Thinkpad X1 Carbon 2012

wow this is a big news to me because last time I asked my friend he assured me that it wont be with IPS... If it's really true this is really great!

 

That's the first time I've seen it publicly in black and white. I don't think they pulled that out of the blue sky so it had to come from Lenovo. It also seems they jumped the gun on publishing it. Lenovo should announce first.

Unless of course Lenovo was supposed to announce the specs this week and failed to tell Dolby the publication date slipped.

Maybe lenovo.com will be updated today or this week.

 

Hopefully they will update the site with these details soon. I'd feel a lot better. I guess they've seen how vocal everyone has been about the importance in display and decided to go that route, if true.

Someone just asked Lenovo's twitter where they can get the X1C and got a response of

"I've been asking the same question around the office! Seriously, can't share official dates but it won't be long now. Regards."

It's obviously August like they've stated officially several times. Let's just hope more details are posted soon.

 

This looks like the holy grail machine we've all been waiting for. Pretty sure I won't be able to afford it.

 

LOL. Love the optimism.

 

New hope! I've been through a battle these past two months. Started with:

Lenovo T430s - returned it , ty display
Asus UX32VD - had broken pixel, returned it, couldn't get a replacement so got a refund
Sony Z3 - returned it, was nice, but keyboard sucked, way too small and flimsy.

I currently have the Macbook Pro Retina, its pretty damn awesome but its way ahead of its time, applications are not ready for it yet. So I will return it.

I hope, pray, believe that the X1 will be the answer! I'm using a Macbook AIR right now and love it, only thing it needs is a better display.

 

Wow, and I thought I was bad.

FYI, The Microsoft Store has the 13.3" Sandy Bridge Samsung Series 9 notebook on sale for $799. Hit Buy Samsung Series 9 900X3B-A02, 13.3 inch notebook PC, Intel Core i5 processor, sleek design, HDMI - Microsoft Store Online and use promo code SUMMERPC2.

Enjoy!

 

I was about to believe I am the only bad guy who keep trying and likes no machine

 

Ok, so after the good news, I have to bring some potentially bad news. I found these listings on insidetech.com/au.



Fortunately, it's in AUS $ and things are priced much higher there. Assuming there's a say..40% increase in cost in AUS for the same product, this will put the X1C variations at about..

US Pricing: $1483 - $1899
AUS Pricing: $2472 - $3166

But this is just my ESTIMATE assuming there's a 40% increase on the AUS version. So I'm guessing the variations will be in the SSDs and RAM.

 

You can't have your cake and eat it too. Carbon materials + IPS + proprietary SSD = expensive. No way around that. You got the T430, T430S and T430U covering the "budget" end of the spectrum. It's pretty obvious where the X1C sits. Lenovo's not going to try to shoot themselves in the foot by offering the X1C at "ultrabook" pricing. Even the name "Carbon" exudes expense! BTW, I still doubt the X1C will have a IPS display since 300:1 contrast ratio seems a little low for the tech (thought it has been talked to death about not having one as well). Lenovo always messes specs up. Time will tell.

Nonetheless, it's good to see Lenovo taking a step in the right direction (sort of actually; still would rather prefer old keyboard and upgrade friendly parts).

 

I hope it does have the IPS. But I am fully aware how expensive those components are. I am willing to spend the premium though as I would like to have a laptop with no compromise. I guess it's comparable to the Vaio Z with its Carbon materials and top of the line specs, though now days the Vaio Z starts at $1600. But you also have to factor in the fact that Sony charges a premium for the name.

 

There is nothing on the Dolby page about contrast ratio, just the 300 nit luminance, so I don't see any reason to doubt the IPS claim. Did I miss something?

I really, really hope the IPS display comes true. It's the deal breaker that will make me finally ditch the old X301.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

 

I will have 100% answer on Monday but my friend who works at Lenovo said that it should not be an IPS as far he was aware of it and no IPS option would be even offered. I personally hope its not true but don't want get overly excited yet

 

I quoted you prior to you editing your post and adding that bit. Like mhult mentioned, you're confusing the luminosity with the contrast ratio. Dolby mentioned it has a 300 nit panel. That does not translate to a 300:1 contrast ratio. In fact, the X230's IPS display also has a 300 nit panel.

On the other hand, according to early testing, the X1C actually has a 400:1 contrast ratio. That's still a bit lower than say the 1037:1 contrast ratio on the X230's IPS display.

Ñóïðåìàòè÷åñêèé óëüòðàáóê: ïðåäâàðèòåëüíûé îáçîð Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon | Íîóòáóêè è ïëàíøåòû - 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest

If in fact Lenovo is now using an IPS display in the X1C, then we can assume the testing was done on an old TN display unit that has been since revised.

