Huawei MatePad Air is a thin and light tablet that the manufacturer has launched this week in China. With a good screen, it mounts a fairly old SoC and its own Harmony OS operating system.
The trade restrictions imposed by the United States have done tremendous damage to Huawei, since they not only prevent American companies from doing business with the Chinese company, but also prevent those companies from having any commercial relationship with third parties that sell technology to Huawei. We see it in the fewer number of products launched for the consumer market and also in the use of alternative operating systems and chips. But the company lives on…
In case it reaches the international market or you are interested in purchasing it from retailers like Aliexpress, say that the Huawei MatePad Air mounts a 11.5-inch LCD screen and 2880 x 1840 pixel resolution. Its refresh rate is 144 Hz and its maximum brightness reaches 500 nits. The screen is compatible with the second generation Huawei M-Pencil stylus with 4096 pressure sensitivity. Thin and light, it uses a metal frame that is 6.4mm thick and weighs 508 grams.
The tablet uses a SoC from Qualcomm, but it is quite outdated. Its about Snapdragon 888, another sign of trade restrictions that prevent you from accessing newer technology. The base configuration includes 8 GB of RAM and 128 of ROM, although it can be expanded up to 12 GB of RAM and 512 GB of internal storage.
More modern in connectivity, supports Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2 and has optional support for 4G mobile broadband networks. It mounts a quad speaker system and its battery has a capacity of 8300 mAh with a fast charge of 40 watts. It equips quite a few sensors, GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo, ambient light sensor, gravity sensor, compass, gyroscope, and a color temperature sensor.
Not being able to use Android and like other recently launched products, the tablet pre-installs its own operating system, Harmony OS. It is a distributed operating system based on microkernel and Open Source developed for mobile devices. It includes its own app and services, although it obviously does not reach the enormous amount of Android software.
Huawei MatePad Air is on sale in China in various color finishes and for 2899 yuan, around 412 dollars to change. It’s a shame about Huawei, but there are more interesting solutions in its market range.
