — the kind that makes you wonder why you’ve been doing it any other way.

Why this Dyson combination matters

Hard floors, for all their aesthetic appeal, are unforgiving surfaces. Dust settles visibly. Spills linger. And vacuuming alone, as satisfying as the process can be, doesn’t quite address the layer of grime that accumulates on high-traffic areas over time. A wet cleaner handles what a vacuum can’t, and vice versa — which is precisely why owning both, rather than cycling through them separately across different shopping occasions, makes a certain kind of sense.

There’s also something to be said for the ease of a dedicated routine. When both machines live in the same home, cleaning stops being a production and starts being a rhythm — a quick pass with the V8™ Slim in the morning, a proper wash with the WashG1™ when the floors need it. Less deliberation, more just getting it done.

The numbers

Originally priced at PhP 74,800 for both, the bundle is currently available at PhP 45,900 — a saving of PhP 28,900. The mechanic is straightforward: purchase the WashG1™ and the V8™ Slim comes with it.

The promo runs from April 16 to 30, 2026, available at Dyson Stores nationwide. For those who’ve been watching these two machines from a careful distance, the window is narrow — but the value proposition is hard to argue with.

Entertainment

BINI, KATSEYE among top worldwide Google Searches ahead of Coachella

Coachella to kick off this weekend

Published

April 10, 2026

GadgetMatch

Graphics by Vincenz Lee | GadgetMatch

BINI and KATSEYE topped recent Google Search trends ahead of their Coachella performances this month.

It’s clear that Coachella attendees are curious about the popular Philippine pop girl group, as well as the Los Angeles-based global girl group.

That’s aside from dedicated BLOOMs who are eager to see Aiah, Colet, Maloi, Gwen, Stacey, Mikha, Jhoanna, and Sheena take part in the legendary California music festival on Friday, April 10.

According to Google Trends data, global searches for the term “BINI Coachella” hit a perfect
score of 100 on April 8.

This indicates that the search term briefly became the highest-ranking search trend.

Meanwhile, “KATSEYE Coachella” scored 98 on April 7 on Google Trends, followed by a perfect 100 on April 8.

The timing of KATSEYE’s new single, “PINKY UP” couldn’t have been better as it dropped just a day before their Sahara stage set.

At the same time, the Filipino octet has also released “Blush” as their new comeback song — just hours ahead of KATSEYE.

As such, EYEKONS have also been scouring the interwebs for the global girl group.

And as these are worldwide search data, the recent Google Search trends somewhat prove these artists are effectively breaking through the global mainstream, and introducing their respective cultures to the global stage.

Entertainment

ITZY’s YUNA is Infinix’s first ever global brand ambassador

Infinix is in with YUNA in the scene

Published

February 27, 2026

Vincenz

Graphics by Vincenz Lee | GadgetMatch

Infinix is entering a new era — and the brand is bringing one of K-Pop’s most sought-after stars along the ride.

A first for Infinix

In line with the launch of the latest NOTE 60 series, Infinix has also named YUNA of ITZY as its very first Global Brand Ambassador. The company calls this a bold step forward for both innovation and style.

For the record, this is the first time Infinix has tapped a global ambassador — and the choice makes sense. YUNA is known for her confidence, vibrant energy, and unapologetic self-expression. These qualities align closely with Infinix’s “Joy Tech, Beyond Limits” philosophy.

In a statement, YUNA shared her excitement about the partnership. She said she’s looking forward to connecting with fans in a new way and creating meaningful stories together with the brand.

For Infinix, this collaboration is more than just a celebrity endorsement. It signals a shift in how the company wants to position itself globally — not just as a smartphone maker, but as a lifestyle tech brand for expressive, tech-savvy youth.

The more, the merrier

The partnership goes along the debut of the NOTE 60 Series, further fueling Infinix’s move toward a more premium smartphone experience.

Like YUNA, the NOTE 60 line also brings notable names in the table:

Powered by Snapdragon from Qualcomm
Design collaboration with Pininfarina
Audio tuned with JBL

It’s a clear attempt that Infinix wanted to elevate both performance and design by blending in flagship-level specs, more refined aesthetics, and immersive sound altogether.

Infinix says this launch also marks its expansion into more premium international markets.

With YUNA as the face of the brand, the company hopes to strengthen its appeal among younger users who want both powerful hardware and a device that matches their personality.

Rather than focusing purely on specs, Infinix is leaning into storytelling — highlighting how technology can spark creativity, joy, and individuality.

With the NOTE 60 Series and YUNA front and center, Infinix appears ready to redefine its brand identity on a global scale.