Laptop Buyer's Guide: 14-inch and Smaller
by Vivek Gowri on July 19, 2010 12:01 AM ESTBusiness Class: Lenovo ThinkPad X201
Did you honestly expect anything else? This is the quintessential business ultraportable. One of the first notebooks to pull off the now-trendy lack of an optical drive, the X series has a long history of being some of the most reliable and well built ultraportable systems on the market. The latest iteration is the X201, which has, as I mentioned earlier, a 12” widescreen, Core i3/i5/i7 processors, and superlight starting weight.
As a business machine, this rules. Amazing build quality, one of the best keyboards in the business, a matte screen, and basically everything else that that has made the ThinkPad line the standard of the business class for the last twenty years. Magnesium alloy chassis, steel hinges, rugged plastic, rubberized exterior coating, spill-proof keyboard, TrackPoint, Thinklight, the X201 has them all. Granted, this also means that an unwelcome ThinkPad family trait - poor quality LCD panels - is in order too (and no, the old T43p’s 15” IPS panels don’t count; those are ancient history at this point.) Having matte displays is a good thing, but when they’re poor quality panels with low contrast ratios, they’re not so appreciated.
But it’s not all about the ThinkPad stuff, the X201 has the computing prowess to back up the build quality. It’s the lightest computer with standard voltage Core i3/i5/i7 processors, even more so than the R700, which to be fair is a bit larger and has an integrated optical drive. Option up to the 9 cell battery, which bumps the weight up to 3.5lbs, and you get around 12 hours of battery life. That’s a pretty ridiculous figure for something with all the power of a full sized mainstream laptop.
You do end up paying quite a bit for all this business quality ultraportable goodness - the starting $999 price is reasonable, until you realize that it includes a paltry 2GB of memory, a 160GB hard drive, and a 4 cell battery. You can find those components in Walmart for $549 on any given Sunday, so some optional extras are definitely in order. Spec’ed the same as the $799 Toshiba R705 (Core i3, 4GB, 500GB hard drive, 6 cell battery, etc) and you’re looking at right around $1300 for the X201. Interestingly, the touchpad and webcam are optional extras on the X201. Look for a faster processor or WWAN, and you’re talking substantial sums of money. Even if you hit one of Lenovo’s awesome sales, the X201 won’t come cheap.
For a hardcore business user though, nothing this side of 4lbs can beat the ThinkPad’s combination of ruggedness, build quality, power, and battery life, and for that reason the extra few hundred dollars are definitely worth it for the people that care.
Alternative: HP EliteBook 2540p
The only other notebook line I’ve found with build quality even approaching the ThinkPad is HP’s new EliteBook lineup. The 2540p is the smallest EliteBook, a 12” unit like the Lenovo. It also has the standard voltage Core i5-540M, 2GB memory, and a 250GB hard drive at $1099. Also, you don’t have to pay extra for the webcam and touchpad. The aluminum panels on the palmrest and lid are nice, and the silver colour could suit some people’s tastes better than the all-black look of the ThinkPad. But it’s a bit heavier than the X201, starting at 3.4lbs, and has less battery life as well (7.5 hours on a 62 Wh 6 cell). The 2540p is still a great business portable, but it’s not on the level of the ThinkPad.
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Dustin Sklavos - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
Really? Because I've owned and reviewed my share of Asus laptops and all of them have done very well. The only one I owned that wound up getting FUBARed was because a friend of mine dropped it on the floor. Thing still works, but the screen is being held together by alligator clips and prayer.Asus makes inexpensive laptops. There's a difference between inexpensive and cheap. If you want to see awful build quality and displays, I'm sure we could recommend a few vendors.
riku0116 - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
I'm looking to purchase a portable tablet PC (read: NOT iPad) to take notes and record lectures on.I've heard good things about the tm2 and would love to see an AnandTech review of this or other tablet PCs as most of them do fall in the ultraportable range.
Dustin Sklavos - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
Part of the problem is that, in my experience writing for a few different sites, HP can be incredibly cagey with their review hardware. Asus, Acer, and Dell tend to be much cooler about it (and we have excellent relationships with them, to be fair).seanleeforever - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
or take a look at X201 Tablet. it is on the pricey side (got my for around 1600 dollar), but well worth it.attila16881 - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
check out the new TM2-2000, i think it would be added to the article ;)Size and Weight: 326 x 230 x 24/30 mm, 1,89 kg
Display: 12,1 wide (1280x800)
Touchscreen: Wacom digitalizer multitouch
CPU:Intel Core i3-330UM (1.2 GHz, 3 MB, 800 MHz)
Chipset: Intel HM55
GPU: SATI Mobility Radeon HD 5450 plus Intel HD (cpu integrated)
RAM: 4 GB DDR3
HD: 320 GB (2,5"; 7200 gpm)
Battery: 6 cells Li-Ion
Digital fingerprint reader, Trackpad Multi-Touch, USB (3 x 2.0),VGA, HDMI, vga webcam
LAN: Gigabit Ethernet 10/100/1000
WI-FI: 802.11 b/g/n
Card reader: SD/MMC/MS/MSpro/XD
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit
jabber - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
Fantastic laptop. One of the best devices I've ever bought.Always gets missed here over the bloody 11Z which isnt nearly as good.
Oh and it has trackpad buttons!
Friendly0Fire - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
Why so little love for the Z? I know it's madly expensive, but after all the complaining about poor screen quality, that thing has an absolutely lavish screen (and a cheap upgrade to 1080p!) on top of a powerful GPU. It also has a DVD drive, backlit keyboard, some pretty powerful non-CULV processors, RAID 0 SSDs and it packages all of that in 3.1 pounds...I know it's expensive, but if price is not a limiting factor, it's probably one of the best ultraportables out there.
Johnmcl7 - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
It is incredible that Sony have managed to pack more hardware than most 13in machines have but in a chassis that's smaller and lighter. It is an expensive and relatively niche machine but on the other hand this is a technology website and the Z series is an extremely interesting machine from a technological point of view, particularly the quad SSDs.The screen resolution is the main reason I'm considering a Z series, I currently have an XPS M1330 which has been a superb machine but the low 1280x800 screen resolution is irritating and about the only feature I'd really like to change. The Z series is one of the few machines to go much above this, as is one Lenovo I believe but that's it?
John
Friendly0Fire - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
Not just resolution. From what I gathered (I'm looking into buying one soon), the screen is also matte and extremely high-contrast. Of course, that goes with the fact that Sony also happens to be making HDTVs :)I only wish there was an Optimus option. Despite the hacking some people have done that appears to enable it in part, I'd rather see a fully support solution. Best would be a manual switch with Auto enabling Optimus.
VivekGowri - Monday, July 19, 2010 - link
Mostly because at $1950 it's well out of most people's price category. But I agree, as an overall machine, the Z is pretty awesome. It still got a mention, but at $1950, it wasn't worth a full page.