Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Ultrabook Review

[Redaktion]

Carbon-based evolution. While Lenovo's ThinkPad X1 Carbon series laptop has always been an impressive piece of hardware, some design decisions have polarized the audience. The X1 Carbon 3rd Gen answers the criticism with solutions which aim to please all parties. We explore the results in excruciating detail in our full review.

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-X1-Carbon-Ultrabook-Review.138033.0.html

[paul4on]

I do not understand why they cannot just use one of those slide-out Ethernet ports instead of a silly adapter. If Lenovo want to copy Apple then they should copy their 16:10 panels with excellent colour reproduction, not Apple's foolish form-over-function obsession.

[kitarek]

I think that 2 factors are very important:

1) this is touch screen so it would be good to check also non-touch IPS display. It should be much better but still not perfect in comparison to Dell.
2) The configuration with NVMe and 512 GB SSD with transfer up to 1.1 GB is sth worth mentioning.

I think that especially 2nd is worth investing if you would like to have good laptop with good keyboard especially for programmers or power-users.

If would like to see test of such configuration here too.
Thanks for review.

[Francesco]

I am waiting for my own X1 to arrive (i7-5600, 512 SSD, non-touch 2560x1440 panel) and I did not resist reading your review. Thanks.

I wonder what changes in battery life when the non-touch IPS panel is considered. Battery life aside, what about brightness and contrast for the non-touch? And what about the difference in weight?

As kitarek points out in her/his comment, the 512GB SSD should boost the i/o speed, in principle by a 3x factor. In turn, this PCIe connected SSD should also allow ultrafast swapping when the RAM is low, thus improving a huge range of other computational/performance features at the same time.

As a personal note, I am going back to Lenovo after a 1.5 years with a Dell XPS 15. Yes, an amazing machine on paper, but full of little problems and - on the top of that - Dell offers one of the worst technical support ever. Btw, before Dell, with my Lenovo laptops neither I nor my colleagues had to call the technical support, never.

[JackWatts]

I'd suggest actually looking at the machine...  It's not an "attempt to copy Apple", it's simply a limitation of the size of the machine. It's too thin to fit a full-size ethernet port or round power plug--hence the adapter and new power plug. Considering how few people actually use ethernet, this doesn't seem like a bad tradeoff. I fail to see what Apple has to do with any of this...

[Captain_Sifff]

Are there displays manufactured by two companies around? Because the review by thinkscopes.com finds 86% sRGB coverage. Or is that within the margin of error?

[DVM]

Maybe I'm missing something, but is there any benefit with the rigid chasis of a Macbook Air vs X1C, that is not so rigid?  I have customers with MBA with the corners bended after a fall, something I think won't happen to a a X1C, because of the construction and the degree of flexibility the X1C chassis has.  But, like I posted before, maybe I'm missing something. 

A parte from that, great review. 

BTW, sorry if there is any typo or gramatical error, since english is not my main language. 

[af]

I do not understand why they cannot just use one of those slide-out Ethernet ports instead of a silly adapter. If Lenovo want to copy Apple then they should copy their 16:10 panels with excellent colour reproduction, not Apple's foolish form-over-function obsession.

wrgs

[Captain_Sifff]

OK, I will answer myself. It seems Lenove has three displays(total for touch and non-touch) available for the X1 according to the FRU list. Mine(Non-touch) was delivered with the LGD LP140QH1-SPB1 which NBC has tested in the 2014 model.

[af]

wrg

[anonymous]

Pros cons still in german :(

[Lein]

Were the X1 Carbons tested with the BIOS version 1.06 or higher?  One of the changes in that revision promised improved graphics performance.  In my own testing, (i7 5600u, 8GB model) I did notice increases in some tests:

3dMark Score Old:
7255
Sm2.0: 2563
SM3.0: 3045
CPU: 3618

X1 Carbon: 1.06 BIOS
3dmark score:
8056
Sm2.0: 2846
Sm3.0: 3384
CPU: 4002

[Lein]

Sorry, forgot to mention, that was for 3dMark06.

For Furmark, running at 1280x720, in three different benchmark runs.

Pre-1.06 Bios:
569
557
532

1.06 Bios:
631
620
632

[PPJr]

IMHO, the absence of FHD option is a show-stopper. There are still lots of apps which won't properly resize with super-high resolution displays. 

[af]

wrg