x120e Owner's Thread

I think its a minor thing - really all you're dealing with is mapping for that one button. turning things off and on can be done with command line and/or soft switches in context menus.
to make it best though means remapping that one button. I would post it in the lenovo community forum - routinely, lenovo service people check in there and try to sort out the issues - its very good.
X Series ThinkPad Laptops - Lenovo Community

you didn't say what state that leaves your wifi connection in. you can manipulate that in control panel function for network connections, select "adapter settings", then right click on your wifi adapter

 

Its currentl status is not connected . didn't understood by manipulate ? any guide

 

open your control panel, or if you can find it [search] "network connections".
open that, then on the Left column look for "adapter settings" and hit that.
right click on the one that is your WIFI adapter, and "Enable". it should auto connect then to your local AP/wifi-router assuming the credentials have yet been stored.

I'm assuming that you're sure you have the driver loaded... no yellow marks in Device Manager.

 

finally found it . Should have checked first there . my wifi was off from bios Sorry Guys for disturbing

 

I wanted to share an experience I just had with my X120e, in case anyone else runs into it. I closed the laptop, expecting it to go into sleep mode. Instead, it remained awake and the fan started to run full out. I had TPFanControl running, so I stopped it and the fan went back to BIOS control and slowed down. But now, I couldn't go into sleep mode via Fn-F4 or by shutting the lid. Also, the Fn keys failed to work for adjusting screen brightness or blanking the screen (Fn-End).

I had a full image back-up of the hard drive from a few weeks ago and restored it. This didn't fix the problem, which told me it was probably a firmware or hardware problem. I found that I was was running BIOS 1.16 but that there was a version 1.17. I upgraded to this BIOS and it fixed the problem.

I doubt that upgrading from 1.16 to 1.17 fixed the problem. I'm guessing that the BIOS became corrupted and the process of re-flashing the BIOS fixed this. Thank goodness, because I really like this little laptop and don't want to try to find a replacement.

 

Agree with you.

Guys my fan is making noise and even laptop remain bit more hot at base

 

It would help to know which processor?
there are plenty of threads detailing how to remove heatsink, remove old thermal paste, apply new correctly, replace. some have had really great results from this, others only a little. I think the difference is just how fortunate the unit was in assembly. Mine has never had an overheating issue and as far as I know it is stock [bought off Ebay]. I have punished it as I do tech work and this is my daily driver.

I would replace this little guy but, as said here before, I've yet to see anything come out that can beat this in every category, without giving anything up. I do other tasks with Android and other windows devices, and a couple of ipads, so it only gets the hard things...
There are faster notebooks for sure. there are better displays. I don't think there is a better keyboard but open to suggestions... but none I have seen do it all quite as handily as this one.
I have no troubles connecting devices; the bios works perfectly; HDMI/HDCP is the best implemented of any notebook I have seen/worked-on/used; the battery life is no worse than every other windows pig on the market.....

 

Actually heating is not much issue mine is about to complete 2years.

Problem is that when that fan start making noise my whole laptop start getting slow even freeze in between. As soon as sound stop it start working normal. Even checked my hdd no bad sector found

 

I assume you are checking the temps with a good 3rd party utility. So if you rule out the fan itself going out due to bearing wear, the most likely issue is software. A program or plugin that is sending the cpu to 100%. Have you checked the Windows Event logs? look for "Error" in the logs starting with the "System" log [Errors have red circle X].
If it were me, I would keep Task Manager open from bootup and when the problem arises find out what processes are at the top of the CPU tree/list.

I recently saw two different cases, back to back, 2 different systems, where Windows Update itself was causing that sort of issue. The process that sent the CPU soaring was actually an instance of svchost.exe which is a normal necessary windows process, but windows update was the issue... however those were systems running xpp. they had registry issues.

find the process that sends cpu to 100% or near.

 

anyone have experience with samsung 840evo ? just ordered from amazon. can't wait to put it on my x120e. also ordered intel 6225 wireless. i feel the realtek chipset abit weak.

is it advisable to do clone from existing ? or just a fresh installed.

