Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 13 Aura Edition laptop review: The X1 Carbon is finally back

[Toortle]

Look at the max power consumption under load: Lunar lake 60W, Ryzen HX 370 94W, Core Ultra 7 155H 167.5W (Thinkpad P1 G7 with IPS screen which supposed to help lower the power consumption).

Conveniently ignoring a larger 16" screen (which consumes more power) and an 80W TGP dGPU?

I am talking with numbers, not about bananas and oranges.

HM.

[Johnnie]

Mate, the Vivobook has a 31% larger battery yet drives a lower resolution screen (1920 x 1200) against this (2880 x 1800).  Also, the Thinkpad is lighter at less than 1kg vs 1.3kg of the Vivobook.  It's a different demography.  From personal experience, the Lenovo Thinkpad lineup is better built, with better quality hardware compared to the Asus Vivobook.  But, don't get me wrong, if your use case and budget fit better with the Asus Vivobook, that's still a solid laptop.

The Thinkpad X1 has 57 Wh battery versus 75 Wh for the vivobook which equals 31% larger battery for the Vivobook.

At the same time Vivobook give you 50% longer battery time under web browsing (16.5 vs 11 hours) and 90% longer battery time under load (165 min vs 86 min) while giving you almost 300% more performance!

Isn't this a better combination of performance and efficiency?

As I said already it also has better single core performance (Vivobook Ryzen 370) than thinkpad with Lunar lake.

Anyway the differences between these processors in single core are in the order of 2-3% which is irrelevant anyway... The 300% in multicore on the other hand is extremely relevant!

For me all the above shows that Ryzen HX 370 is a jack of all trades while Lunar Lake is only for light office work.

[Konstantinos]

Conveniently ignoring a larger 16" screen

And you conveniently forgot to answer my main question:

If Intel H series supposed to compete with the HX 370, show me one laptop with intel H series that is 1.3 Kg, lasts for 16.5 hours and scores CB15 close to 3350...

Intel has no CPU right now that can achieve this combination of performance and efficiency. This is my point.. You can choose not only the H series but any Intel series you like!

[Benjamin Herzig]

How comes there's a Cyberpunk 2077 battery runtime test for the Apple MacBook Pro 14 2024 M4 Pro but not for this review?

Please do one for this review too.

It is not really a standard test for non-gaming Windows laptops, but I have added it for you 👍

[SA_NYC]

Tremendous review, thank you! I'm really looking forward to getting one of these, as I love X1 Carbons. (I am a sucker for the trackpoint, plus the page-up/down keys.) And now with better battery life and the Ctrl and Fn keys finally reversed, life is good!

[dawn]

Thanks a lot for the review, Benjamin. I'm considering the ThinkPad X1 Carbon G13 as a replacement for my current laptop, so I really enjoyed reading it.

However, I'm a quite perplexed by the display measurements. I understood that G13 uses the same display as G12, namely Samsung ATNA40YK20-0. Do you have a theory, as to why the color accuracy was so much worse on the G13 unit? It seems to be a massive difference, especially seeing that calibration didn't help much.

Code Select Expand

sRGB dE2000 avg/max (post calibration)
4,7 / 9,1 (X1CG13)
0,68 / 3,15 (X1CG12)Did you change the protocol or setup somehow? I noticed that you used different calibration devices (X-Rite i1Pro 3 vs. X-Rite i1Pro 2), but it's still strange to see such diverging figures.

[Benjamin Herzig]

It is difficult for me to assess where the difference comes from - sorry, I can't really help you there, as I did not review the X1 Carbon Gen 12 myself.

