X201s - Buy now or wait for next gen ?

[cantona2k]

Hi all,
i am currently on an T400s and are considering a smaller laptop for mobility reasons (work on train/ plane etc.).

I am right now considering the X201s or Sony Z13.
Yesterday i had the chance to use the Z13 a bit in a store and it didn't really convince me (for the price...) - especially considering the build quality compared to my last years Lenovos.
So i am leaning heavily to the X201s (for the 1440 screen mainly compared to the X201).

My question now is: would you buy a X201s now or wait until the new line appears (usually March i guess)?
In theory, i could wait but i am a bit unsure whether it will be worth the wait.
of course i know nobody can give me any details on the next x2xx but i am interested in what you think nevertheless

Would be great to get some input over the weekend as i plan to make a decision until Monday!

Thanks a lot,
Chris

[ZaZ]

Unless you've got a specific need to run CPU intensive applications, perhaps you do, I don't think the newer X20x machines will offer much of a performance boost. I'd say there's a pretty good chance the new X series notebooks will have 16:9 screens, which will give you less vertical real estate. I don't think there's much chance of getting 12" 1600x900 LCD. I'd say if you want a 12" notebook with above WXGA resolution now's the time to do it while there available.

[cantona2k]

thanks for the input!
yeah, the 16:9 screen really seems like something to avoid.

Any opinion on the Sony Z13 as an alternative?
Thanks again !!

[Maryland, USA]

If most of your use will be when the laptop is docked, powered by AC current, it's a pity to use a low-voltage CPU. Docking also makes the advantages of the higher-res, brighter screen less compelling.

[artic_squirrel]

New intel's platform will be interesting if:

-video is important to you, the IGP will be more interesting, some people say it could run games, of course only a fool would do that on a X series

-intel finally furnishes usb 3 chips directly on the chipset [nobody knows that presently, and that sux big time]

and who knows, Lenovo could listen to the community and release a decent screen for once [but nobody believes that, obviously]

otherwise, buy now.

[Tony Chan]

Somewhere I read also suggest the next gen intel chipset/cpu will be more power efficient, which translates into longer battery time??

[sanjuro]

Somewhere I read also suggest the next gen intel chipset/cpu will be more power efficient, which translates into longer battery time??

Not clear. Forthcoming Sandy Bridge CPUs will be better performers, especially on the graphics front. Not much has been revealed about their power consumption. It is likely that SB chips will attain same or better performance at lower heat but not how much.

[ausmike]

Hi everyone ....
I am also in 'waite' mode for the newer X2/X3 series machines from Lenovo
I have had used a XxTablet with touch screen and felt a lot LESS IMPRESSED....

My hope and wish list from Lenovo for X Series would be :
1)decent proc's ..preferably newer intels (as the 'SU' Series has serious limitations in 'several usage/apps' running.....
2)BEST IN CLASS display .........say when compared to mac air....etc etc
3) MUST HAVE HDMI connector ..........for easy connection to HDtv/Display ...great for connection when doing (ppts)pres'tions and or Movie watching etc..
4)USB3 x 3 atleast ,,,,,as I have current W and T series with USB3 and transfer rates are super nice! (ok make it backward compatable to usb2 also)
5)add the newer BATTERY Tech...now avalible eg ones used by HP ; Apple; Sony etc on their similar systems...
6) make it LINUX adaptable/compatable ....(big ask!!)

ARE YOU LISTERNING LENOooooVO !!

[penartur]

1)decent proc's ..preferably newer intels (as the 'SU' Series has serious limitations in 'several usage/apps' running.....

I use my X200s (which is slower than X200 which is in turn significantly slower than X201) as my primary working machine and i've never felt that CPU was too slow. What limitations are you talking about?

2)BEST IN CLASS display .........say when compared to mac air....etc etc

Macbook air has the poor display. Lenovo uses even worse screens, but i'd prefer IPS panel rather than examining different tastes of crap.

3) MUST HAVE HDMI connector ..........for easy connection to HDtv/Display ...great for connection when doing (ppts)pres'tions and or Movie watching etc..

Or DisplayPort.
I've purchased the $200 dock with the sole purpose of connecting an external 27" LCD to my X200s, because X200s only have analog D-Sub display output on board (and the quality of such a connection sucks even on 1680*1050 resolutions, not to mention 1920*1200).

4)USB3 x 3 atleast ,,,,,as I have current W and T series with USB3 and transfer rates are super nice! (ok make it backward compatable to usb2 also)

USB3 _is_ backwards compatible with USB2. Also, in order to experience "super nice" transfer speeds you should use USB3 peripherals as well. If you're experiencing "super nice" transfer speeds when pluggig your old thumb drive in USB3 port, then it is purely a placebo.

5)add the newer BATTERY Tech...now avalible eg ones used by HP ; Apple; Sony etc on their similar systems...