 

funny - I was looking at the same drive and the same thing myself! I have a Crucial 60GB ssd now but wanted to pickup on the deal, and move this one to my desktop based HTPC

NO you don't want to clone.
fresh install.
There is a good guide to setting up fresh SSD here: Sean's Windows 7 Install & Optimization Guide for SSDs & HDDs
I would imagine samsung also has a guide somewhere on their stash... what the guy 'sean' says at the outset is quite true - in the early SSD days there were ways to non-optimize if one just did an install with no prep or tuning but all things are better at the current time. the drive firmware is working for you and Seven/8 are well coded to deal with SSD

Here are a few sensible tweaks after the OS is in and all drivers loaded.
Settings after the OS transfer

Disk Defragmentation makes no sense on an SSD. For a laptop, go into Services, navigate to Disk Defragmenter, right click on it and go to Properties. Here you set the service to Disabled.
For a desktop, you may want to disable defrag in the Disk Defragmenter and only for the SSD so that the remaining HDDs can still be defragmented.

Note: As long as Defrag Service is turned off, you cannot shrink any partition. The partition shrink process requires the Defrag service. If you need to shrink a partition later, turn the Defragmentation Service temporarily on.

Hibernation File – most of us do not use Hibernation, but Sleep instead. But, the hiberfile takes precious space on your SSD – to the same tune as the size as your RAM. To get rid of it, run the following command in elevated Command Prompt: powercfg –h off. If you ever want it back, it is powercfg – h on.

Superfetch – many “experts” suggest to turn Superfetch off. I think that is not appropriate. Fetching a program or data from RAM is still a lot faster than fetching it from a disk – even from an SSD.

There are no other settings that are necessary. On the SSD forums you will find a lot of tweaks. I recommend you stay away from them.

Also - from benefit of personal [bad] experience: Install all the .NET's upfront! .NET is great for programmers but can get nasty on older installs that have a lot of other patches etc. Just keep going back to Windows Update for a few days and get them all through .NET 4.51 ...

this is probably too obvious but not knowing your level of expertise: just move the documents/folders from UNDER your "Documents" Folder in Windows explorer: don't copy "Documents" in whole [or other 'system' folders that Windows 7 sets up]. Folders that you created after first install are fine.
Also ENABLE the hidden Administrator [root] User profile within the first couple of days, set a password for it, and make sure it is all setup and working correctly: login to it after a couple of reboots and make sure it comes up the way you set it. after that, you can disable the account again [and you should do so for security reasons]

 

received my samsung 840 evo. fresh installed win7 x64. really rock solid. but the wireless card causing alot of issue now. wireless is working fine. however everytime resuming from sleep always causing a lockup on the windows. the only way to fix it is force reboot. anyone having the same experience with SSD and Intel 6200.

 

technically that makes no sense to me. I would try, just for info, change something in Power Profile related to the NIC [wifi]. if its set to stay awake, change it [and/or vice versa]. see what the results are.

the Intel 6200 is something you put in?

 

Folks, the battery is being recalled.

http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/detail.page?DocID=HF004122&rd=1

 

Only some batteries. The program (which apparently checks the battery's serial number) says mine is good. Which is a relief, really, since I run on the battery most of the time!

 

My x120e has been apart a few times to replace screen case and fan,but just recently the screen will go blank if I slightly move it towards the keyboard. If I move it back away from the keyboard it stays on. The fan stays on and the laptop seems on,but no video. If I close the screen totally it goes to sleep, then when I open it the screen comes back on. Any insight? Thanks

 

seems too obvious - either the harness connection is loose or the harness is shorting - like pinched or something.

 

I haven't taken it apart yet,but it seems more like something to do with the circuit or device that turns of the video/display as you are closing the laptop. It now seems to happen much earlier than it should. I can stress the display by pushing against the sides or front and move it away from the keyboard to any degree and it will stay on. As soon as I move the screen past around 90 degrees forward towards the keyboard it shuts off. It won't turn on by moving it the other way either. I have to close and then re-open it to bring it back to life.

