Hands-on with Huawei's new MediaPad M2 10.0 tablet and its 4 speakers

In addition to announcing the Huawei Mate 8 and new female-oriented versions of the Huawei Watch, Huawei also rolled out the MediaPad M2 10.0. This Android tablet is essentially a larger version of the earlier MediaPad M2 8.0, offering a slim aluminum body (7.35mm, to be specific) with polished chamfers and a 10.1-inch 1080p IPS LCD display. Don't ask us why the tablet's named the 10.0 when the screen's 10.1.

The big highlight here, though, is the quartet of speakers, which Huawei describes as having been "positioned to deliver premium sound quality." Huawei's partnered with audio house Harman/Kardon on the speaker system, building in an "Intelligent Power Amplifier" and Harman/Kardon's Clari-fi tech that restores details lost in compression.

The tablet will be available in multiple configurations, including different colors, radios, storage, RAM, and stylus support:

  • Silver with 16GB storage and 2GB RAM: $349
  • Silver with 16GB storage, 2GB RAM, and LTE: $399
  • Gold with 64GB storage, 3GB RAM, and M-Pen active stylus: $419
  • Gold with 64GB storage, 3GB RAM, LTE, and M-Pen active stylus: $499

Every variant runs a Huawei EMUI-skinned version of Android 5.1 and has a fingerprint sensor built into the bottom bezel. The M-Pen stylus that comes with the 64GB version of the tablet offers 2048 levels of pressure sensitivity for whatever artistic applications you have in mind.

The Huawei MediaPad M2 10.0 is set to arrive in the first quarter of 2016, with numerous launch countries including the United States.

Derek Kessler

Derek Kessler is Special Projects Manager for Mobile Nations. He's been writing about tech since 2009, has far more phones than is considered humane, still carries a torch for Palm (the old one), and got a Tesla because it was the biggest gadget he could find. You can follow him on Twitter at @derekakessler.