The Huawei MateBook E Go (Wi-Fi) is a Windows on ARM device based on Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx Gen 3 platform at a reasonable price compared to Surface and ThinkPad.

Before you purchase…

Caveats

The native orientation of the display panel is portrait.
The keyboard cover doesn’t outperform 2015 Surface.
- No backlight
- No wired connection - lags
- Doesn’t get disabled when flipped to back
The quality of touch panel and pen driver is questionable.
- The driver package is not DCH-compliant (an extra installer is needed to be properly installed)
- Userspace daemon runs in amd64 emulation
- Ships debug-version runtimes (msvcp140d.dll) and API set stub DLLs (only needed for Windows 7)
- Uses a kernel-mode driver for userspace USB communication
  - Leaks handles on pen contact/leave/attach/detach
- Log spam in C:\ProgramData\Huawei\HuaweiTHP
Wide-gamut display but doesn’t support the new MHC calibration pipeline and auto color management.
- Despite Microsoft saying 8cx Gen 3 is supported.

Firmware keys

F2: Setup

F10: Recovery

F12: Boot menu

Clean OS (re)installation

Preparation

Windows 11 ARM64 installation ISO。
Files from stock OS that are worth keeping:

# drivers and post-install customizations
C:\Recovery\OEM

# stock recovery image
(LABEL=WINPE)\*
(LABEL=Onekey)\*
(LABEL=WINRE)\*

Files from stock OS that are worth restoring after installation:

# Qualcomm color management libraries
C:\Windows\System32\qdcmlib.dll
C:\Windows\System32\qdcmlib_x64.dll

# informational ICC profiles for Huawei PC Manager
C:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\color\native.icc
C:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\color\sRGBICC.icc
C:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\color\displayP3.icc
C:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\color\digest.sha

# rotate display in Windows PE/RE
(LABEL=WINRE)\Recovery\WindowsRE\Winre.wim:\Windows\System32\changeDisplay.exe
(LABEL=WINRE)\Recovery\WindowsRE\Winre.wim:\Windows\System32\winpeshl.ini

Drivers for Windows PE

Inject drivers in C:\Recovery\OEM\Customization\Product\Dirvers2PE\WinPEDriver to boot.wim.
Be aware that USB hot-plugging may not work in Windows PE.
Firmware enumerates an I2C HID touch panel on USB or recovery boot (but not on normal OS boot).
To rotate display orientation in Windows PE, run changeDisplay.exe in command prompt (Shift-F10 in Windows Setup),
Alternatively, you can use Windows RE of stock OS (hold Shift and click reboot, no touch input though).

Drivers for full Windows OS

Inject drivers in C:\Recovery\OEM\Customization\Product\Dirvers2PE\PlatformDriver to install.wim, or the offline image after extracting WIM.

Configure Windows RE

The vanilla winre.wim (located in (install.wim):\System32\Recovery) need the following customizations:

Inject drivers in WinPEDriver
Put changeDisplay.exe and winpeshl.ini to (winre.wim):\Windows\System32.

💡 Remove stock winre.wim from WINRE partition before first boot to the new installation so that the partition can be automatically reused.

Caveats on USB boot

Chained bootloaders (e.g. booting via UEFI shell, GRUB or Rufus UEFI_NTFS) may fail to boot even if secure boot is disabled. It is recommended to split install.wim to swm files and place them in FAT32 filesystem.

Perform installation

When everything are ready, follow generic instructions on installing vanilla Windows.

Extra drivers (that can work without Huawei PC Manager)

Touch panel

Pen

Installer: https://updatessl.dbankcdn.com/download/data/pub_13/HWHOTA_hota_900_9/3d/v3/acgtYjaRT26UUmzJaWrMaw/full/update.zip
Checksums: https://updatessl.dbankcdn.com/download/data/pub_13/HWHOTA_hota_900_9/3d/v3/acgtYjaRT26UUmzJaWrMaw/full/filelist.xml
HuaweiPenApp from Microsoft Store: https://www.microsoft.com/store/productId/9PL42N8RRXJN

Huawei softwares

Huawei PC Manager

Download from https://consumer.huawei.com/cn/support/laptops/matebook-e-go/

Hardware features that need Huawei PC Manager

Driver/firmware updates
Charge limit
Display calibration (3DLUT stored in firmware flash memory)
Use detached keyboard cover

Almost everything runs in amd64 emulation, though.

dantmnf/Huawei MateBook E Go (Wi-Fi).md