 

Interesting. What does the X120 use to switch the screen on/off? And what do your power settings look like?

Change the settings so that closing the lid turns off the computer. Does the machine shut down when the screen goes blank (not just when the lid is closed)? If so, it could well be a problem with whatever switching mechanism the X120 uses. I've seen simple mechanical switches, activated by a bump on the bottom of the screen, but that doesn't seem to be the mechanism Lenovo used.

Does anyone here know how the machine senses when the lid is closed?

 

Looked back several months in this thread and saw no mention of the x120e BIOS v1.17, released Dec 03 2012. This BIOS release never showed up in my Lenovo System Updates.. so I'm still using v1.16.

I wonder why System Update never listed it? Should I stick w/ v1.16? The only change listed is: (New) Updated CompuTrace ROM.

Thxs, tom

 

anyone upgrading their wifi card into broadcom dual band ?? have no luck with the intel one. thinking of trying broadcom now.

 

I see a good many notebooks, ios devices, 'droids, desktops - the stock/original wifi in the x120e is pretty stout. never seen any weakness with it. if you had issues with the original, and the much loved intel part, I think you're done. issues are somewhere other.

 

ah damn. my stock is still realtek 1x1 bgn. its not too bad actually. however i just upgraded my router to AC router. duh. and all of my devices is sort of ac ready other than my lovely x120e. intel ac7260 i think might be overkill for the E350 itself.

 

Guys, noticed that the rubber feet at the front/bottom of my x120e came off...is there a place where I can order a set?

 

I just upgraded with a used Broadcom card that I bought on eBay. It's wonderful, compared to the old 1x1 card. For some reason, it was performing unusually poorly for me. I'm now able to connect to my 5Ghz network at a reported speed of 144Mbps, and local file transfers are about 8x faster than with the old card.

 

I had the back feet come off a couple years or so ago, so when the front right one came off, I just adoped the same strategy: Radio Shack sells some small stick-on feet, and so I installed a set of these just back of the openings for the original front feet. So far, they've stayed on and worked well, and it was a lot cheaper than ANYTHING I could have got through Lenovo. I now have all-matching feet on my 120. Whoot.

 

Not that anyone is listening here anymore, but:

I come to praise machines with replaceable batteries!

My X120e was down to about an hour, +/-, as its battery aged into the gray. A quick trip to eBay for an OEM battery, and I am back on line.

This machine is too good to give up.

 

I still use my x120e quite a bit. My battery health is great because I've set the system to never charge over 85%. Yes, this does hurt my run time but most of the time 4 vs 5 hours is no big deal. In the cases where I need the run time I just set the system back to 100% charge.
I got flack from another poster a while back for doing this but really, I haven't had good luck with aftermarket batteries and OEMs are expensive (or used). Why tear up the battery if I don't have to?

 

I'm still listening!
my batt is old, but still will churn for about 4 hours of moderate use - NOT doing HTPC duty! haha.

i still try once in awhile to find a suitable replacement for this laptop but haven't.
the Yoga 2 is pretty good in the 11" form, but stuck with Intel HD### du jour video. so you need to pay up and get the faster i5 if you want to beat the vid performance of the x120e. that will set you back about $450 or more. I had [through my shop] a 14" lenovo i5 model that seemed slow to me - I was quite underwhelmed.
and sadly, a small form factor AMD-powered unit like the x140 is not any significant amount better than this unit, in the AMD model, plus its fatter, heavier, etc and I doubt it has the keyboard this one does.

if anyone knows of a REAL replacement for this that does what it does better than it does, speak up.

 

I couldn't find a 'real' replacement either after looking for the last year or so. I gave my x120e to my folks after their laptop died and spent way too much time trying to find something else. Long story short, for what it was, it was very, very good. My only complaints were that I wish it had an IPS screen (reduce the need to find that 'optimal' angle for viewing), higher resolution (some programs needed more screen real estate), and a backlit keyboard (for typing at night).

Over the last year I tried a Sony Vaio Pro, MacBook Air, and a Yoga 2 Pro. All went back.