In the end, this could just be a mistake on Dolby's part and we will get the above average TN display that we've been expecting the whole time. But an IPS surprise would be amazing.

Looking forward to what you find out Mark.

 

There's another possibility I think we've discussed but I don't remember now. It is possible the X1 Carbon will offer more than one screen option. They already have a 14" 1600x900 screen on the T430, T430S, and possibly the T430U. So it seems reasonable that there would be a Premium option like the 1.25" X220 and X230.

 

True true. I was thinking the same thing. I'm going to assume there will be just one screen but haven't ruled this out.

I heard the IPS screen was a bit of a surprise and came out of nowhere for the X230, or one of the similar Lenovo models. Does anyone remember if this was true?

 

Has there been any word about the battery life? I think I remember reading in the lenovo blog that they cut the size of the battery last minute to get everything to fit. The original X1 only lasts ~3 hours... just wondering how much this battery life is going to suffer.

As for quality... Lenovo/IBM last me at least 4 years, and this will be my next. From the t40p (1400x1050) -> X61 Tablet (1400x1050)... it's about time they give us a powerhorse built for work and in a small form factor.

As for the keyboard, I'm just a big a fanactic as most Thinkpad keyboardists... losing the single row and moving pgup/pgdown to the arrow keys area will take 10 minutes to get use to and I'm looking for to it.

 

Lenovo has had IPS screens off and on. They were branded "Flexview". The most recent is the premium 1366x768 12.5" screen on the X220 and X230. Before that it was the T60p.

So it's entirely possible there will be a base X1 Carbon model for the penny pinching corporate programs that has the same screen as the T430 and T430S. They could offer an IPS upgrade. That would be fine with me. I'm a screen snob.

When my machines arrive next week, I'll have notebooks with the 15.6" FHD, 15.4" Retina, and 13.3" PLS. I would love to add a 14" Flexview.

 

They're marketing it as an ultrabook. According to Intel's requirements, we should see a minimum of 5 hours. That's likely a possibility due to the ULVs.

 

Sorry about the confusion guys. I meant to type "400:1" and instead hit the "3" by mistake. I never actually looked at the Dolby webpage... My statement still stands as noted by urbanglowcam. The only rumor of IPS came from the Dolby webpage, so there's a small glimmer of hope. Not very likely though.

 

I e-mailed Dolby, trying to finesse a little more info (and specs!) on the X1 Carbon. They politely referred me back to Lenovo. Drat! :-(

 

You're under a month ... not much longer to wait.

 

Waits for the inevitable question, "Will it play Diablo III? What about Skyrim?"

 

I just REALLY hope it will not disappoint, since I desperately need a new notebook. The ZenBook Prime is looking pretty good lately (especially at that price), so I'm hoping the X1 Carbon will be worth the wait.

 

Pretty much what I think too. I buy a new Thinkpad every year for the past 5 years and their screens are killing me.
The only reason why I am even considering another brand is the screen, I'm so tired of mac fanboys showing off their MBA at meetings these days...

 

Hi Guys i got email back from my friend late friday but didn't see this until now cuz am out in santa cruz, he sais that the it is TN panel made by LG. He said that Dolby specs are likely wrong and wasn't aware that x1 would be offered optional IPS panel not at least for launch. He could be wrong since he works in marketing but at least at this time I wouldn't get hopes too high. Sorry guys :-(

 

Why can't the X1 Carbon have a better resolution screen :-( that is just slightly better than my x201 tablet screen... Also I hope that X1 Carbon lacks the creakyness of the plastic parts in my previous modern lenovo laptops... (i.e. I hope the carbon chassis is rigid). Both my T400 and X201t squeak at the palm rest, also the X201 screen lock squeaks and the overall feel is quite plasticky.

I would be happy if its resolution was on par with the Nexus 7, but even 1920x1200 would be great on a 14" screen. It doesn't even matter if the gamut is not very wide. You don't have to be an graphic artist to enjoy decent resolution. I work with typography and reading text on the X201t screen is quite appalling. You can quite clearly see the subpixel antialiasing artifacts and generally webpage text is blurry. I am not a mac fan but in this case i envy the macbooks. Their gamut is almost as wide as AdobeRGB and the resolution is high enough for very smooth font rendering.

Still, I'm considering getting the X1 Carbon if the price is not ridiculous. Do you have any hints on where to get thinkpads with decent discounts in EU?

 

Informative thread, thanks gentlemen. Having just spent the past three days reading the original X1 thread, the T430u one and this one, comes down to whether or not the T430u will have HD+. If it does, I'm going with it as I need the HD and memory space both. If not, then I'm going with the X1C.

Either one will be a vast improvement over lugging around my W520 and its slice.

