Wired - Lenovo's Wedgetop Burns Twice as Bright, Half as Long

[FdmNews 0]

With the ThinkPad X1, Lenovo may have its most eye-catching laptop to date. And, battery life aside, it's a hot performer.

 

 

For years, many people felt that buying a ThinkPad meant sacrificing looks for durability. But the truth of the matter is that Lenovo has been experimenting with design, including machines that come in various colors (besides black, I mean) and at least one that had a titanium lid. The striking butterfly keyboard on the IBM-era ThinkPad 701 even earned it a place in New York Museum of Modern Art’s permanent collection.

 

The ThinkPad X1 may be Lenovo’s most eye-catching laptop to date. With a bold, angular design — not to mention impressive thinness and a bevy of new features — the X1 spits in the face of today’s all-curves laptops and says: Yeah, to hell with it, we really liked Tron.

 

The bold design choice will be love-it-or-hate-it, but I suspect most shoppers who would consider ThinkPad at all will ultimately fall for its charms. That said, in actual use I found myself torn over the wedge-like design. It is very striking but it sacrifices a bit too much usability in its quest for head-turning looks.

 

The biggest problem is that ports on both sides are impossible to get to without flipping the computer onto one edge. This is a particularly big problem for ports on the left side — a USB port and a headset jack — which are inexplicably covered with a plastic flap.....

 

 

 

 

 

View the full article