Lenovo ThinkPad X100e: Powerful, High-Resolution Netbook with Anemic Battery Life

The Washington Post

 

Is the Lenovo ThinkPad X100e a netbook or an ultraportable? The answer seems to be: a little of both. It's faster than most netbooks, with a larger, higher-resolution screen; a spacious keyboard; and a bigger hard drive than you'll usually find in lilliputian laptops. You pay for those extras, though. It's a little heavier than run-of-the-mill netbooks and has limited battery life. The price is nearly in ultraportable territory, too: The machines start at $499, and the configuration we reviewed costs $599. That's a lot for a netbook.

Here's the first thing that'll strike you about this ThinkPad, though--it's red! (If you find that color shocking, you can also order the standard ThinkPad black.) If you associate red with speedy sports cars, the X100e won't disappoint. With its Athlon Neo MV-40 processor and 2GB of RAM, this ThinkPad scored a 52 on WorldBench 6, a screaming speed for netbooks. I didn't notice any drag in opening and switching between applications, fiddling with Windows controls, or browsing the Web.

Don't expect powerful video performance, though. The X100e turned high-def, full-screen video into something more like a slideshow. And even at 480p, video stuttered and jerked. Lenovo is mostly marketing the X100e to corporate types and must think that they should be working instead of watching YouTube.

And this laptop is indeed useful for getting work done. The 11.6-inch display has a native resolution of 1366 by 768, significantly more than the typical 10.1-inch, 1024-by-600-resolution netbook screen. And the display is relatively easy to read even from an angle. But I found the on-screen colors a little washed out.

The keyboard is full-size, with large Shift and Tab keys. The keys give the kind of solid feedback touch typists need. Lenovo gives you two options for pointing devices--and that's probably one too many. ThinkPad traditionalists can use the company's signature eraserhead pointing stick, which has its own mouse and scroll buttons. That system works well for those who are comfortable with it. But Lenovo also jammed in a touchpad for all the people who aren't accustomed to the eraserhead. And there just isn't enough room for the touchpad--the surface is small, and the buttons are tiny. They're about a quarter-inch deep and right at the edge of the laptop. If you miss the buttons (not hard to do), your thumb slips off the laptop entirely. The trackpad does feature multitouch, but the response is inconsistent--sometimes a two-fingered scroll works just fine, sometimes the trackpad doesn't notice it at all.

The X100e comes nicely equipped, and you can add more features. Our test model had a 320GB hard drive (you can also save some money with a 250GB disk). The laptop comes standard with gigabit ethernet and 802.11n wireless networking. A built-in 3G wireless broadband card is available at an extra cost. Beyond that, the features are pretty standard--two USB ports on the left, one on the right, plus a multicard reader on the right and a VGA port in the back.

For a small machine, the X100e's sound is impressive. Lenovo has nestled the speakers on the underside of the wrist rest, which slopes up off the surface of the table the laptop's resting on. That design seems to let more of the sound escape, giving the laptop decent volume. And for small speakers, the sound was relatively clean and precise, though understandably light on bass.

At 3.3 pounds (3.9 pounds with the power brick), the X100e is a little heavier than other netbooks, but I hardly noticed the extra weight. With the standard batteries the X100e lasted for only 5 hours and 28 minutes. That's anemic for netbooks, but not unexpected given the X100e's more powerful processor.

Our test unit came with Windows 7 Professional, a nice upgrade from the Windows 7 Starter Edition on many netbooks. Don't look for much else in the Programs folder, though. Adobe Reader is the only piece of third-party software. Lenovo has also loaded its proprietary utilities, including a password manager and power management app. I find Lenovo's utilities more useful than the bloatware that comes on many machines, but that doesn't make them exciting.

At 600 bucks, the X100e we tested isn't the kind of disposable computer that many netbooks amount to. For the price, you'll get sprightly performance, a larger display, and a comfortable keyboard. But if you're looking for great video performance or all-day laptop battery life, look elsewhere.

Review: Lenovo Rethinks Design and Price of ThinkPad

The Wall Street Journal / Walter Mossberg

Lenovo is rethinking the ThinkPad.

