Engadget

Accessories, iOS has them. Not many devices can boast the same rich and dazzling array of add-ons that the iPhone or iPad enjoy -- from keyboards to docks, arcade cabinets to battery packs. Today's offering? A mobile mixer. The iRig MIX from IK Multimedia, to be precise. It's essentially a mini DJ tool, designed to work with such iGadgets, and brought to you by the same serial audio-accessorizers behind the iRig MIC Cast and AmpliTube. If you think you've seen this fella before, then you likely have, as this got its first glimpse of sunlight back at CES. Now it's here for real, auditioning for your affections as if it were on "American Idol."

While it's easy to dismiss some of the more ambitious accessories as as trying to push the limits of iPad / iPhone functionality to the extreme, it's also worth remembering that accessory X isn't always about replacing object Y. No one ever bought a USB webcam thinking it'd turn them into Spielberg, now did they? But, they might have gotten one thinking it would give their PC some skills it never had before. So it's with this short, preemptive missive in mind that we turn on the iRig MIX, plug in and rock out. Hopefully.

Forget that "MX Quad-core" moniker, because Meizu's just formally introduced its first quad-core Android phone as the "MX 4-core" in Hong Kong. For those who care, this is the first time ever for Meizu to collaborate with a carrier -- that being Hong Kong's PCCW, who's offering the HK$3,099 (US$400) 32GB model for free on various tariffs, while details are light on the HK$4,099 (US$530) 64GB version. Once the stage cleared we had a chance to take a closer look at the international variant of the MX 4-core. Aside from the disappearance of the Chinese logo above the screen plus the duller logo on the back (but accompanied by an extra capacity label), the 4-inch HSPA+ phone looks identical to its dual-core sibling. Additionally, Hong Kong and mainland China customers who pre-order between now and the launch on June 30th will get to pick a colored back crystal shell for free, including ivory white, milky lime, lilac purple and misty pink to replace the original white.

Software-wise Flyme -- Meizu's heavily customized Ice Cream Sandwich -- is also very similar to its Gingerbread predecessor, except for its slicker responsiveness (especially the camera app) and the odd interface tweaks here and there. There are also a few new features that are worth a mention: on top of the new native stopwatch, countdown timer and multi-segmented timed task lists, there's Flyme Voicemail which is essentially a native recorder for incoming calls that you reject (think of it as a neat alternative to conventional visual voicemail), and there's Flyme Message which is Meizu's take on SIP services like Whatsapp and Line. We shall dig deeper in our full review, but for now, you can check out a quick hands-on video after the break. And for those who still possess Meizu's older Android phones, we were told to expect Flyme to be delivered over the air in early July (as opposed to the original June date), so keep an eye out for that little update icon.

Update: We mentioned in our video that the China version of the MX 4-core doesn't come with the Play Store, but it turns out that we were mistaken. Hooray!

Update 2: By the way, it's pronounced "fly-me."

When ASUS first teased the Transformer Pad Infinity TF700 back at CES, many customers looked on, simmering with rage. You see, only several weeks earlier the company started selling the Transformer Prime, a top-tier tablet priced at a not-so-cheap $500. It was a state-of-the-art product... until ASUS unveiled the TF700, a tablet that was similar, only better. It, too, has a Tegra 3 chip and 8-megapixel camera, but it adds a higher-res, 1920 x 1200 display and promises improved signal reception, a pain point for the Prime.

Little did those disgruntled Prime owners know it would actually be a long time before the TF700 ever became available. Now, we're finally hearing it will go on sale in the US in mid-July, at which point the Prime is expected to drop in price before it gets discontinued. But is the TF700 all that much of an improvement over the original? And how does it stack up against comparably priced tablets, such as the new iPad, Acer Iconia Tab A700 and Toshiba Excite 10? Check out our early review to find out.

You can strap the GoPro HD Hero 2 to any number of things to document your extreme adventures in high definition. However, for all of the improvements in the second version, we found it to be distractingly heavy, difficult to mount and with audio that left plenty to the imagination. Still, a few days of testing, even with some aerial combat thrown in, can't match constant use over the last six months. So, why not tell us how you've found using this thing on a daily basis and if you could, what would you change about it?

Your smartphone and / or tablet is just begging for an update. From time to time, these mobile devices are blessed with maintenance refreshes, bug fixes, custom ROMs and anything in between, and so many of them are floating around that it's easy for a sizable chunk to get lost in the mix. To make sure they don't escape without notice, we've gathered every possible update, hack, and other miscellaneous tomfoolery we could find during the last week and crammed them into one convenient roundup. If you find something available for your device, please give us a shout at tips at engadget dawt com and let us know. Enjoy!

