Huawei is generally thought of as a company that builds low-end smartphones using last year's hardware - that and mobile broadband dongles (including the awesome MiFi for Three).
In 2012, Huawei plans to show that it can not only compete at the high end, but dominate it. With just as much expertise in producing high-end hardware as anyone else, the company isn't going to stop at smartphones, as the MediaPad shows.
The first MediaPad is a 7-inch tablet. And you may be surprised to learn that it hasn't been fitted with a low-rent processor or a low-resolution screen, or constructed using cheap plastic.
The rather drab box won't excite you as much as the iPad's designer packaging, but once you get the MediaPad out and into your hands it has a premium feel you'd expect from something costing a lot more.
Crisp and clear
There's a bright 1280x800-pixel IPS screen, which means you can play 720p HD video without scaling, and even though Apple has since announced the new iPad with a Retina display it's fair to say that the resolution is more than adequate. Huawei has a newer MediaPad coming that has a full-HD display, if you really do need more.
The MediaPad runs Android Honeycomb OS, but an update to Ice Cream Sandwich will be released shortly that should make better use of the 1.2GHz dual-core processor, such as hardware graphics acceleration that will purportedly improve the user interface.
1GB of RAM ensures that it's more than able to run multiple tasks at once. ICS won't just speed up the MediaPad, but it's also add new features like easier app management (such as shutting down apps with a quick drag off the screen) and the face unlock feature, which uses the front camera to unlock using facial recognition.
When I first used the device, I noticed that the text and icons were quite large. Although the resolution ensures smoother text, you won't get the real benefit of those extra pixels until you enable the 'high-resolution' mode.
Anyone who has dabbled with rooting will know this doesn't increase the pixels, but it adjusts the screen density, which scales up (or down) text and icons accordingly. Smaller text and icons means more information on the screen, and once you've enabled high resolution mode it's clear that MediaPad isn't just a smartphone with a larger display.
I'm fairly certain the MediaPad is the first tablet, or indeed smartphone, to let you change the screen density without rooting. The smaller text (eyesight permitting) has an obvious benefit for reading email, browsing the web, or scrolling through your calendar.
There's also another ace up its sleeve in the form of a SIM-card slot that takes data connectivity beyond wi-fi. The tablet supports 2G, 3G, and HSPA for download speeds of up to 14.4Mbps, as well as 802.11b, g and n for wi-fi.
To keep everything running, there's a 4,100mAh internal battery. With the brightness turned up, the tablet needs all the power it can get. The official standby time is 200 hours, but if you're actually using it a lot you'll need to charge it every couple of days.
Bring your own charger
That brings me to a pet hate of mine. A lot of early tablets relied on a dedicated power supply to charge, even with an industry standard micro-USB connector present.
Advances in technology mean most new tablets are chargeable via USB, but the MediaPad isn't one of those. This means you'll need to carry your power supply with you instead of just topping up the juice from any existing charger you may have.
For imaging or video calling, there a 5-megapixel autofocus camera on the rear, sadly without a LED flash, and a 1.3-megapixel fixed-focus camera at the front.
The last key feature of the MediaPad is the HDMI socket, which lets you turn your TV into a 'Smart TV' or do work by adding a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse. With a mouse pointer and proper keys to add text, the inclusion of Huawei's own office software is another bonus, letting you work and edit Microsoft Office files.
Keeping it simple
Besides the office software, the rest of the MediaPad is left well alone, leaving you with a vanilla install of the Honeycomb operating system. There's 8GB of internal storage and a microSD card slot to add upto 32GB more.
Even with a new 10-inch version of the MediaPad on the horizon, with a powerful 1.5GHz quad-core chipset, the 7-inch MediaPad is a respectable tablet, especially with the added benefit of 3G for use 'on the road'. With its high-resolution mode, it's even better. It doesn't beat the Samsung Galaxy Note, but it's not far behind.
The only downside is with Huawei trying to compete at the higher end of the market, it has priced the MediaPad accordingly.
This tablet retails for around £500, which - for a tablet with just 8GB - is quite a lot of money. It's also rather hard to find. But if the price does begin to fall and you stumble upon it on the high street, it's certainly worth checking out, and a good omen for what's to come from Huawei.
Huawei MediaPad
A decent tablet in a solid chassis, but with a pretty high price to pay given that there are more powerful devices on the horizon
Jonathan Morris
From starting out as a games tester for Mastertronic, Virgin and Sega in the late 1980s, it may seem odd to then ditch everything to write about mobile phones that, at the time, lasted 20 minutes between charges. He always had a hunch mobiles would become quite popular, but possibly didn't realise how powerful (and, ironically, returning to 20 minutes between charges). Jonathan's job is to continue advising on the best hardware to buy, in order to enjoy games that have advanced considerably since those long days and nights testing Double Dragon on the C64.