[Ice]

X1 Carbon Gen. 12 and 13 is great laptop, We have both of them in the company.
the only weak point is Speakers, when we watch an interview or conversation on the camera, they're too weak.for music listening not to mention very bad... just for comparison the Latitude 9440 and 9450 or Elite x360 1040 G11 have top sound, as does the MacBook Pro 14...
I don't know why Lenovo thought this wasn't important. nothing without quad speakers and 6-8 watts
Notebookcheck you have never directly criticized it as a weak point, I think you should
Tnx

[Mehmet]

Thanks for the excellent review. I am a fan of X1 Carbon (I am on my second one). The battery life is very important to me and this unit seems to have really improved in that area compared to the previous three generations. I have one question though. Are the results of the battery test showing the OLED screen running at 120 Hz or at 60 Hz? And how much of a difference would a switch from 120 to 60 or vice versa make?

Thanks again.

[Worgarthe]

Are the results of the battery test showing the OLED screen running at 120 Hz or at 60 Hz? And how much of a difference would a switch from 120 to 60 or vice versa make?

"We ran the X1 Carbon through the Wi-Fi test with dark mode and the faster 120 Hz refresh rate at maximum screen brightness, and it achieved almost the same runtime as when running in the lower-brightness setting with 60 Hz mode and no dark mode. Upwards of 12 hours of runtime could potentially be achievable here, if all the power saving methods (lower brightness, 60 Hz refresh rate, dark mode) are combined."

[indy]

I have a quick question.  Currently, I am using a 14-inch MacBook with an M3 Pro chip and 36GB of RAM. Overall, it is an outstanding device however, in my personal experience, while macOS is good it does not feel as functional as Windows.

...

Should I consider a device with a Snapdragon X Plus/Elite, Lunar Lake 258V or 288V, or Ryzen AI 9 370 chipset?  Or, would it be wiser to retain my MacBook for another year or two until newer AMD Ryzen, Intel, or Snapdragon X chipsets are available?

Your Macbook is going to be better than most Windows in terms of performance, battery life, functionality, and pretty much any other metric.  Windows 11 is a shitshow.  ESPECIALLY if you are coming over from a Macbook and you are anywhere in their ecosystem.  I would go Linux before going Windows, although with your workload that would be challenging.

Stick with what you got.  And I say this as someone who really doesn't like Apple's ecosystem or marketing.  I will readily admit they just plain make better devices for people that are in their ecosystem and don't tinker much.  Nothing you have listed would benefit from a migration to x86 and certainly not Snapdragon with it's compatibility layer issues.

[Thorfinnsson]

Looks quite good.

Needs a brighter display so that it can be used outside in full sunlight.  With any luck one of the IPS displays available in 2025 provides that.  My current Thinkpad P16S (display also rated for 400 nits) is unable to do this.

WWAN option is also required.  Lenovo is historically solid on this, so I expect it to arrive next year.

Last item on my wishlist is a 2-in-1 version, which once again Lenovo is historically strong on.

32 GB RAM max is a big bust, but Intel is to blame here rather than Lenovo.  Let's hope Intel addresses this issue as 32 GB is barely acceptable these days.

[Benjamin Herzig]

Last item on my wishlist is a 2-in-1 version, which once again Lenovo is historically strong on.

Lenovo already announced the 2-in-1 equivalent of the X1 Carbon Gen 13.

Sadly, you lose the benefit of the low weight there, as the X1 2-in-1 uses an heavier aluminum chassis.

[RobertJasiek]

Your Macbook is going to be better than most Windows in terms of performance

Because "most" includes every cheap device. If, however, one compares to Windows devices with Nvidia dGPU and related software usage, Windows / Linux devices have a good chance to wipe Macbooks.

[Thorfinnsson]

Last item on my wishlist is a 2-in-1 version, which once again Lenovo is historically strong on.

Lenovo already announced the 2-in-1 equivalent of the X1 Carbon Gen 13.

Sadly, you lose the benefit of the low weight there, as the X1 2-in-1 uses an heavier aluminum chassis.

Very nice.

Weight does not disturb me, I used to carry a Thinkpad P51.

I switched to ultraportable devices due to battery life.

It could be a negative for some users of course.

I also see from your post that you linked that the displays on this device are expected to be 500 nits.  That might be (barely) sufficient for outdoor use.