Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional) reviews

Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional)

Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional) Reviews

First of all, the fact that I rank this Windows-based convertible tablet three-star does not mean that I think the other Windows-based convertible tablets are better. Absolutely not. This is the best among the mediocre class. Also, I am a PC person throughout and never even liked Apple products. So before you label me as a PC-hater, please at least give what I have to say some serious thought. The Lenovo X2xx tablet has been a very good series for business purpose. Reliable, fast, businesslike plain appearance, and best-of-the-class keyboard. But this is just not enough in a world that has changed. I almost returned mine after I bought it, from Lenovo direct. The configuration I got is close to $2000 even after discount. SSD, top-of-the-line processor, 8G RAM, 3G/4G cellular network, etc. I kept it in the end. After all that time spent on installing the software and doing configuration, I felt my time was too precious to be wasted. Besides, the prospect of waiting for almost a year for a Windows 8 tablet (which is not guaranteed to be good) is bad enough that I decided to stick to this imperfect but still useful machine. After all, it is usable and powerful, and I am familiar with the Windows ecosystem for work. No other tablet on the market, regardless of how excellent it may be in the user interface, provides an adequate ecosystem for work. Perhaps few things are really wrong with this machine, but so many things are just outdated, and pretty lame. People blame Microsoft for not coming up with Windows 8 quick enough, but the primary reasons that these Windows-based convertible tablets are so bad are actually not Microsoft, but CPU makers and PC manufacturers: (1) The inability of CPU makers (Intel and AMD) to make a tablet-suitable processor which is power efficient to run Windows sufficiently fast under 10W power consumption; and (2) The failure of the PC manufacturers to understand what really is important for consumers. If they are to make a good Windows 8 tablet, they will need to change the following at the minimum. FIRST, POOR BATTERY LIFE The tablet comes with a huge and ugly 6-cell battery. The appearance of this tablet would rank 7/10 without the ugly battery, but with the 6-cell battery, it would go down to 3/10. Just imagine the 9-cell battery that they also brag about. The only battery that is reasonably sized for this type of battery is a 3-cell (and that's what is shown in the photos here), but guess what, the 3-cell battery would not last very long on this power-hungry laptop. Lenovo claims 9 hours of battery life for the 6-cell battery (both Lenovo website and the Lenovo PDF datasheet make the same claim). Unfortunately, this is shamefully inaccurate, in fact outright untrue. When run in a very conservative "energy savor" mode, it lasts about 4 hour 30 min. according to my experience, just about half of what was claimed. I usually don't run any heavyweight programs. No video, no games. Just regular content generation software, document viewing and editing, and Internet. The screen brightness is set to 10/15 (about 65%) when used indoors. This is as conservative as you can get. And I don't see how you can go any more battery-friendly than this other than manually set the CPU maximum speed to a very low level, which defeats the point of having a machine like this. The poor battery life is not only disappointing, it makes me so upset, especially because the primary reason I updated to this from my X200 tablet was due to the promised much-better battery life. Misled by the false claims, I was expecting much better battery life than X200, but this is just marginally better. I needed a laptop that can last beyond 7 hours so you can go through a whole day without charging. This completely fails. I seriously think that Lenovo could be subject to a class-action lawsuit in this matter of misrepresentation. But when you think of it, although you can blame Lenovo for not being truthful, but you really can't blame Lenovo for not being able to make a laptop with that kind of battery life performance. No one can do magic with energy and power consumption. The Intel processor used in this machine consumes 35 W of power! (In comparison, the latest Nvidia Tegra 3 processor consumes 1-2 W.) If Intel does not get their laptop processors to run under 10 W in the next year, I'm seeing a troubled company. They will be killed by Nvidia's Tegra 3 and Tegra 4 by then once Windows 8 machines start to run on Tegra processors. Although it is true that the Tegra processors (or any ARM processor for that matter) will not be immediately compatible with the legacy Windows applications, Microsoft has chosen Windows 8 to be run on these processors with a reason. It would be a beginning of a sea change. Once that begins, Intel must produce processors that are fairly competitive in power consumption, otherwise it could gradually