I finally picked up a Yoga 11s a couple of weeks ago. The build quality is good (which is why I went with it over the newer Yoga 11 2?), it has an IPS screen, and I have the newer i5-4210 model with 8GB of RAM which is pretty fast (at least for my needs). The downsides, glossy screen, no backlit keyboard, and most importantly, while the keyboard is still 'okay' to type on, it is in no way as nice as the x120e.

But I got it for a good deal so, for the price, it was better than buying the 11e or the x140e which are the more direct descendents of the x120e (though with those I think I would have at least a better keyboard).

 

had wondered about that one. glad you mention the glossy. for me that's a dealbreaker.
I can tolerate reflectivity on my ipad, where its in my hand and angles can be tweaked instantly, intuitively, but I tried hard to adjust on laptop [hp model] and just hated it.
tried a sammy with matte screen, but the display was even poorer than the x120e - very intolerant of vertical off-axis... hard to imagine worse

i still would like to see one of the acer travelmates that had matte display, i3/i5 in 11 form. they came and went fast so they're tough to find

 

Yeah, the x120e is not easy to replace. Battery life is just OK by today's standards but the keyboard is really good. The screen isn't that good but it is matte which is rather rare in consumer systems. I can understand gloss on a touch screen but I've never understood why one would pick gloss on a non-touch screen. I'm not too worried about the resolution. A high DPI screen would be nice but the screen is already rather small. I guess it helps that I've always had a larger laptop with a higher resolution screen when I needed to do real work. My x120e has almost always been used for web surfing and minimal writing. I tried CAD on it just for fun. It did work but not at all well. Since getting my light but large Precision M3800 I haven't traveled much with the Lenovo. That was different when my other computer was nearly 7 lbs.

 

I nearly bought an X140e the other day, but decided not to for now. The X120e continues to do an excellent job, and while it would be nice to have a faster machine with better battery life (and a better-placed Delete key!!!) my current machine is doing well. All four feet have been replaced with rubber bumpers, and the screen bumpers with felt, but damned if it isn't still a great little tool.

Just keeping the faith, such as it is!

 

i hear ya.
i still have my original 'feet'! but lost one of the screen bumpers ... bummer.

i have recently bought for others a couple of newer 14" nb's - pretty nice, but when I add everything up I still prefer the old warhorse for the combo of "all the above" - it just does too many things well.

I DO wish I could find one good SATA driver, however. just too lazy to work hard at it. the one that is getting installed via windows updates and/or recent catalyst is awful.
apparently they just don't try anymore

 

I ended up running the generic Microsoft SATA driver on mine. I've seen more than one AMD system (including an HP G62-347NR) where the AMD SATA driver caused the machine to randomly lock up at times. Happened on the x120e as well. The generic driver seems to work fine for me, on both HDDs and SSDs. I don't use the generic SATA driver on my Intel machines though.

 

I lost the screen bumpers a while back...I got some tiny felt furniture dots and stuck them on the edges of the bezel--works well. Not quite as nice looking, but very effective!

 

so my x120e wont turn on...pressed the power button and the light around it just flickers.

tried removing the battery, HDD, and RAM to see if it will turn on...and nothing...

anybody had this issue and had it fixed or is it really time to say goodbye to this trusty laptop?

 

Do you mean flickers (rapidly) or slowly pulses

You've almost certainly tried this already, but in case you haven't--plug in the power supply, hook up the battery, etc., etc., and hold the power button down for 20-30 seconds. Thought this seems unlikely to be helpful given the steps you've already taken, it might be worth a shot.

