Hello Linux Geeksters. As you may remember, Canonical has announced at MWC 2014 that Meizu MX3 and BQ Aquaris will be the first two Ubuntu Touch-powered smartphones.
Recently, Ubuntu’s Mark Shuttleworth has announced at CeBIT 2014 in Hannover that the Meizu MX3 will cost about $400, while BQ Aquaris will be available for only $200.
Hardware specs of the Meizu MX3 running Ubuntu Touch:
Meizu MX3 has a 5.1 display with 1800 x 1080 resolution, a Samsung Exynos 5410 Octa-Core CPU, 2 GB of RAM, 16 GB of internal storage, 8 megapixel camera will most likely run Ubuntu Touch flawless.
Hardware specs of BQ Aquaris running Ubuntu Touch:
BQ Aquaris has a 5 inch display with a 720 x 1280 resolution, a quad-core MediaTek 1.2 GHz Cortex A& CPU with a PowerVR SGX544 @ 286 MHz GPU, 1 GB of RAM memory, 16 GB internal memory and microSD slot, WiFi 802.11 b/g/n, GPS, an 8 MPX rear camera with autofocus and flash and 1.2 MPX front camera and a 2100 mAh battery.
Also, for a comparison between the two new Ubuntu Touch devices and LG Nexus 4 running with Ubuntu Touch, see this article.
The story so far:
Canonical has been working a lot at Ubuntu Touch, the mobile version of Ubuntu. While the initial plan was to make it available for all the Google Nexus smartphones and tablets, the developers have dropped the support for Galaxy Nexus, Google Nexus 7 2012 and Google Nexus 10, Ubuntu Touch being officially available only for the Google Nexus 4 smartphone and the Google Nexus 7 2013 tablet.
While there aren’t a lot of applications for Ubuntu Touch yet available, Canonical’s Mark Shuttleworth hopes that by the time the first Ubuntu Touch powered phones hit the market, the top 50 Android/iOS apps will be available for Ubuntu Touch.
Also worth mentioning, Mark’s Shuttleworth big dream is to reach full desktop-mobile convergence somewhere between the releases of Ubuntu 14.10 and Ubuntu 15.04 (between October 2014 and April 2015).