Technology

The Huawei Mate Xs – Improved features.

We heard about the Huawei Mate X last year which got a little bit delayed. But Huawei have gone back and improved the Mate X and we have here the Huawei Mate Xs.

Huawei Mate Xs – In the Box

Xs comes with USB type C earphones, a USB type C to USB type C cable and a 55 watt Huawei Supercharger. This can charge Huawei Mate Xs from zero to 85% in just 30 minutes. You can also use this charger to charge your laptop because of the fact that it’s got 55 watt charging. Absolutely awesome.

Huawei Mate Xs – Display

Xs comes with a massive eight inch OLED display. It looks really, really good. Now when you fold it, you actually get two displays,
you get the main outer display, this is around 6.6 inches, but then as well as that, you then get a back display which is around 6.3 inches.

Now Huawei have actually made a few improvements to this display compared to what we had on the Mate X. So firstly, this is a quad layer display, so we’ve got a few different layers to make it protected. And also the crease is no longer as visible as it was on the Mate X.

Now Huawei are using an aerospace-graded polymer, so this is still plastic-based. Based on other foldable devices that we’ve seen, which normally have the folding element inside, this is more of an outie.

So we’ve got the display on the outside when you’re putting it in and out of your pockets. That’s something that I am a little bit concerned. But the improvements that Huawei have made should make this more durable compared to what we had on the Mate X.

Xs comes with a screen protector. This is not to pealed off, warning to everybody out there who’s going to try to peel it off. Do not peel this off.

You’ve got a very usable 6.6 inch display when the device is closed. So you could very comfortably use this as a regular smartphone.

But when you do want to experience that full tablet size device, then you can pop it out and you’ve got this full screen experience with no notch, or no punch, or anything like that.

Huawei Mate Xs – Hinge

Now the hinge has also been improved, so we’re getting a pretty much flat display when it is completely out. And then it folds back on itself a full 180 degrees. Now as well as that, we’ve got these two elements that are at the top and the bottom of the hinge area and these will prevent any dust and debris getting in to the display. Looks very promising.

Now another very interesting thing about the Mate Xs is that we’ve got this side bar here along the side, obviously, and this actually has a few different purposes. So firstly, it actually kind of acts as a bit of a handle. So you can hold the device when it’s flat out with one hand using this as a bit of a grip.

But more importantly, it houses the quad camera set up, a flash, the button, which actually expands the device out, a volume rocker, as well as a side mounted fingerprint scanner, which also doubles up as a power button.

Huawei Mate Xs – Cameras

These are quite similar to what we’ve got on the P30 Pro. So we’ve got a primary 40 megapixel camera with an f/1.8 aperture. Now this is a super sensing camera. So instead of using red, green and blue, it uses red, yellow and blue and this allows the sensor to capture a lot more light.

Huawei very big on low light photography. We then have a 16 megapixel ultra-wide camera. This, of course, great if you want to get a lot more into your shots. We then have an eight megapixel telephoto camera, this is going to give you up to three times optical zoom, up to five times hybrid zoom, which uses a combination of optical and digital zoom and it’s also going to give you up to 30 times digital zoom.

And finally, we have a time of flight sensor. This is going to help with depth information. Rear facing cameras can also be used as front facing cameras. This is a very interesting thing about these cameras.

Now because the device falls back on itself, you can use the rear side of the display as a viewfinder for your selfies. Rear facing cameras are used as front facing cameras so you get much better quality selfies.

You’re also getting that flexibility of using multiple lenses so you’re going to be able to get ultra-wide selfies, you’re also going to be able to use the time of flight sensor for your portrait selfies.

Another interesting use of these cameras is that if you do have the device folded, if you’re taking pictures of somebody else,
then they’re going to be able to see what they look like from this back display while you’re taking that shot. So if you want to hand the device over to somebody, and you want them to change the composition a little bit, you’re going to be able to see that.

Huawei Mate Xs – Design

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So this is a very, very cool and interesting setup. The device is not too thick when folded. USB type C is at the bottom as part of the sidebar. Then we’ve got a few mics. There’s a bottom firing speaker. Now we do have stereo speakers. So there is one here bottom firing and then there is one in the earpiece.

At the top, we’ve got a SIM card tray. Now we do have support for dual SIM cards and then there is an IR blaster. On the right hand side, there’s the volume rockers as well as that power button that also doubles up as a fingerprint scanner.

Huawei Mate Xs – Internals.

This is another area where there’s been some big improvements. We now have the Kirin 990 chipset compared to the 980 that the Mate X came with. What’s the most interesting thing about the 990 is that it has integrated 5G capability. So you’re not going to have to have a separate 5G modem. This is all within one chip, which is going to give you much more efficiency when it comes to power. You do have eight gigabytes of RAM with 512 gigabytes of storage.

Software.

Xs comes with EMUI 10.1 using open source Android 10. Google Play Store issue still exists. I currently can’t talk too much about that because this device is pre-released.

We are not sure exactly what’s going to be happening, are we going to be getting an alternative? Let’s hope that this issue can be sorted out.

Multitasking features

Multitasking features have been built into EMUI 10.1 to take advantage of the larger display. If you do have an app open while the device is folded, when you do unfold it, that app is automatically going to expand and utilize the full display. What you can also do is drag from the side and hold. This is going to give you lots of shortcuts to apps.

You can have two apps open side by side, We can also change the size. If we want to open a third app, then we can have that floating on top of both of the currently open apps. And that’s definitely an interesting use of the real estate that you have on the Mate Xs.

We also have Huawei Share built in. So if you do have another Huawei device, then you’re going to be able to quickly and easily transfer images and files from the Mate Xs.

Battery

We get a 4500 milliamp battery. It’s actually split in two because of the folding nature of this device. We’ll have to see how long that’s going to last. As mentioned, you do get that 55 watts supercharging, which is absolutely insane.

Price

Information is not available in terms of price and availability yet. For latest details on Mate Xs check here.