Lenovo, screw of the worshiped ThinkPad brand, was a of the initial Windows laptop makers to right away take on Apple's MacBook Air , with its 13-inch ThinkPad X1 . This was before Intel had started publicly branding gaunt laptops with its copyright ultrabook tag, and the manners for this new category of gaunt laptops were still in flux. We called that original X1 "an attractive center belligerent for business thoroughfare warriors," but moreover said, "It's not as smooth or as light as a MacBook Air -- not by a long shot."
Lenovo's ultrathin ThinkPad is reborn as a 14-inch ultrabook, the X1 Carbon. When you initial speckled the X1 Carbon at a Lenovo press eventuality progressing in 2012, I considered it might not skip sufficient from the original. The name was scarcely the same (not even called the "X2"), and it looked a bit thinner, but not all that ample developed from final year's X1.
Getting an chance to assessment and examination the final chronicle of the ThinkPad X1 Carbon creates a large difference. Lenovo formerly settled that it would be the world's lightest 14-inch laptop at 3 pounds, and in the hand, you can unquestionably feel it. This is evidently a reward product, interjection to the light weight and the carbon essential element lid.
The components are standard, with a third-gen Intel Core i5 CPU, integrated Intel HD 4000 graphics, and a 128GB solid-state expostulate (SSD). That's a sincerely typical loadout, and existing in a few really affordable laptops. But no a would explain the X1 Carbon as affordable. It starts at $1,399, and the examination setup is $1,499 (with a mobile broadband modem). More costly builds, with faster processors and a 256GB SSD, cost up to $1,849.
Of course, you obtain a lot of additional features that might help clear the aloft price: Lenovo's industry-leading keyboard, a revamped potion hold desk pad that functions improved than any Windows hold desk pad I've tried, a apartment of Lenovo-branded safety and encouragement apps, and IT-department-friendly features similar to Intel's vPro technology. On the down side, battery life, an area Lenovo routinely does really good in, was merely adequate, at a only over 5 hours.
Even even though this is still a business-targeted ThinkPad, it's moreover a of the many gratifying ultrabook laptops I've used this year. It's expensive, primarily compared to ample of the ultrabook competition, and has a handful of quirks, but if you're peaceful to make a sizable investment, it's the ultrathin 14-inch ultrabook to beat.
Design and features
While the pattern is familiar, the X1 Carbon is ample thinner than the original X1, and the front tapers to a crook edge. The tip casing is done of carbon fiber, typically found in only the many costly laptops, as is the system's inner hurl cage, a unbending latticework that protects the laptop but adds minimal additional weight.
The matte-black look is concept sufficient that I skepticism it'll ever look indeed dated, but there's moreover not ample forward-thinking about the aesthetics, either, deliberation Personal Computer makers (plus Apple) have been churning out ultrathin systems for a few time. It's the weight that really sells the design. On the table, it looks similar to a standard, really gaunt 14-inch laptop, but collect it up, and it feels surprisingly light. Despite having a bigger shade and bigger footprint, it weighs only about the same as a 13-inch MacBook Air .
The set of keys retains the mutated island-style keys used in the initial X1, a look that comes from Lenovo's consumer line and that is bit by bit creation its way in to ThinkPad models as well. It's moreover backlit, that is a underline every travel-oriented laptop should have. As with other island-style Lenovo keyboards, the particular keys have a somewhat convex curvature at the bottom. I've found that bit of additional aspect area creates typing easier, and mistakes reduction frequent. Lenovo refers to the figure combined by the keys and the space between them as the "forgiveness zone."
Many gaunt laptops have shallow, clacky keys that are improved than typing on something similar to the iPad's practical keyboard, but frequently not by much. Even on this slim chassis, the keys have glorious height and solid, pleasing feedback. It's unquestionably the most appropriate ultrathin laptop set of keys I've used.
The hold desk pad is a bit of a leaving from the usual Lenovo style. Instead of a hold desk pad with well-defined left and right rodent buttons below, it's a one-piece click desk pad with a potion surface, similar to what you'd obtain on a MacBook or Dell XPS. Lest you regard we're going as well far off the battered track, there is still a second set of rodent buttons on top of it, and a normal Lenovo ThinkPad trackpoint nestled between the G, H, and B keys.
The sharp potion aspect is a acquire change from the normal slow feel of so many Windows hold pads, and the on the whole feel of navigation and multitouch gestures is ample more manageable than the norm. Many hold pads have a matte finish, with varying degrees of finger drag, but the potion aspect here is surprisingly sharp and friction-free.
A well-defined touch-pad settings menu, called UltraNav, allows you to tweak the actions slightly, inclusive adding a trackball-like movement underline (which only done mousing really imprecise), and installation a dilemma as a tap-to-right-click region (as against to having to pull down on the descend right corner). I didn't see the touch-pad choice I longed for most, that was to use a two-finger daub wherever on the desk pad as a right click (as found in OS X), but you can set a two-finger click to do that.
The manifestation is excellent, with a matte complete on the 14-inch, 1,600x900-pixel-resolution screen. I've seen more high-end laptops newly increase a full HD 1,920x1,080 screen. On a 15-inch system, it works, but on a 13-inch it's as well much, creation content and icons as well small. On a 14-inch, you could go possibly way, but I'd lean toward 1,600x900, as seen here, as the honeyed spot. The shade is splendid and colorful, notwithstanding the insufficient of a shiny coating. My colleagues and I roughly zodiacally prefer matte screens, and are generally unhappy to only find them in business-targeted laptops.
You might never use this feature, but it's engaging to note that the shade folds scarcely 180 degrees back, fibbing roughly flat. There have not been many times I've wished my laptop would open wider, but I suspect there have been a handful.
The Lenovo X1 Carbon's speakers obtain surprisingly loud, and a Dolby Home Theater v4 program package lets you tweak the EQ and other sound settings a bit. But it's still not going to spin this in to the sound network for your next residence party. Besides, people do not purchase ThinkPads for their great speakers -- but they do purchase them is to microphone and Webcam, as used in videoconferencing. Using the useful built-in videoconferencing app, you can set the mic's pickup pattern, spin on face tracking on the camera, and even send an picture of your desktop as your sociable video feed.
Connections and configurations
This is a business laptop, at least on paper, so a few consumer-friendly features, such as the HDMI port, obtain jettisoned. Somewhat surprisingly, Ethernet gets downgraded to a USB dongle as well. While scarcely every other stream laptop offers two USB 3.0 ports, the X1 has a USB 3.0 and a USB 2.0. A useful "airplane mode" switch on the left edge turns off all the system's radios if needed.
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