lose it on every front on the mobile processors, and eventually the entire PC category. They would become a niche player in the server processors, plus perhaps also doing some foundry work for better designers for mobile processors. The status quo is not going to work for Intel. Just look at these so-called ultracompact laptops now. So pathetic. As evidenced by PC tablets like Lenovo X220t, it is beyond doubt Intel will soon be facing its biggest crisis ever. I am not predicting a failure of Intel, nor do I stand for a benefit from a failure of Intel. I very much hope for their success. I want a genuine Windows-based tablet that is sufficiently fast, under 2 pounds and has a battery life of 10 hours. The current PC processors simply can't do it. The Oak Trail processors used in the current Windows-based tablets are not even half way there in terms of performance/power efficiency. SECOND, SCREEN RESOLUTION UNSUITABLE FOR TABLET VIEWING Only 768 pixels on the shorter side? Have they ever tested this machine in the tablet mode viewing documents and webpages in the vertical direction? This is ridiculous. This is even a step back from the three years old X200 (which was two generations ago). First of all, to highlight how outdated this is, the new generation of smart phones are approaching this vertical-width resolution (Sansone Nexus Prime is one). A class of small 7 inch tablets (for example, T-Mobile's Springboard) actually have better vertical-width resolution. But I do not wish to make a point out of this just because others are offering more pixels. What is important is that when it comes to tablets, the vertical-width resolution (the shorter dimension) actually matters very much. This is because the tablet mode almost cries out for, if not dictates, use in the portrait orientation. But with only 768 pixels, virtually nothing can be displayed in full width in the portrait orientation, and as a result it requires horizontal scrolling for every line you read. Let me repeat, it is "scrolling every *line* you read", unlike in the case of a vertical scrolling you only do it for every page view. It destroys the user experience completely. This type of screen can only be used for conventional laptop viewing in the horizontal orientation. So did they forget they were making a convertible tablet with X220 here? If documents and webpages can't be viewed in portrait mode, what's the point to have a tablet for business use? You absolutely need a minimum of 900 pixels in the width in order to have a basic workable solution for working professionals who actually read full-size documents. It's not like that there aren't screens that can satisfy this need. Lenovo's failure to use an adequate screen for is top-of-the-line PC tablets is frustrating. Get real, you PC makers. As a loyal PC user, I am exasperated by the incompetence of these PC makers. POOR POWER MANAGEMENT Thanks to Windows 7, the power management of X220 is definitely better than the traditional laptops. But again it is not good enough for a tablet. In order to be adequate for true mobile use, they desperately need an instant resume function. Lenovo seems to be patiently waiting for Windows 8 for this functionality. A rather disappointing attitude. They need something like what Asus did for their ZenBooks which also run Windows 7. The 2-second instant resume of the ZenBooks would not only increase the effective battery life, but also significantly improve the mobile user experience. Because the X220 is a tablet intended for true mobile use, it needs that kind of instant resume function worse than ZenBooks do. But here we are, the ThinkPad tablets remain tepidly inadequate in this important respect. FRUSTRATINGLY INACCURATE PEN DIGITIZER This is another major letdown. Even after calibration, the active spot on the screen can be almost half a centimeter (5mm) misaligned with the tip of the digitizer, making it extremely confusing and time-wasting to use. The X200 had the same problem, but I thought they should have made some progress in the last three years. Absolutely nothing. Had they made it right, the digitizer would be such a wonderful tool on Windows operating system. Not only is it an excellent user interface for general purpose, it also gives you the most excellent and unique experience on Microsoft's OneNote and handwriting recognition. A major software advantage is marred by bad hardware. BUGGY SOFTWARE FOR TOUCHPAD AND PEN TABLET The software (drivers) for the touch pad and pen tablet is buggy and unreliable. Read more ›. this is my Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional) reviews

Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional) Specs

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. Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional)

Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional) Best buy

Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional)
. Lenovo ThinkPad X220 (42962YU) 12.5" LED Tablet PC - Core i7 i7-2620M 2.7GHz 4G DDR3 320G HDD (Windows 7 Professional) will.. (Read More)