What do you mean by that?

6) make it LINUX adaptable/compatable ....(big ask!!)

And what is wrong with current laptops? What is the problem in installing linux on it?

[ausmike]

ummm ,,,, well.... seems one has to EXPLAIN details ,,,,,and its a WISH LIST!!
> in short of of earlier questions ,,,,,, my current W&T series with USB3 = 110+ sastained Tranfer Speeds & with USB2approx 70+MB/sec transfer speeds... (pls dont ask HOW!!)
>display port = old fuddyduddy stuff ,,,,,, lets get real world "HD 1080p+ standards ,, etc" WHy spend any more than $10 on a HDMI connector cable ,,,,,with HDMI ports! - works great with my SL and Edge thinkpads!
blah blah ,,, but AFAIK none of the TP since T60P was made (2007models , none of rest are LINUX/UNIX certified , not atleast by IBM !...... but then.... be nicer if they made it ANDRIOD compatable!

not sure what else was asked ,,, sorry

[penartur]

> in short of of earlier questions ,,,,,, my current W&T series with USB3 = 110+ sastained Tranfer Speeds & with USB2approx 70+MB/sec transfer speeds... (pls dont ask HOW!!)

Do you mean megabytes or megabits? If the former, then it is impossible to even get 70+MB/s on USB2, just because by design it is limited to 60MB/s. If the latter, then both speeds are far below USB2 throughput, and i doubt that transfer speeds related to USB3 vs USB2, and not to e.g. CPU performance.

>display port = old fuddyduddy stuff ,,,,,, lets get real world "HD 1080p+ standards ,, etc" WHy spend any more than $10 on a HDMI connector cable ,,,,,with HDMI ports! - works great with my SL and Edge thinkpads!

DisplayPort is the new stuff. You will need the cable in any case, be it DisplayPort->HDMI or HDMI->HDMI.

blah blah ,,, but AFAIK none of the TP since T60P was made (2007models , none of rest are LINUX/UNIX certified , not atleast by IBM !......

What do you mean by "LINUX/UNIX certified"?

[Daniel Bakker]

What do you mean by "LINUX/UNIX certified"?

IBM had made a few T60 Thinkpads which were 'linux-capable', they supported linux for those thinkpads the same way they supported windows.

you know what I would like? and android-capable tablet
angry birds!

[penartur]

IBM had made a few T60 Thinkpads which were 'linux-capable', they supported linux for those thinkpads the same way they supported windows.

"Linux-capable" and "pre-installed linux" are different things.

[Daniel Bakker]

who said preinstalled? they were delivered with a DOS license.

[ausmike]

Dreaming of Linux & Andriod "capable/preinstalled & supported"
..................ooops just a dream !!! Ah well !

[ThinkRob]

Dreaming of Linux & Andriod "capable/preinstalled & supported"
..................ooops just a dream !!! Ah well !

You can get that. It's just not worth it.

add the newer BATTERY Tech...now avalible eg ones used by HP ; Apple; Sony etc on their similar systems...

The primary difference between the batteries in Apple's new laptops and the ones in ThinkPads is that you can't remove the former. Naturally, if you can build the battery into the base of the laptop you can make it larger (hence the runtime), but for people who don't want to ship off their laptops just to replace a dead battery (or for anyone who takes flights that last longer than the battery, or for anyone who works away from an outlet for an extended time) it's a bad idea.

decent proc's ..preferably newer intels (as the 'SU' Series has serious limitations in 'several usage/apps' running.....

The SUxxxx series were ULV chips. They tended to run at much reduced clock speeds, but they were only used in a few models (some X200ss and all X301s). Lenovo shipped full-voltage mobile C2Ds in the X200 series, and LV ones in the X200s/X300.

I'm afraid I haven't encountered the "serious limitations" in multitasking that you're referring to. My typical workload is a heavily multi-threaded, multi-process one, and while the lower clock speed of the ULV chip in my X200s made compiles slower, I can't say it fared noticeably worse with multi-process workloads.

[ausmike]

@*Rob ,,,, thanks for write-up ,excellent

AFAIK...T60P model 2007 was the ONLY ThinkPad that was FACTORY PREINSTALLED and WARRANTY with Linux (I have one of them -warranty ran out in 07-'10)

So yeah ... still dreamin on FACTORY APPROVED & or Preinstalled Linux on X & T Series
-factory approved = means the drivers for installed hardware WILL WORK CORRECTLY
-factory approved = means WARRANTY is valid for installed hardware etc
-factory approved = official driver updated releases and matching updates for any hardware updates eg wireless l 3G cards etc etc
and CHEAPER to purchase these models ! (nope not a windpows hater)
Sorry everone , been lazy last weekend was -37 degC - SNOW BOUND and ......sleep!

