At Huawei\u2019s Shenzhen HQ, we saw an earlier \u2018cert\u2019 version of the Mate X, one that’s slightly different from the phone spotted in the hands of Huawei CEO Ren Zhengfei in late July. The only changes coming to the final version are a slimmer lock button that runs flush when the phone is placed flat, and refinements in the ‘Falcon hinge’ – but the hinge won’t be carbon fiber, as some have predicted.<\/p>\n

Here’s another plot twist that almost went down: the Mate X engineering team had tried other refinements \u2013 including replacing the steel back with an aluminum one, which would have saved 20g off the final weight.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, when the team tried this a few months ago (testing it out sometime between February and today), the aluminum material wasn\u2019t strong enough. The steel back will remain in the final Mate X after all.<\/p>\n

But the Mate X engineering \u00a0team had a bunch of other ideas, too. One of those is the aforementioned glass back. Another is an ‘sheet’ display – think of it like a roll-out sun shade – that could extend from the bottom of the phone. The tech for that is still years out (even up to a decade) from being feasible, but it shows where the Huawei engineering team is thinking.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But, right now the Mate X front display is covered in plastic, as glass simply doesn’t fold \u2013 yet.<\/p>\n

There are clearly big challenges standing in the way, especially in the assembly process. The engineering team would need to deal with new gluing complications given the additional glass surfaces (and presumably their touchable display properties).\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The foldable Huawei Mate X is unlikely to come out before November, which means a delay from the previously slated September launch, TechRadar learned at a press event at Huawei\u2019s Shenzhen headquarters today. There’s no possibility of a September launch date anymore, which leaves the door open for the Samsung Galaxy Fold to be the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","spay_email":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[50,37,46,49,51],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","yoast_head":"\n