Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Review: Exotic Case, Ho-Hum Screen - hartleykinet1940

At a Glance

Expert's Rating

Pros

• Good keyboard and choice of pointing options
• Integrated 3G cellular broadband

Cons

• Limited port selection
• LCD panel seems obtuse and a little washed exterior

Our Verdict

Lenovo's X1 Carbon offers an understated look and exotic chassis material, but the LCD panel display quality could follow improved.

Lenovo is with reason proud of its ThinkPad X1 Carbon ultraportable laptop. The machine is incredibly thin—just 0.7 inch at its thickest stage—and the chassis is built with carbon fiber, resulting in an Ultrabook that ships with a 1600-by-900-pixel LCD display and weights slightly fewer 3 pounds.

In Search of Slim

In its zealous following of ultrathinness, nonetheless, Lenovo did make a few compromises. Like the Asus Zenbook Prime UX31A and the Vizio C14-A2, the X1 Carbon has no assembled-in ethernet port, though Lenovo does admit a USB-to-ethernet dongle. The X1 Carbon's LCD panel flexes enough to make me a little nervous, though a little deform North Korean won't hurt the display—and in fact may meliorate the laptop's resilience when born.

Port Minimus

There are other, unknown shortcomings. For example, Lenovo supplies a USB 3.0 connector on the right side of the X1 Carbon, but a USB 2.0 port—alternatively of another USB 3.0 port—connected the left. Leastways the USB 2.0 port delivers adequate current to charge a smartphone Beaver State other mobile twist. The only video output is a mini-DisplayPort connector, and the lone audio seafarer is a combination input/output jack.

The Lenovo lacks a dedicated wired ethernet port, instead offering integrated 3G (not 4G) cellular broadband. Accordant to Lenovo, the chipsets needed for PC 4G support would get condemned up too much system board space and consumed besides much power. You can use the integrated 3G As a mobile hotspot, if you need that capability.

Performance

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon test model we tested includes an Intel Meat i7-3667U CPU, with a default clock absolute frequency of 2.0GHz and a maximum Turbo frequency of 3.2GHz. Like most Ultrabooks, this indefinite uses Intel's HD 4000 coordinated GPU and ships with 4GB of DDR3-1333 memory. A 256GB SanDisk cubic-state drive handles warehousing chores.

In our public presentation testing overall, the X1 Carbon basically tied with Vizio's C14-A2, despite having a quicker C.P.U. than the Vizio's Core i7 3517u. The Vizio outpaced the X1 Carbon in PCWorld's WorldBench 7 bench mark screen suite, earning a mark of 158 A against the ThinkPad's score of 144.

Along the power incline, the X1 Carbon uses Lenovo's RapidCharge scheme, which allows the system to billing to 80 percent in just over 35 minutes. The system's measured stamp battery life was a solid 6 hours, 11 proceedings, almost an hour longer than the Vizio C14-A2's 5 hours, 17 proceedings.

Non surprisingly, in view of the laptop's Intel HD 4000 GPU, the X1 Carbon's game performance was fairly weak. Even with detail settings at low, the Lenovo struggled to an unplayable 11.4 frames per second in Crysis 2, although its frame rate on the Dirt3 test was a Thomas More playable 36 fps.

Overall, Lenovo seems to have emphasized battery life over raw performance, a perfectly sensible preference in designing an ultramobile PC.

Display and Audio

As usual with ultraportable laptops, audio frequency timbre in the ThinkPad X1 Carbon is limited. Lenovo did admit Dolby Family Theater V4, which enhances the audio slightly. Overall audio frequency in music was neutral, only I could get a line noticeable distortion in the speakers when volume levels were cranked too high. Though the X1 Atomic number 6 bathroom't pump proscribed sound at selfsame loud volume, its speakers were definitely healthful sufficient for almost-field use during travel.

The laptop's 14-in LCD panel offers an excellent resolution of 1600 by 900 pixels. Text looked crisp, merely colours attended be muted and light levels were on the low side. But then, the flatness-finish screen picked up almost no glare from background lighting, which your eyes will surely appreciate.

Video playback quality tended to be somewhat disappointing, due in part to the comparatively unsaturated colors and in part to the screen's limited viewing angles. Straight happening, both high-definition and criterial-definition content looked smooth, with soft telescopic jerkiness or frame stuttering.

Usability

Lenovo includes both a TrackPoint stick-based pointing device and a broad glass multitouch-enabled touchpad. The last mentioned was a bitty too sensitive unsuccessful of the box, but it does possess good palm rejection, making for generally good cursor control condition.

The keyboard layout is good. The keys themselves are slimly indented and offering redeeming tactile feedback, though keystroke travel is short. Lenovo also includes discrete page down and page sprouted keys, a receive addition to the habitual Fn-primal options.

Bottom Line

Lenovo assign some serious persuasion into mobile usability with the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, including pitted band and the RapidCharge lineament. The slightly flexible carbon-fiber chassis is an interesting departure from the rigidity of machined metal cases. Though Lnovo's failure to offer threefold USB 3.0 ports and HDMI output is a trifle dissatisfactory, the port selection isn't radically different from what similar superthin Ultrabooks supply. If you're a grievous traveler, the X1 Carbon merits closer inspection.

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/460806/lenovo_thinkpad_x1_carbon_review_exotic_case_ho_hum_screen.html

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