For years, the iconic laptop brand, originally created by IBM, has been known for solid construction and great keyboards, but with a boxy black design and relatively high prices. It has a business orientation, though it also has been the choice of some tech-savvy consumers willing to pay a little more and forego flashy style touches.

IBM and Lenovo, a Chinese-owned company that bought the brand in 2005, have at times been bold with the ThinkPad's engineering. For instance, in 2008, Lenovo launched a very thin but full-width line, the X300 series, which uses cutting-edge materials and goes head-to-head with Apple's ultrathin line of laptops, MacBook Air.

But Lenovo has been reluctant to tinker much with the ThinkPad's design. It has retained the classic but boring black-box look and preserved the solid, comfortable keyboard.

Now, to broaden the brand's appeal, the company has decided to depart from that template. It has just launched two new ThinkPads at uncharacteristically low prices, with new designs, sizes and colors, and—shudder—a revamped keyboard.



I've been testing the two new models, and, in general, I like them. They are the least expensive ThinkPads ever offered, and the first available in a color choice other than black. Each can be ordered in red as well. Also, one is the first ThinkPad in years that is a mini-notebook, rather than a full-size laptop.

One of these two new models, the X100e, is a small, netbook-like machine with an 11.6-inch screen—starting at $449, though the upgraded configuration I reviewed costs $599. The company refuses to call the X100e a netbook. Its keyboard, screen and resolution are better than what many netbooks offer, but it's also heavier.

The other new line is called the ThinkPad Edge. It's a full-size machine, with a 13.3-inch screen, that is more rounded than traditional discount laptops, and has a silvery band around its edges. It starts at $579, though the step-up configuration I reviewed costs $799.

Both machines retain the solid feel of a ThinkPad. Neither is the lightest computer in its size class, though they're not overly heavy. The little X100e weighs 3.3 pounds and the Edge weighs 3.6 pounds with its base laptop battery, and 3.9 pounds with a larger battery.

And both retain a classic ThinkPad feature—the TrackPoint, a small red nub in the middle of the keyboard that can be used to move the cursor. It is an alternative to the touchpad that each machine also includes.

In my tests, both new ThinkPads proved snappy, though neither has the latest or most potent processors. Both ran Windows 7 fine, and handled well a variety of popular software—Microsoft Office, Firefox, iTunes and Adobe Reader. One caveat: The test units Lenovo sent me had twice the standard memory of base models or typical used computers. And my test Edge had a more powerful processor.

Under my tough battery test, where I turn off power-saving software, keep Wi-Fi on, set the screen at maximum brightness, and play a continuous loop of music, the X100e's battery lasted 3 hours and 44 minutes. In normal use, you could likely get 4½ hours or more.

The Edge had a battery time of 4 hours and 16 minutes, so you could likely get over 5 hours in normal use. But the costlier Edge configuration I tested had a larger laptop computer battery than the base unit, so would likely last only two-thirds as long.

Start-up times on the two were respectable for a Windows PCs: ready to go from cold start in just over a minute. The touchpads on both also feature multitouch gestures, like the ability to use your fingers to resize or rotate photos.

What about the new keyboards? Instead of the closely packed, large, scooped keys that ThinkPad loyalists love, the X100e and Edge have "island-style" keyboards, with distinctly separated, flatter-looking letter and number keys. The Backspace, Shift, Enter and Tab keys are large and prominent. Lenovo eliminated the little-used SysReq, Scroll Lock and Pause keys.

I found the letter and number keys to be comfortable, accurate and fast, with a solid, reliable feel—even on the smaller X100e. Lenovo explains this is because the letter and number key tops aren't really flat, but have the same curve as the tops of classic ThinkPad keys.

But the new keyboard has compromises. On the Edge, the Delete key was too small and insufficiently prominent. On both devices, the Home, End, Page Up and Page Down keys are far apart, and the latter two are tiny and hard to press, especially on the Edge. The Num Lock key and virtual numeric keyboard are gone.

All in all, ThinkPad lovers looking to save money, and other users of discount computers considering a ThinkPad, might find these new models worth a try.