 

speaking as a tech: that ain't a good sign.
you've done the usual root-cause steps and it points to the motherboard, which is rare to fail on these. no storms?
do you recall the state of your battery before the fail? reason I ask is re: the integrity of the AC Charger. if ac charger went [they do], batt would finally drain out and not recharge. batteries can also fail suddenly, but its almost unthinkable that both would occur in near proximity.
the good news:
- techs that don't mind doing hdwe work will buy that unit on ebay. pull the hdd and ram and let it go.
- I have recently seen clean used ones going in the mid-$100's... E350 models. the lower models can be had for less than a hundred but I wouldn't go there.
- net/net you could be back in for right around $100 total.
I cannot replace this laptop with anything better at $100, $200, $300, $400 so far as I have seen, unless I'm willing to give something up:
- GOOD display NON GLOSSY!!! [almost NONE to be had on the market]
- connectivity
- easy to work on [i swap out hdd's a good bit due to work]
- tough [well....]
- perfect portability
- best keyboard ever made on a small laptop
- good GPU - can even do HTPC duty with ease

anyway... preaching to the choir

 

last one: !! Lenovo ThinkPad X120e 0596 2RU AMD Dual Core E 350 1 60 GHz D597 645743004740 | eBay

 

and this is STEALING. no HDD - you already have a HDD! make him an offer
Lenovo ThinkPad X120e 11" AMD E 350 1 6GHz 2GB RAM HDMI No HDD View Details | eBay

 

I hate it when they don't show the actual computer. A Dell refurb of a current model is likely to look brand new. This "refurb" is more likely "used". The price isn't bad but without seeing the condition I would be a bit nervous about buying. It's also not cool that it lacks an OS since I don't think it's that easy to restore the computer to factory settings just by downloading things from Lenovo. I know that I wasn't able to put my HP DM1z back to HP's factory setup when I totally wiped the disc. I had Win7 discs but I never was able to find all of the HP helper programs (the good ones, not the bloat).

That said, if you look around on ebay you can find deals. I've purchased 3 of these computers off ebay for around $50 each. One didn't have a HDD. One said "keyboard not working" which was nothing more than the keyboard connector came unseated. I don't recall the story on the last one. All of them worked perfectly once they were reformatted, keyboards re-seated etc.

I don't use mine quite as much as I used to since I got my Dell M3800. The M3800 is light enough (vs my old 15.4" CAD computer) to move around. The battery life is also allows me to actually sit with the machine a bit. Compared to my new Dell I don't really notice the low power CPU in the X120e. I do notice the slow HD (vs an SSD). I've put a hybrid drive in the X120e but it doesn't seem that much faster than the old drive and far slower than the Dell. I also find I miss the high dpi, good color quality touch screen (I miss all three of those things). On the other hand I still love the matte finish and great pointer stick. Also, the Thinkpad's battery life is better than the Dell. Both claim about the same run time but the Thinkpad seems to do a better job of delivering.

I would point out that for both computers I use custom charge settings that limit the batteries to no more than 85% charge. The result is both computers take a pretty big run time hit. However, the Thinkpad still shows excellent battery health after almost 4 years of use with lots of charge-discharge cycles in there. I strongly recommend that people consider setting a peak charge % of around 85% for normal use and don't start charging if the battery is over 80%. This does wonders for the long term health of the battery. I know some will complain about loosing 15% of the run time (more if you consider that you rarely use the bottom 10%). Not a problem. When you need the extra run time go into the battery settings and change for max run time (I do this before flying). My experience with the laptops I've had over the last 10 years is most batteries show signs of wear after 2 years and few are working well after 4 years. My Thinkpad is the first computer I've owned with this function. It's also the first time I've had a computer with a very good battery after so many years.

 

good info and useful discussion.

the AMD SATA drivers are always to be checked. one works, the majority of the others don't. its safer to use the basic generic microsoft sata driver unless one wants to "stick handle" the sata drivers.

EBAY: nearly always, if I ask a seller for additional 'real' images I get them. Also [for those that don't know], Ebay often will go to bat for the buyer whether or not the seller has stated "accepts Returns". been there several times. I've only had to return one laptop in the last few years and really it wasn't bad. the offer was for good G4 with 2 good batteries and charger. turned out the charger was bad and one battery was bad. I asked for compensation but ended up sending back, at their expense. the laptop was actually pretty nice

