The Huawei Matebook 16 reminds me of a speedboat to which we would have hung an ocean liner anchor. The machine is well designed, powerful and affordable, but it has a huge liability that puts off buyers. With the policy of the USA since the Trump administration until today towards the solutions of the brand, the general public is now afraid to invest in a machine signed by the manufacturer.
On paper, the Huawei Matebook 16 is excellent. Launched last May only in Asia, the machine is now planned for international marketing. Finally, international, where the brand will have the right to sell it. In France, the machine is well planned even if it has not yet given its release dates. It will be equipped with AMD Cezanne processor. Ryzen 5 5600H and Ryzen 7 5800H 7 nm with very interesting performances on this type of format.
As a reminder, the Ryzen 5 5600H is a 6-core and 12-thread processor running from 3.3 to 4.2 GHz with a Vega 7-core graphics chipset on its board rising to 1.8 GHz. The Ryzen 7 5800H is an 8-core and 16-thread solution which can go up to 4.4 GHz and its 8-core Vega reaches 2 GHz. They are here integrated into the Matebook 16 with 16 GB of DDR4 RAM and 512 GB of PCIe NVMe storage.
The 16 ″ display will feature an IPS type panel that will deploy 2520 pixels wide by 1680 pixels high. A solution with a 3: 2 ratio displaying 189 dpi with a brightness of 300 cd / m² and full coverage of the sRGB color gamut. Resorting to a 3: 2 display is a pretty rare argument to catch the attention of many people, especially in such a clutter-to-diagonal ratio. The machine measures 35.1 cm wide and 25.49 cm deep. It is the other interest of this ratio more in height than the traditional 16: 9 of multimedia, the diagonal does not push the machines to become too wide. The thickness of the machine is 17.8 mm and it is just under 2 kilos.
We find on the Huawei Matebook, 16 all the connectors necessary for this type of solution, in addition to the Wifi6 and Bluetooth 5.1 module, there are two USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-A ports and two other type-C ports. An HDMI 2.0 port is also present as well as the classic 3.5 mm combo audio jack port. A pair of 2.5 watt stereo speakers is present on the front… which of course means that the machine does not have a numeric keypad despite its width. The brand persists in offering a webcam buried in the backlit keyboard, under a key. A classic 720p HD model that will therefore be replaced by an external solution to avoid filming yourself from below. A fingerprint sensor is present on the machine’s power button.
The price of this machine is quite interesting. The Ryzen 5 5600H model is priced at € 1,099, the Ryzen 7 5800H version at € 1,199. Attractive prices and very attractive machines… if we go beyond the problem posed by the brand today. To know what future it has in this segment in 2021?
–
