X1 Carbon 5th gen upgrade suggestions to recent model carbon/yoga/nano

[meeotch]

It's coming up on time to upgrade my trusty X1 Carbon 5th gen (2017) to one of the newer models (10th or 11th gen?), and I haven't really be following along with the current state of the art. A couple of questions:

1. Any particular negative changes since 2017 to the X1 Carbon line? (I've heard the keyboards have less travel. My current one suffered from the "trackpoint requires superhuman strength" problem of that generation, but I mostly fixed it with custom trackpoint caps off of Etsy.)
2. I like the carbon a lot, but would consider a yoga or nano or other, if there's a compelling reason.

For context, here's my current setup, and how I use it:

• screen - 2560 × 1440 anti-glare, 14". Prefer the anti-glare to glossy. And it drives a 4k external monitor just fine.
• ports - prefer having at least one legacy USB3-A, plus thunderbolt for the dock. I have a low-profile USB-A yubikey that I leave plugged in. They make a USB-C, so it's not necessarily a deal-breaker, but it has no keychain attachment.
• input - don't ever use the trackpad, but do use the trackpoint and the mouse buttons below it constantly, including the middle-button-trackpoint-to-scroll.
• mem - 16GB / 1TB - mostly fine, wouldn't say no to more, though.
• battery - it's old, so now I get about 4.0 - 4.5hr of moderate use. New, I'd hope for 6.0+hr. Obv, more is better.
• weight - 2.5lb, which is fine. Probably wouldn't go a whole lot heavier.
• cpu/graphics - I do use photoshop/lightroom, and some light Maya/Houdini. I don't need a "portable workstation", but I don't want it to be painful to use those apps.

That's it, I think. I did google around, but didn't find an all-in-one chart that listed the pros/cons of all the models. It's worth noting that I typically will wait for the newest gen to come out, then pick up the second-to-newest for cheap.

UPDATE: unless I'm missing something, *none* of the new Carbons or Yogas come with higher res than 1920x1080. Only the Nano does, and it's only got a 13" screen. WTF? There seriously isn't a 14" screen that's higher than HD res? FURTHER EDIT: looks like maybe you can get 2240 x 1400 on a Carbon, if you build it yourself. Still, worse than what I currently have. Bleah.

[mikemex]

I also have an X1C5. In fact, I'm typing this on it since I sent my P14s to service.

Maybe I'm just doing basic stuff lately but I don't really sense a huge difference in performance. I'd say, stick to it a bit longer. Buy a new battery. I'm pretty convinced the 5th generation is the most power efficient to date. It says over 20 hours just sitting idle and my battery isn't new.

The newer generations, specially 9th and above, have 16:10 screens which is a huge benefit.
Performance will be much better of course, but that only matters if you're really pushing it.

Drawbacks?

* The wireless module is soldered. So another thing to call for a motherboard replacement if it fails.
* The key travel is lower. I think the X1C5 has 1.5mm vs 1.35 of the newer models.
* The ergonomics are surely not the same.

Otherwise, I'd say pretty much the same, just newer.

[meeotch]

Thanks for the reply. And yeah, my X1C5 isn't dog-slow, but it is starting to feel a little pokey, especially with a million browser tabs open, and when running on battery power. I'm pretty sure I have my power plan settings to *not* cap the CPU speed when on battery, but it still feels slower. I get about 4 or 4.5 hours on battery with regular browsing and nothing too crazy going on. Anyway, it's old enough that I feel like I'm ready for a refresh. I just don't want to buy new, and discover something that's even worse than what I've got. I hated it when they switched to chicklet keyboards, way back in the day. And the trackpoint on my X1C5 was terrible compared to the original ones.

That's interesting about the 16:10 screens. Having more vertical space is definitely a benefit. (Though the new models have lower resolution than my X1C5... but I never use it at full 4k anyway. Mostly at 2560x1440.)

I actually got a lot of good info in a reddit thread I posted: https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/comme ... _to_recent

TL/DR is about halfway down: 11th gen (newest) Carbons come with 13th gen CPUs, which are less power hungry than the 12th gen CPUs. And opting for a "U" CPU, maybe even an i5 instead of an i7 would potentially get me the same/better battery life as my 5th gen X1C, but much faster.

But man oh man, was it a pain to drill down through all the options to find the one or two models that had decent screen res with a non-power-hog CPU. It shouldn't be so difficult to identify a new machine that's an all-around upgrade from something I bought in 2017, ffs.

[dr_st]

Well, because of the move from dual to quad-core CPUs, there is a chance that even an X1C6 will feel much faster than your X1C5. While being exactly the same form factor and almost the same ports. If you could get one cheaply, and maybe recoup some of the price difference by selling the X1C5, it might be a good upgrade.

[ZaZ]

I thought some of the newer models offered the 2880x1800 OLED display?

[meeotch]

I thought some of the newer models offered the 2880x1800 OLED display?

Yep, they do. (Still a large step down from the 4k resolution on my 5th gen, but again I typically don't use it in 4k.) The difficulty was finding a high res screen that wasn't tied to a power-hungry CPU, so that I could try and guarantee a step-up in battery life from my current machine. But I eventually did - see my post in the reddit thread for details. Not sure how much of a battery hit the OLED screen is, though...

[mikemex]

Just so you know, Lenovo appears to have dropped the ball once again. We're going to experience the buttonless clickpad nightmare soon, as they did with the 4th generation.

YES. On the X1 Carbon.

[meeotch]

Good god. And you're supposed to use the TrackPoint... how? By tapping on the clickpad to "click"? By yelling "click" at Windows Hello?

Palm on clickpad, middle finger on TrackPoint, thumb on left/middle clickpad buttons. This is the Way. If they wanted to make it lighter or smaller, they'd be better off removing the clickpad and leaving the buttons.

(Some googling indicated it might only be an option. But that kind of option just drives people in a particular direction. Maybe that's the point, so they can say not enough people wanted the option & then remove it on the next round. https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/comme ... arbon_2024 )

[RealBlackStuff]

That 2024 X1 looks to me like a Fruit knock-off with Trackpoint.
Or maybe Elon Musk has secretly bought Lenovo as an outlet for his infamous X...