Thinkpads Forum

These are pretty rare where I am and you basically have to take whatever spec you can if they come up unlike the x200 laptop which is relatively common.

The one I picked up is mid spec with the i5-520um. Now this thing has an issue, being only 11w and 1.066ghz w/ 1,866ghz turbo. It is NOT a fast cpu, it feels like a higher speed Core 2 Duo maybe a p8700. You probably dont want the Celeron one. My limited testing shows its in turbo zone a lot.

Typical 4gb ram, Intel 6200 wireless and it has the Gobi 2000 and usual features. Might upgrade to the Intel 6300 if it has the 3rd wire.

Speed is fine with Win7 and a 120Gb ssd. Of special note however is the *extremely* bright and colorful Boe Hydis panel. 700 nits apparently. And the panel is *behind* what looks like a slightly toughened glass or glass like digitiser.

I'm not too interested in the pen, and worse still, its not a tablet in the traditional sense where you can use your finger, you MUST use the Wacom pen so this feature is not my concern.

It does feel a LOT heavier than the 200 and 201 I have so you win some you lose some. Still, my ex lease supplier gets these sans hdd but otherwise complete for under $100... as a laptop with a free copy of Win7/10, what can you lose?

Like my 201 laptop the touchpad is pretty useless so use the trackpoint or the mouse. Otherwise the design is impressive, the tablet lock mechanic is pretty clever and it feels like a nice unit. Good pickup if you can find them.

These older convertible tablet pcs ARE indeed heavier than their standard versions, and yes there does appear to be a gap if it is anything like my X200 display with LED display.

When I was shopping around for X200/201 tablets a few years ago, one thing I kept wondering about is the difference between the ultra low voltage i5-520um (as opposed to the i5 standard voltage or i7-640LM low voltage cpus) and the older core 2 duo processors (SL9400 and SL9600) in the X200 tablet. In the end I went with the X200 tablet because it was cheaper. Any feedback you have about its speed is much appreciated, as the performance of this cpu has always mystified me. I actually *bought* one with an i5-520um, but chickened out and sent it back without opening the box because I was uncertain of its performance. In the end I never did find out how it would compare, and no one else ever had any reviews or comments about its speed.

To me the pen drawing thing is just a lark but for many programs I find to be too laggy.

When you write the 'ink' as its drawn on the screen comes out a millisecond later and its disconcerting.

However strangely enough I find One Note 2007 to be pretty much spot on as far as draw speed goes, maybe because it NOT a raster drawing program so its not carrying baggage.

Otherwise this is a decent sort of equivalent to your std. x200/201 laptops.

In normal usage I dont seem to getting much over 1,2Ghz, of course when installing programs or running updates then yeah, it asks for the full 1,866mhz.

I might pull the drive and install Windows 10 to see how good it is. I havent seen much writeups of Win10 and the X tablets.

TonyJZX wrote: I might pull the drive and install Windows 10 to see how good it is. I havent seen much writeups of Win10 and the X tablets.

If things are still the same as they were with Windows 8 and 8.1, everything will go smoothly until you get to the Intel graphics. The official issue will not install and the only one that will work is the generic driver from Windows Update. It's functional, but not as tight as the original. You're welcome to give it a shot though as the unofficial driver may have improved.

Its my impression Intel HD drivers are pretty good in Windows 10? As long as they allow brightness control and some video acceleration then that's all that is needed?

I have the exact same 1GHZ X201 tablet. Windows 10 has had very few issues on it. Power manager is fully functional and the graphics are working as well as in Windows 7. That being said, I mostly use Windows 7 64 bit on it and the Windows 10 install was done just because I could and it helps to have it if I ever want to sell it. It also works great with Mint Linux 17.2 with the exception of the tablet buttons.

TonyJZX wrote:Its my impression Intel HD drivers are pretty good in Windows 10? As long as they allow brightness control and some video acceleration then that's all that is needed?

With this one, I've done my best to avoid the non-Lenovo drivers even under Windows 7 because even though brightness control and hardware acceleration would "work", there were a number of odd issues, such as the brightness for the power plans resetting themselves on a regular basis. And that was with the drivers from the Intel website - not even the Windows Update-issue. If you're considering trying, I'd make an image backup of the current Windows 7 setup just in case things don't work ideally in that department (depending on how well you trust the Windows 10 rollback program).