Fortunately, we see more and more laptops with a fast AMD processor on the market. Huawei also equipped one of its newest laptops with an AMD Ryzen 7 with the MateBook 14 2020 AMD. How do you like this AMD version?
Huawei MateBook 14 2020 AMD
price € 1100, –
Color Gray
Processor AMD Ryzen 7 4800H
Memory 16 GB
Graphic AMD Radeon Vega 7
Display 14 inch ips (2160 x 1440)
Storage 512 GB NVME SSD
Operating system Windows 10 Home (64 bit)
Format 30.8 x 22.4 x 1.6 cm
Weight 1.49 kilos
Battery 56 Wh
Connections USB-C (charging and video), HDMI, 3.5 mm, 2x USB 3.0
Wireless Wifi 5 (2×2), bluetooth 5.0
Other Fingerprint scanner
Website https://consumer.huawei.com
8 Score 80 
- Pros
- Lightning fast
- Nice screen
- Beautiful housing
- Price / performance ratio
- Negatives
- Only once usb-c
- Unusable webcam
- No Wifi 6
In terms of design, this one does Huawei MateBook 14 2020 AMD think of, for example, the MateBook 13. The housing is made of aluminum in a gray tone that Huawei calls Space Gray, just like Apple. Build quality is excellent. With a weight of 1.49 kilos, it is no longer a feather-light laptop, because there are enough laptops of the same size that are a lot lighter. But I can’t call it heavy either. In terms of connections, you get one USB-C and twice USB 3.0 (gen 1). The USB-C port supports charging and image output. In addition, the laptop also has an HDMI connection and a 3.5 mm headphone connection. With this, the laptop has enough connections, although I would have preferred to see USB-C twice myself, because USB-C is the only way in which a 4K screen can be properly connected.
Unlike other Huawei laptops MateBook X Pro, the nfc tag for Huawei share is neatly incorporated into the laptop under the touchpad. That is a lot nicer than the ugly sticker that Huawei sticks on some other MateBooks. You can use Huawei share to quickly transfer files from a Huawei smartphone to the laptop.
As you may know, Huawei is involved in a trade war and American companies are not allowed to supply technology to Huawei for smartphones. This does not seem to apply to laptops for the time being. The most important updates are distributed via Windows Update, so that the laptop must also receive support in the event of any tightening.
Powerful hardware
The MateBook 14 2020 AMD contains, in the form of the AMD Ryzen 7 4800H, a particularly powerful processor with no less than 8 cores, 16 threads and a maximum clock speed of 4.2 GHz. It is also a processor with a tdp of no less than 45 watts. In short, a processor that wouldn’t look out of place in a desktop, something that makes the thin housing of the MateBook 14 even more impressive. Huawei combines it with 16 GB of ram and a 512 GB NVME SSD. In any case, in the test sample, this comes from Samsung in the form of the PM981a. You can possibly replace the SSD with another one, replacing the RAM is not possible because it is soldered to the motherboard. As on other laptops, Huawei has divided the SSD into two partitions and the Windows partition with 120 GB is awkwardly small. You can of course change the partitioning yourself.
We see a strange choice in the wireless field, because the MateBook 14 is equipped with a WiFi 5 card from Realtek instead of the WiFi 6 card that most laptops have nowadays. Now you will not be bothered by this in practice, but it is still striking.
Lousy webcam
The MateBook 14 is unfortunately equipped with the strange webcam that Huawei also uses on other laptops such as the MateBook X Pro. Instead of the screen bezel, Huawei has placed the webcam in a false key between the function keys. This makes thinner screen edges possible, according to Huawei. On the other hand, the position of the webcam is unusable. In the most optimal situation you are visible from a very strange angle. However, taking notes during your video call is impossible, your fingers are life-size in the picture. And if you use the laptop on your lap or on a stand, then either your double chin or your sweater is in the picture. Admittedly, the webcam wasn’t really that important in the assessment of a laptop until recently. But in the past year, the webcam has become more important than ever and then you notice too strongly that this solution really is form over function. The collapsible webcam only has an advantage in terms of privacy, as you are certainly not in the picture when folded. Although it is possible to switch on the webcam in the collapsed state with software.
Extra high screen
Huawei typically uses a 3: 2 aspect ratio on their laptops and the MateBook 14 is, thankfully, no exception. Because the screen has a resolution of 2160 x 1440 pixels, you actually have more workspace in height than on the average laptop, which is very pleasant. The screen also has excellent colors and viewing angles. The brightness is fine at 300 nits in itself, but there are plenty of laptops with a brighter screen. Especially because the screen has a mirror finish due to the touch layer, extra brightness quickly comes in handy. The touch is smooth and the hinge is adjusted tight enough to hold the screen in position when touched. The hinge is too stiff to open the laptop with one hand, you really need two hands for that.
Keyboard and touchpad
The keyboard has a pleasant touch and enough travel. The backlight can be set to two levels. It is nice that the on / off switch is placed above the keyboard and is not incorporated in the row of function keys. As a result, the delete key is on the far right of the function key row, which is nice for when you tap blind. The on / off switch has a fingerprint scanner so you can quickly log into Windows. With a size of 12 x 7 centimeters, the glass touchpad is nice and spacious and supports multi-touch gestures. The touchpad works best when you disable tap-to-click and thus actually press the touchpad for a click. Then it is really a very nice copy.
Excellent performance
The AMD Ryzen 7 4800H is a processor with excellent performance and in PCMark 10 this laptop scores an excellent score of 5225 points, making this one of the faster laptops you can buy now. This is confirmed by the Multi Core score of 9531 and Single Core score of 1236 points in Cincebench R23. The SSD is an excellent specimen and achieves read and write speeds of 3570.28 and 2907.46 MB / s.
The Radeon Vega 7 GPU integrated in the processor is relied on for the graphics capabilities. That may sound impressive, but with a score of 1063 in 3DMark Time Spy, it is certainly not a game card. Fluent gaming is only possible at 720p. For an integrated GPU, it is also a nice score.
The battery has a capacity of 56 Wh, which means that the laptop can last for about 8 hours in practice during office work. In the battery test of PCMark even 11 hours and 46 minutes is achieved. You can buy laptops with a much better battery life for the same money, but eight hours is of course perfectly usable and you get excellent performance in return. A disadvantage of the power present in the laptop is that the cooling is clearly audible during heavier tasks. Fortunately, the laptop works silently in light office work.
Conclusion
If you want your laptop to be both nice and compact and powerful, the Huawei MateBook 14 2020 AMD is an excellent option. In terms of dimensions, this laptop can compete with laptops with a more energy-efficient processor while the performance is much better. In addition, the housing is beautiful and the screen excellent. In short, a laptop with which you can also perform heavier tasks perfectly. Only for gaming, this laptop is not very suitable due to the absence of a separate GPU. The main disadvantage is the webcam in the false key, which is of little use to you in practice and that is inconvenient. An extra USB-C port wouldn’t have been wrong either. However, the price / performance ratio makes up for a lot. The MateBook 14 2020 AMD is unfortunately not yet for sale at the time of writing. According to Huawei, it should be available in the first quarter of 2021.
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