It's fast and light, has a great 12.5-inch display, and it
continues the company's tradition of superb input ergonomics, offering an
innovative buttonless touchpad and a long-stroke keyboard. It also provides
excellent battery life with a
bottom-mounted battery slice. The laptop's boxy, businesslike appearance and
somewhat cluttered keyboard deck might lack the sex appeal some users are looking
for.
Exact prices for the
various ThinkPad X220 configurations are unavailable but its starting price
should be $979, with additional costs for better CPUs, solid-state drives
instead of standard hard drives, and more RAM. CPUs range from an Intel Core i3
to a Core i7, the unit accepts up to 8GB of system memory, and storage options
start with a 160GB hard drive and end with a 160GB SSD. The aforementioned
12.5-inch, 1366-by-768-pixel display is available in two flavors: one with an
IPS panel for wider viewing angles, and one without. Performance for any task outside of
enthusiast gaming and high-end 3D workstation applications is of no concern
with the X220.
Some of the keys are
a tad odd on the ThinkPad X220, such as the extralarge Esc and Delete keys
above the main alphabetical keys. However, unlike other vendors' keyboard
quirks, they help, not hinder your typing. As usual for Lenovo, the long-throw
feel of the keyboard is nothing short of excellent. The touchpad is a
buttonless design--you press down on the left or right front edge to click,
which makes it easier to use than standard buttons when you're using the thumb
and forefinger of one hand. Two normal buttons sit above the touchpad, and
Lenovo's TrackPoint eraserhead pointing device is also in attendance. Mute
buttons for the dual microphones and the 720p Webcam join the volume rocker and
ThinkVantage (toolbox) buttons at the top of the keyboard deck.
The X220's battery
life is outstanding, and you can enhance it with options. You may also opt for three-cell and nine-cell
main batteries, for less weight or longer run times respectively, and add a
bottom-mounted $179 battery slice. The slide adds 0.4 inch of thickness but
nearly doubles battery life to over 14.5 hours. For world travelers, the extra
1.6 pounds of weight and bulk will be an acceptable trade-off.
The ports and
connectivity on the X220 are top-notch. The system has three USB ports, one of
which is powered (for charging cell phones and the like) even when the laptop
isn't turned on. Optionally, with the i7 CPU, one port can be USB 3.0. You'll
also find an ExpressCard slot, an SD Card slot, a Wi-Fi switch, a VGA port, and
a gigabit ethernet port. A dock is available with a multiformat burner,
Bluetooth is on board, and the Wi-Fi is dual-band 802.11n (2.4GHz and 5GHz).
Our test laptop arrived with IBM's biometric finger-swipe sensor to facilitate
security.
If there's anything
you should be wary of with the X220, it's the number of "value-added"
applications and unnecessary background processes. The Windows 7 Professional
operating system has just about every software feature you need for a laptop,
yet on our machine a quick glance at the Windows Task Manager revealed nearly
90 processes running and almost 30 percent memory usage--without one user
application running. One or two of the background apps are worthwhile, such as
the Bluetooth manager or the tool that shuts down the hard drive in case of a
fall, but additional battery meters and Wi-Fi handlers are generally useless. A
trial version of Norton Internet Security and Microsoft Office 2010 Starter are
bundled.
ThinkPad users won't
find anything mind-blowingly different about this latest addition to the X2
xx series, but the improvements are noticeable
and all enhance the usability of the system. If you're not looking for a
supersexy laptop, or if you're trying to get away on the cheap, the Lenovo
ThinkPad X220 is the best thing going in an ultraportable.
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Pros
- Lightweight, with great
battery endurance and options
- Excellent performance and
ergonomics
Cons
- Comes overloaded with
background apps
Bottom Line
Fast and light, with
great input ergonomics and battery life, this powerhouse ultraportable is
best-of-breed, though its old-school looks may not appeal to everyone.
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