[ThinkRob]

So yeah ... still dreamin on FACTORY APPROVED & or Preinstalled Linux on X & T Series
-factory approved = means the drivers for installed hardware WILL WORK CORRECTLY
-factory approved = means WARRANTY is valid for installed hardware etc
-factory approved = official driver updated releases and matching updates for any hardware updates eg wireless l 3G cards etc etc
and CHEAPER to purchase these models ! (nope not a windpows hater)

1) A "factory approved" model with a given set of hardware will have exactly the same level of driver support as a model with the same hardware that's not "factory approved".

2) Warranty status is not altered by your choice of operating system. Lenovo won't provide support for anything other than Windows on machines that were sold with Windows, but that's another matter entirely.

3) Very, very little of the hardware requires "official" drivers. In fact, about the only piece of hardware in a ThinkPad I can think of that regularly uses drivers from outside the mainline kernel are the GPUs, and even then only some ATI and NVIDIA ones. Everything else, from the SATA controller to the 3G card, is supported by open source drivers. Unlike with the Windows drivers, the Linux drivers used in commercially-support Linux distros (such as RHEL and SLED, the two distros that IBM and Lenovo have offered machines with) don't have a hardware whitelist. It's all open source and it supports all the hardware of a given model (branded or not) -- there's quite literally no "official" driver to release!

Basically, a "factory approved" model gets you software support and the assurance of compatibility for a specific version of a specific distro. If you run anything outside of that, it's of no use whatsoever. If you run a different version than officially supported, same story. IMHO there's really very, very little to be gained from such a machine. (It appears that the market agreed -- Lenovo doesn't offer any machines with Linux pre-installed. Not that they need to, anyways, given their current hardware's excellent compatibility with all major modern distros...)

[sxr71]

Hi everyone ....
I am also in 'waite' mode for the newer X2/X3 series machines from Lenovo
I have had used a XxTablet with touch screen and felt a lot LESS IMPRESSED....

My hope and wish list from Lenovo for X Series would be :
1)decent proc's ..preferably newer intels (as the 'SU' Series has serious limitations in 'several usage/apps' running.....
2)BEST IN CLASS display .........say when compared to mac air....etc etc
3) MUST HAVE HDMI connector ..........for easy connection to HDtv/Display ...great for connection when doing (ppts)pres'tions and or Movie watching etc..
4)USB3 x 3 atleast ,,,,,as I have current W and T series with USB3 and transfer rates are super nice! (ok make it backward compatable to usb2 also)
5)add the newer BATTERY Tech...now avalible eg ones used by HP ; Apple; Sony etc on their similar systems...
6) make it LINUX adaptable/compatable ....(big ask!!)

ARE YOU LISTERNING LENOooooVO !!

In general while I used to exclusively buy Thinkpads, I think some other manufacturers offer some machines that offer better overall characteristics for some usage patterns.

I am happy with the CPUs and really care more about battery life/power efficiency more than outright processing speed. I have never really had an issue with the processing power of any X-series Thinkpad. There are basic engineering limitations when you expect a machine that weighs less than 2.5lbs. I put an SSD in mine and that takes care of any performance issues if I even had any. If you keep an ultraportable then I suppose it would make sense to keep a desktop for more computationally intensive tasks of which there are really only a few.

X-series displays have always been pathetic and they better really start thinking about putting half-way decent panels in them.

In this day and age either HDMI or DisplayPort is a must. Let there be VGA also, but a digital output is a bare minimum.

USB 3 is also something I would expect from the refresh/redesign.

Battery life IMHO is really hindered by the Windows OS. I think Windows is just pathetic in extending battery life. Anandtech did a review of Mac OS vs. Windows battery life and the only reason the 11" Air can get 6 hours of battery life is because it runs Mac OS. I haven't tested personally but I bet if I ran Windows in bootcamp the battery life would become half. People may hate me for saying but, slowly I have come to the conclusion that MS is basically incompetent. They are single handedly screwing the ultraportable market with an OS that eats battery. This is an issue with all portable computing hardware not just ultraportables and really they come across as purely apathetic when they have demonstrated that after all these releases of their OS they still don't care at all about power use. It's all a song and dance at MS. Real crap software products in general. I have respect only for Outlook and Excel. The rest are all crap (in a relative sense).

As for Linux, I welcome the option. I have read that they do some BIOS verification of some hardware parts that makes life miserable for people changing parts for better Linux compatibility. So, far from releasing Linux capable machines out of the box, they take it one step further and throw a roadblock in the way of people trying to run Linux on a Thinkpad. This sort of stance is just plain bad.

I have to agree overall. I used to buy only Thinkpads but my last 3 laptop purchases were not Thinkpads and sadly I have no real interest in seeing what's coming next. I think they screwed up the X-series by going widescreen and if they return to 4:3 that would be enough of a differentiating factor to come back to Lenovo. I used to think that I could not live without the Trackpoint but as much as I wouldn't have admitted it last year the Apple Trackpad is nearly just as useful. It's not as good as the Trackpoint, but it is just fine.

