Ha, moondog and I were just chatting about this earlier today.

In general, with China travel expanding rapidly many airlines are expanding their fleets very rapidly. While in the US if you want to fly an A330, you have to fly to Europe or Asia, in China there are a ton of new A330's running around domestically.

While I haven't flown any of the new MU or CA A330's, I've had a few experiences with the new CZ ones (SHA-PEK, SHA-SZH, SHA-CAN) and they are a gem. Way better than the old 777's they fly or worse the older Airbuses (A6). These new planes are clean, bright, have IFE, and plenty of space (gone are the 10 across days).

moondog, on my A320 flight I did your trick and ended up with Row 4 middle bulkhead. Slightly better than my 14F and since most Chinese aren't as big as the typical American, I had plenty of arm space. I did get the VERY last overhead bin space though...