Hands-on: Huawei MediaPad M1 – 8″ Tablet with Front Stereo Speakers

The front facing stereo speakers on the HTC One has really spoiled us and watching videos on a mobile device can never be the same again. The folks at Huawei probably have gotten their inspiration from this when designing a multimedia oriented tablet. As a result, the new MediaPad M1 looks uncanningly similar to a HTC One, with a metallic looking body and 2 speaker grills that faces to the front.

It was officially announced during Mobile World Congress where we have managed to get our hands on one. In the hands, it is about the same size as an iPad mini with a 8″ IPS display that’s rather decent with a 1280×800 pixels resolution.

On-board it runs on Huawei’s sister company Hi-Silicon Quad-Core processor that’s clocked at 1.6GHz. There’s also 1GB of RAM and 8GB of on-board storage that can be expanded using microSD card. You’ll also get a 5MP camera at the back without any assisted flash and over at the front, there’s a 1MP Camera. The battery has a rather generous 4,800mAh capacity which can be reversed charge like a battery pack to charge your smart phone. That’s not all, there’s 4G LTE and it even lets you make phone calls as well.

In the hands, the device is decently built with an aluminium frame but it isn’t as refined when compared to an iPad mini. Video playback experience on the MediaPad M1 is pretty good especially with the stereo sound coming from its pair of front facing speakers. Software wise, the MediaPad M1 runs on Android 4.2 which is skinned with their custom Emotion UI 2.0. It lacks an App Drawer, so all installed apps and shortcuts would appear on the home screen.

No word on the pricing but this should be an affordable tablet with a decent screen and better than average audio output. Watch our hands-on video with additional photos after the break.

Huawei MediaPad M1 Hands-on Video

Huawei MediaPad M1 Hands-on Photos