I'm not exactly sure of what you mean by a 'Chinese' phone. However, you may be talking about ODM phones. Most of the time, these phones are system clones of regular phones with some customisation. It may be a good idea to just buy one and take it apart to see what platform it runs on. Maybe it uses OMAP or something else? In which case, you probably have more knowledge on how to proceed. Maybe it is even compatible with Linux.