It took five years to build the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building -- but this week Inhabitat reported that Chinese company BSB plans to build the next world's tallest tower in an astounding 90 days. Dubbed Sky City One, the soaring spire will be constructed using prefab building techniques in record time. In other architecture news, Singapore officially unveiled its lush, sprawling Gardens by the Bay in advance of their opening next week -- and the stars of the show are these spectacular solar-powered supertrees that harvest rainwater and light up the night. We also took a peek inside a bomb-shelter-turned-nightclub that is blowing up in Beijing, and several internet titans unveiled new building projects -- Twitter moved into a new green-roofed headquarters in San Francisco and eBay announced plans to power its flagship data center with a Bloom Energy fuel cell farm.

Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

If you hadn't been paying too much attention to the wide swath of tablets and clamshells (and mashups of the two) that Microsoft is targeting with Windows 8 and Windows RT, then the announcement of Surface contained many surprises. If you have, then there were probably far fewer surprises. But even if you knew just about everything about Windows 8 and Windows RT, you were probably a bit surprised to see Microsoft jump in with its own pair of devices to support the flavors of the imminent Windows upgrades supporting Intel and ARM processors.

After all, the fundamental business model of Windows has relied upon licensing to third parties. Ballmer himself has noted in the past that products that ship in the hundreds of millions (or more) of units per year lend themselves well to the licensing model as opposed to the vertical integration model most notably pursued by Apple among Microsoft's main competitors.

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder. But that adage, such a truism when applied to interpersonal relationships, doesn't quite carry the same weight when extended to the intimacy between expectant geek and promised hardware. So here we are, six months later: CES has long passed, the One X and Galaxy S III have been revealed, and the Android landscape is now decidedly governed by Ice Cream Sandwich. A veritable eternity has passed since Sony first introduced the AT&T-bound Xperia Ion, its LTE flagship for the US market, muting much of the initial buzz surrounding the handset. So, why choose now to bow a smartphone that's already been outshone by more recent and robust contenders? Perhaps it's simply a case of better late than never. But surely after all of that time, both parties could've managed to ship it with Android 4.0 and not the dated 2.3.7 build of Gingerbread that we get instead.

The Ion's aging OS and 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon S3 CPU may be a nod to mobile's past, but the rest of its internals paint a more forward-thinking picture. This 4.6-inch Sony-bred device boasts a 1280 x 720 HD Reality display, 720p webcam / 12-megapixel rear camera with Exmor R sensor, PlayStation Certification, 16GB of storage plus 1GB RAM, a 1,900mAh battery and NFC. For that spec mix, you'd expect the Ion's on contract cost to double up on the Benjamins, but instead it's been priced to sell at an attractive $99 -- much like the Lumia 900. Will that retail positioning hurt or help its prospects? Can the Ion effectively straddle two worlds, carving out an identity for itself and attracting a defined market segment? Or will this hodgepodge of internals prove too inconsistent for any demographic, save, perhaps, bargain hunters? Find the answers to those questions and more below.

We know you've got questions, and if you're brave enough to ask the world for answers, here's the outlet to do so. This week's Ask Engadget inquiry is from Cesar, who wants to become the next eBoy. If you're looking to send in an inquiry of your own, drop us a line at ask [at] engadget [dawt] com.

"I design and make customized t-shirts in my town, and over the last two years they've become pretty popular. I've had to expand to keep up with all the demand, so now I'm looking at taking my business online, but I don't know anything about building my own e-store. What's the best way for a newbie to start their own e-store? I've been looking at services like Wix, but can you think of anything better? Thanks in advance!"

We're always looking to ask questions that are a little bit different than "help me pick an Android tablet" and this one's a real doozy. In a former life we once had to help build a site that used POWA, which we were quite taken with, but that's as far as our knowledge goes. Perhaps one of you knows of a truly excellent e-commerce platform for small businesses and can point Cesar in the right direction. Go on, let's be good to one another.

Not all mobile news is destined for the front page, but if you're like us and really want to know what's going on, then you've come to the right place. This past week, we learned of the first market outside of China for ZTE's new Grand X smartphone, and received news that both the Sony Xperia U and Xperia P will arrive in Australia. These stories and more await after the break. So buy the ticket and take the ride as we explore the "best of the rest" for this week of June 18th, 2012.