Priorities:

1. Weight (anything 4# or under is good).
2. Memory (want 16GB, but will live with 8GB).
3. HDD (SSD is nice, but 7200 RPM on a 7mm will do for 500GB; 1TB will be very nice for the road).
4. Screen resolution (FHD would have been the ideal, but nobody does that with anything more than 4GB RAM, deal-breaker).
5. Screen size (in a perfect world [mine anyway], 4# or under, 15" 1920x1080 with IPS would have been oresome, but no one does it but Vizio with the "Thin + Light" and see item #4 above).

So, again, it comes down to the resolution on the T430u. <fingers crossed>

Cheers, B

 

The T430U final specs have been released?

 

I second that. I too envy MacBook users especially about the display and chassis design (which make it very unique and could be done EASILY in the PC market). However, I am not sure why the PC industry is insisting on their 'stupidity' in having the same cheap, non-creative, and lazy minds who continue to provide us with what I would call 'DOA' machines year after year and we just have to work hard to see which compromise should we do and what defects can we live with till the next year to find that nothing has changed!!

 

Thors.Hammer,

Not that I'm aware of, but everything I've read and seen here on NBR and elsewhere says HD 1366x768, but this news on the X1C gives me potential hope they got that HD+ message on that unit as well.

 

I am searching for about 10 years for a perfect windows notebook with no compromises and I am willing to pay a lot of money for it! But because it seems be be impossible for the ignorant PC industry to build such a notebook, I already bought two MacBooks pro (15 and 17), but they are only perfect if you don't have to work with windows.

I am praying for weeks that the X1C will be an real alternative for the MacBooks. If the statements in the Russian test belonging to the display are correct ( Ñóïðåìàòè÷åñêèé óëüòðàáóê: ïðåäâàðèòåëüíûé îáçîð Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon | Íîóòáóêè è ïëàíøåòû - 3DNews - Daily Digital Digest) perhaps my wishes will become reality. For me it does no matter if the panel is a TN type if it's as good as it was described (even if I would prefer an IPS panel too).

 

You and I both. Five years ago I was writing the editors on CNET asking/looking for "A laptop with a 15-inch UXGA LCD, 2GB RAM, 100GB hard drive (or higher) and under 5#." Now my dream machine is less than 4#, 15", FHD, 16GB RAM, 1TB HDD, but I'll settle for HD+.

Cheers, B

 

This is my dream machine and I am very shure that there are a lot of people who are looking for a notebook like this:

- weight less than 4#
- thickness less than 1"
- 15", FHD or HD+, IPS, 300+ nit, nonglare(!!!)
- 16:10 ratio (or are all notebooks today only be used for watching videos!?)
- 8+ GB RAM
- 256+ SSD (or HDD with 16 GB SSD if more space is needed)
- battery life 6+ hours
- DisplayPort
- quiet (at normal work)
- calm (at normal work)
- high build quality

Such a notebook can't be cheap, therefore the price level of the MacBooks would be accepted.

There are some notebooks which fulfills one or more of the listed criterias, but until today I didn't found one, which fulfills all!

 

There is one. My second one arrives Tuesday.

 

I think we should recognize until the final specs and options are released, that speculation is fine. When someone starts sounding like they have a definitive answer, I am going to ask for the source of the information so it can be confirmed.

Lenovo has historically offered more than resolution and LCD panel on many of their models. I can certainly see the T430U being offered with a 1366x768 screen, as well as an option for 1600x900. Lenovo already has 14" screens like this.

The biggest looming question is will they break from the pack and offer a high quality 14" IPS screen. That remains to be seen.

 

Some of the ultrabook and portable notebook designs that have come out recently are far from DOA. The Apple look is distinctive, and I can assure you that if a company tried to out and out copy it (some may say the IdeaPads are going for this look) there would be just as many folks lamenting the ripoff job going on.

In regards to the Carbon, I can not believe there is still no word yet on specs and pricing. Lenovo is being incredibly savvy here. This will be a graduation present for myself anyway, so it'll be fitting if it doesn't release until the start of grad classes.

 

X1 Carbon should be available August 15.

14" HD+, Camera, Bluetooth, Fingerprint Reader, 4 Cell Battery, Win 7 Pro 64, 3 Yr Depot

34442HU (Core i5 3317U, 4GB, 128 SDD)
34442GU (Core i5 3427U, 4GB, 128 SDD)
34442DU (Core i5 3427U, 4GB, 256 SDD)
344425U (Core i7 3667U, 4GB, 256 SDD)

 

Very well.

