First impressions of the Huawei MateBook X Pro 2020 - a MacBook Pro rival on Windows

There are enough large companies on the Windows laptop market, so new players have to play with their trump cards, otherwise no one will notice. This is exactly what Huawei did, releasing the flagship model MateBook X Pro in 2018 with a bezel-less screen and other interesting solutions. The laptop proved to be successful and today we are getting acquainted with its updated version. Let's find out what the company is asking for 130 thousand rubles.

Design

Outwardly, the model has not changed, which is good. The design of the MateBook X Pro has been very successful and has not lost its relevance in two years. A utilitarian aluminum case, angular shapes and a color a la Space Gray work for the image of a serious laptop. If such severity is not to your liking, there is an emerald-green version - in this version, the novelty will definitely stand out.

Of the connectors - the required minimum: two USB Type ‑ C (USB 3.1 and Thunderbolt 3), a full-size USB 3.0 and an audio connector. The kit also includes an adapter with additional USB Type ‑ C and USB Type ‑ A, as well as HDMI and for some reason VGA. It would be better instead of the latter there was a full-size card reader.

The quality of materials and workmanship is exceptional. Liked and keyboard with a touchpad - which is as large as the trackpad found in the MacBook Air. There is a built-in fingerprint sensor. The scan is registered the first time it is pressed, the login is quick and convenient.

Screen

The display in the MateBook X Pro is chic and has remained that way. The 13.9-inch LTPS sensor has thin bezels, a 3: 2 aspect ratio and a 3,000 x 2,000 dots resolution. The pixel density is 260 ppi (higher than on a MacBook with Retina), and full sRGB color gamut is also declared.

The picture is very clear and contrasting, the shades remain saturated at any angle, the brightness margin is also excellent. After the MateBook X Pro, the screens of the 2020 MacBook Air, HP Elite Dragonfly, and ASUS ZenBook 13 are far from impressive.

The display supports touch control. Working in Excel and web-surfing with it is much more convenient.

Performance

The MateBook X Pro 2020 has received the latest generation of Intel Comet Lake processors. The model is based on a 4-core 8-thread Core i7-10510U, discrete graphics NVIDIA GeForce MX250 with 2 GB VRAM, 16 GB Dual Channel LPDDR3 RAM and 1 NVMe Solid State Drive TB.

Among the key characteristics stands out the clock frequency, or rather its limit value of 4.9 GHz. The laptop cannot hold it for long, but short-term accelerations are enough to make the system work with lightning speed.

In the Geekbench 5 processor test, the novelty showed a good result for both one and all cores. However, we have yet to evaluate long-term performance, graphics performance and cooling efficiency.

Other features

The webcam is built into the keyboard and pops out with a push. Connoisseurs privacy they may not glue it with adhesive plaster, but simply put it into the case. The main disadvantage is the capture angle, because of which you look at the interlocutors in video calls from top to bottom.

The laptop is equipped with four speakers, which produce very loud and high quality sound. At high frequencies, they even surpass the stereo system in the MacBook Air, but they are inferior in the study of bass. There are also four microphones for high-quality sound recording and voice control.

A 56 Wh battery is installed inside. Huawei claims 13 hours of video playback on a single charge, a good figure for a Windows laptop. How things are in practice, we will find out during prolonged testing.

Finally, the MateBook X Pro 2020 supports Huawei Share technology for contactless data exchange with a smartphone. There is also a “multiscreen” function for projection of its screen onto a laptop. This only works with Huawei devices and Honor based on Android 9+.

Subtotals

At first glance, the Huawei MateBook X Pro update came out very successful. The company did not fix what was not broken, leaving the design and screen unchanged. At the same time, the hardware was updated, so the performance should be at a high level. We will tell you about all the possibilities of the novelty in full review.

Buy

The author thanks Huawei for the device provided for testing. The company had no way to influence the test result.