In general it seems to me that Lenovo has followed the Thinkpad formula very well, but they have utterly failed to gauge the market, and most importantly their customers. We have been asking for so many things for so long and refresh after refresh nothing got addressed. They have failed to evolve the Thinkpad into a machine for 2010 and beyond, and they seem to still want to offer machines that would be great for 2005. I am the last person to care for a jazzy machine and I like the design of Thinkpads but really putting out machines without a display port in 2010 is just arrogance. We get it, the machine is aimed at business users, but that didn't stop these guys from switching from 4:3 to 16:10 just to save money. If they really cared about business users they would have kept a 4:3 option at least in the X-series. To me it all comes down to using "business users" as a scapegoat to keep the parts as cheap as possible and to gouge customers like $200+ for a dock to get displayport, not to mention the added weight and bulk. The use of cheap crap displays using the excuse that business users don't care about things like that. Well it all sounds like a poor excuse.

[sxr71]

Also I noticed that there are no X201s machines on the Lenovo site. Am I not looking hard enough? Did they get discontinued? Do they have to be custom ordered or bought from 3rd party resellers?

[ZaZ]

I don't know if they were ever officially discontinued, but due to a shortage of LCDs, they were dropped from Lenovo's web site fairly early on. There were quite a few top seller models available, but those have dwindled to a trickle. Ebay is probably your best option, but you're probably looking at a refurbed unit there. The do occasionally come up in the outlet as well.

[ThinkRob]

We get it, the machine is aimed at business users, but that didn't stop these guys from switching from 4:3 to 16:10 just to save money. If they really cared about business users they would have kept a 4:3 option at least in the X-series. To me it all comes down to using "business users" as a scapegoat to keep the parts as cheap as possible and to gouge customers like $200+ for a dock to get displayport, not to mention the added weight and bulk. The use of cheap crap displays using the excuse that business users don't care about things like that. Well it all sounds like a poor excuse.

The use of poor-quality panels I'll give you, but the choice to go to 16:10 wasn't really a conscious one. There simply aren't panel manufacturers out there making new laptop displays in the 4:3 format. Chi Mei, AU Optronics, Hydis/Mitsubishi, TMD, LG-Phillips, Samsung, and others -- none of them are making new 4:3 panels in the sizes and resolutions used for laptops.

Now it's true, if Lenovo placed a big enough order from a manufacturer, they would no doubt re-tool and produce the requisite panels. But Lenovo's volume for any given model isn't that large, and it'd be quite expensive if they were the only customer purchasing such panels. Add that to the fact that Lenovo likes to have multiple suppliers producing (or able to produce) each FRU and you quickly realize that continuing to use 4:3 panels would require either purchasing and running the means of production (something that Lenovo has little and likely less ability to do) or increasing the cost of each ThinkPad several times over to cover the cost.

Still sound like "using 'business users' as a scapegoat"?

[pianowizard]

My question now is: would you buy a X201s now or wait until the new line appears (usually March i guess)?

I would definitely get an X201s now, because of its 1440x900 resolution. The new line will almost certainly be only 1366x768.

none of them are making new 4:3 panels in the sizes and resolutions used for laptops.

Panasonic still makes 4:3 laptops.

[ThinkRob]

Panasonic still makes 4:3 laptops.

And none of them use new panels. I didn't say that there were no new 4:3 laptops -- there are a (very) few -- but that there are no new 4:3 laptop panels. AFAIK, Panasonic uses old panels that they still have in stock for their ToughBooks, since they're a low-volume line.

[ThinkRob]

As for Linux, I welcome the option. I have read that they do some BIOS verification of some hardware parts that makes life miserable for people changing parts for better Linux compatibility. So, far from releasing Linux capable machines out of the box, they take it one step further and throw a roadblock in the way of people trying to run Linux on a Thinkpad. This sort of stance is just plain bad.

News to me. I've run Linux on probably about a dozen models of ThinkPad at this point, and I've never seen anything that looks like a "roadblock". The only problems that I've seen w/ regard to the BIOS are:

1) The DSDT is invalid, but not grossly so. Fixing and recompiling it doesn't change anything as far as I can tell.
2) The volume keys on some models either send odd key events or don't send anything depending on what the OS identifies as (i.e. whether you pass acpi_os=Linux as a boot parameter.) As far as the thinkpad_acpi maintainers and others can tell, this isn't due to malice as much as it's due to simple bugs. Even then, it's mostly a cosmetic issue: what I've seen will happen is that the mute key won't send a key even down to the OS, thus the OSD won't be updated. Mute still works fine though. I've only ever seen one ThinkPad for which this was the case "out of the box", and it was trivial to fix.