First, here's the video with Russell Compton from the Think Product Group Marketing at CES where he himself says up to a 1TB HDD and that the LCD will have a matte finish - Lenovo ThinkPad T430u: Hands On - YouTube

Next, the unit on a Vietnamese web site - Thông tin chi ti, and commented on here - Lenovo ThinkPad T430u Listed with Non-Ultrabook Intel i5-3320M CPU.

Lastly, the T430u thread here on NBR where, I daresay, there has been less speculation on the unit's specifications than those offered here in this thread on the XC1 - http://forum.notebookreview.com/lenovo-ibm/636585-thinkpad-ultrabook-t430u.html

I don't believe the unit will have an IPS screen, but I'll speculate and hope both, per my original post, that it has HD+ resolution.

Oh, and having owned two A31P's, a T42P, an X300, a T61P, a W500, W510, a W520 and now an X1 myself in the last twelve years alone I think I'll continue to opine on Lenovo's history, what they have and haven't done over the years, myself as well.

 

Great! And may I ask which notebook you will get at tuesday?

 

I found the source, googling the part numbers: http://www.partnerinfo.lenovo.com/p...Lenovo_TopSeller_Quick_Reference_Guide_US.pdf

4GB of ram is very bad news for me :/

 

I have another Retina MacBook Pro arriving Tuesday. I sold the first one to a friend that is off traveling right now. I can personally confirm each of your criteria below. The one exception is probably the brightness. I am not sure on that. I don't think it's as bright as 300 nits. Seemed more like 250.

- weight less than 4.46 pounds
- thickness less than 1"
- 15", FHD or HD+, IPS, 300+ nits, nonglare(!!!)
- 16:10 ratio (or are all notebooks today only be used for watching videos!?)
- 8+ GB RAM
- 256+ SSD (or HDD with 16 GB SSD if more space is needed)
- battery life 6+ hours
- DisplayPort
- quiet (at normal work)
- calm (at normal work)
- high build quality

 

I guess I have to make a clarification here. When I was taking about PCs, I meant the Windows PC industry. I definitely did not mean Apple. I was actually being envious of Apple and wish I could have been able to use Apple OS and Apps on OS X and be as productive as I am on Windows.

My guess is that Lenovo will continue to follow the stupid minds of its designers and marketers like other companies (such as HP and Dell) and will just provide as with X1C with 14" HD+ and at most dual-core processors (though I doubt it and probably will be ULVs). Look at the newly released or the coming 'DOA' EliteBooks that have the lowest resolution. They did everything else right then messed that up as just one reason for you NOT to buy it. I am starting to feel that those people DON'T want to sell!!!

 

I'm still going to remain optimistic until 8/15.

If they don't have a 8GB config, I am done buying Lenovo hardware of any type.

 

Thanks a lot!

Of course I know the new MacBook Retina and at this moment I am working with a 15" MacBook Pro from 2011. But I have one big problem: As a windows programmer I cannot work with OS X. But if you have to work with windows at a MacBook, optimus is disabled and therefore the MacBook gets hot, noisy and battery life is less than 3 hours.

In addition you surveyed one of my most important criterion: The MacBook Retina don't have a nonglare screen! The Apple marketing tells something about 75% reduction of reflections but outdoors the MacBook Retina is like a mirror (and I love to work outdoors!).

 

I just noted that T430s is also listed with 4GB of ram in that pdf, and we all know by now that that is indeed false. I guess those listings are for the base models, before picking upgrades.

 

Oops, I missed that one. Yea, it's still pretty glossy but I am indoors with my computers most of the time.

As for programming, have you ever tried your dev tools inside a Fusion or Parallels VM with one of these machines? With 16GB of RAM like the config I have coming, and fast Samsung flash storage, the only place I can think of that might be a hindrance would be graphics programming. VMWare has done a remarkable job with the 3D capabilities in the VM. I run full Aero and all. The upside to the VM is that OS X is still keeping the heat down, Optimus is used, battery life is good, etc.

 

Thanks for the pdf and data(@andrubuntu). That's the first solid release date info.

Strange thing is, that in the pdf on page 7, it says that the old X1 will transition to the new X1C on August 1(!!!) but in the lines above and underneath it says that the new X1C will be released Aug 15.

Well we will see, Aug 15 doesn't sound too bad.

Crossing fingers for a fab display

 

The August 15 date is great to hear. The talks of no IPS screen isn't...but if true, I hope it at least has a great TN screen.

The 4GB listing worries me a bit unless it can be upgraded easily. Hope we see some reviews soon. They're really keeping this thing locked up!

 

The viewing angles in the pictures and video I've seen of the X1C are very good. Even if it's TN I imagine it'll be pretty good. LG TN with good viewing angles, maybe it's a relative of the current Macbook Air screen. I imagine LG can sell those to other customers if Apple stops using them.