in recent few months I've bought a Dell Latitude 14" [i3-4030u], a Acer V3 aluminum-body 14" with the same, and now a Toshiba E45-B, i5-4210u 14" ultra - sort of a MBP killer. I've kept the last one til now but frankly, I tire of it after a few minutes and grab my X120e. That E45 is highly praised by owners.
What gets me is that I'm used to one-handing the X120e. I pick it up open or shut and move it easily, can prop it on one knee or just about anywhere else. not afraid to get it dirty, and the matte display, as it turns out, is one of the better. I've seen other matte finishes that either distort pixels or don't do much to cut glare, just make it fuzzy.
The E45 is fast, but not so fast that it is a HUGE issue. These days, all browsers look slow and complex to me [they are... both]. IE11 includeing the Win10 version are slow if you have more than a few tabs, but IE ROCKS on youtube or other high def video [check your perf manager and you'll see what I mean]. So, odd as it sounds, I use IE almost exclusively on my HTPC rig. Firefox for my personal work, and occasionally chrome 'cause its fast out of the chute to go fetch something.
its the browsers that control the user's perception of "fast" in any well-balanced laptop.
the Quad Core Z3xxx fanless models are fast if they have enough ram and a good ssd. pentium faster.

I'm wanting to put Win10 on my x120e. Win10 makes things go .... it will be the best yet :hi2:

 

one other thing - these very light 13-14 " models I"ve observed have a common annoyance - while using, the lid will "vibrate" somewhat like a tuning fork due to the mass/weight balance between body and the display/lid portion - they're tall and weigh about what the base does, and when typing setup a sympathetic wobble or vibe that is not from loose hinges but quite the opposite: the whole thing is really tightly spec'd, and so the vibes echo through the whole

 

If I had the need for a new notebook right now, I would most likely purchase an X140e, many of which show up (reconditioned) for c. $250 on eBay. It's not quite as nice as the X120e aesthetically, but it comes with a more powerful processor, and retains the non-glare 11.6" screen. I haven't seen one in person yet, but reports I've heard are pretty good.

 

I have noticed the x140e is developing a following. its a shame imho that they didn't give it a quad core bay trail Pentium - would way outshine the somewhat mediocre perf of the a4-5000, and without the inevitable sata junkware amd puts out. Really I'm not convinced there is a perceptible diff in 'responsiveness' between x120e and x140e. still both are highly spoken of by owners.
there were a couple of obscure early yoga 11.6" configs that were actually really good, and went away rapidly. right now the yoga 2 [stay away from 3...] 11.6" is out of production. no news why or when. but those are pricey for what's under the hood. still a hole here where the humble x120e reigned as unpraised Master of the niche!
the dell inspiron 3000 upper-processor models are ok... just ok will have to do in the current environment. glitchy touchpad, weak keyboard, glossy screen, but it basically works, which qualifies as a win these days.

 

FWIW I got Windows 10 Pro up and running fairly easily. No devices missing, everything basically works similar to Windows 8.1 just with the usual early preview bugs - not with the hardware just Windows being updated, un-updated etc.
I did not see the snappy improvement in speed I was expecting, as I did on the G4-1117dx I also have.
It may be because it just updated to build 9926, and that build is a bit buggier, more aggressively-loaded than the prior.

 

Sigh. After almost four years of heavy use, my X120e keyboard lost a key this morning, and I was not able to replace it. So I'm plugged into my "desktop" station right now. New keyboard (reconditioned) arrives on Monday. Not bad, all things considered...

 

Replace and back in action. Let's see: added memory, replaced HD with SSD, bike crash, replaced battery, replaced keyboard, and it's still working. I like my X120e. Second-lonest I've ever owned a computer.

 

Well, I did it. I replaced my X120e with an X140e. For the most part, I like the new old machine a lot--you can still swap the Ctrl and Fn keys, even though you can't swap the keycaps. I swapped out the 7mm 500GB drive for a 256GB SSD, and stole some of the memory from the X120e so it's now sitting at 6GB of RAM. It runs cooler, has much better battery life (I'm seeing an actual 8 hours+) and runs very quietly with TpFanControl. Once I have some USB3 peripherals, that should be good as well. It doesn't look quite as nice as the X120e, but I think it's just as solidly built, if not moreso.