The "X" Factor

I admit it: I have a weakness for "Halo" products..... who doesn't? Over the course of the last few months, I began to think about a replacement for my X301 that has been my personal laptop for the last couple of years. No, it's not too old for what I do with it, but there are certain aspects of it that have called attention to themselves in a negative way. More and more of my external devices are USB 3.0. Even the Penryn generation of Intel's Core 2 Duo line is showing it's age, but especially so with the ULV or Ultra-low voltage sub-group that the X301 uses. It's screen is getting increasingly less tolerable due to the combination of, not the greatest panel, high resolution (1440 x 900 on 13.3") and my inexhorably aging eyes! So, for the last month, I began the process of evaluating candidates for replacement.

First to come under consideration was the thin "S" version of the T4x0 series, but I ended up discarding when I came across my ultimate target. But actually the main competition was the MacBook Air. WHAT you say? TRAITOR! A Mac-In-Trash! Have I taken leave of my senses? Let's all take a deep breath....... that's it...... in... out..... Let's start with; what do I do with my personal laptop? It's on a browser almost 100% of the time, so the OS is irrelevent. We are increasingly a "platform-agnostic" home, with iPhone and iPads pretty much all over the place. We actually are owners of 5 (count-em, 5) iPads, but that a story for another time. We even have one of the "White" MacBooks around here as a learning tool for my wife now that she's in a "Mac-centric" school district and working on an iMac on a daily basis. Back to my original train of thought. I'm about "thin-and-light", and while Apple may not have invented the concept (actually IBM did), they might have perfected it! I don't care if you're a "die-hard" PC guy, you have to admit that the MBA (MacBook Air) is a tour d' force of industrial design, so much so that Lenovo had to emulate it. This summer, my missionary brother/sister-in-laws were here and when they are home for their furough, they take the opportunity to update their hardware since everything computer is cheaper here than in Austria. This time, he bought his wife a current 13" MBA, so I was able to get a firsthand look at it. It's just a really nice computer and would handle anything that I need for my laptop to do. Did I buy it? No..... and not because it's not a great computer. Believe me, I was close to going Mac! What kept me from turning to the Dark Side?

...... Yes..... that's a power adapter..... just like the other 6, 7 or 8 that are scattered all over our house. Because, we're ThinkPad people! My wife, ThinkPad T500, my son, ThinkPad T400, my daughter, ThinkPad X61, myself ThinkPad Xxxx. OK, you get the idea. I'm not terribly OCD, I'm just lazy. I don't want to move my adapter around as I go from place to place in the house. Oh.... guess what's at work? Yeah; ThinkPad L420! However, the irony of it, is that this prosaic little device also led me to exclude... a ThinkPad. The X1 Carbon... because it's thinness caused it to have a special (different than all other TPs) adapter! And that led me to...

"So, you didn't want an X1 so you bought and X1"? No; I'm not ready for the coo coo farm. I can't have an X1c (for Carbon), but I could have an X1 (1st gen). Like I could afford a "Carbon" anyway, but that's beside the point. So, here's the scenario: I'm looking around for something updated, but thin and light, AND wouldn't cause me to change peripherals. Oh yeah, and that I could afford! There's always that! In my examining the X1c (longingly) and finding it not quite the right fit (like that gorgeous girl in your Agronomy class that you never forgot, but I digress), I came across the original X1 which was the replacement for the X301 for those not up on ThinkPadology. Yes, it's bigger and heavier (by a whole, half a pound) than my X301. But it has USB 3.0 and a 13.3" screen that's not only brighter but also of a lower resolution (1366 x 768) than the X301 as well. I'm not sure I'm a big fan of the Corning "Gorilla Glass", but I can live with it.

As you can see; there's no optical drive, but the one I bought came with an external DVD burner. It is also the higher spec'd version with the 160Gb Intel SSD vs. a mechanical drive, so it was probably about $2000 give or take 2 and a half years ago when it was bought. Yup, it still has around 6 months of warranty left on it.

I'll put you out of your misery now. I give a hair over $305 (plus $26 2-Day shipping), and it's literally "mint", as in I can't find a mark on it, or the Lacie drive or the 2 power adapters or the Lenovo backpack that came with it. I've never bought a used computer that looked this new! 

Are there things I don't like? Yes. It's too big physically for a machine with a 13.3" screen, not huge, mind you, just a little too big. The 13" MacBook Air is better. The screen is very nice, but the resolution is a little low and the jury is still out on the glossy Gorilla Glass. Kinda don't like the 6-row vs. the traditional 7-row keyboard. HATE that some idiot decided that the headphone jack needed to be behind a rubber door! It runs a bit hot, but what doesn't these day? It's that I'm not used to a full power CPU (an i5 2520M in this case). It only came with 4Gb of RAM in one socket (vs. 2 normally). Only one of the 3 USBs is 3.0 and one is behind that stupid rubber door. Did I mention I hate the rubber door!?!

What do I like/love? Well.... LOOK AT IT!!! What's not to love!?! The people who have seen it pretty much have the same reaction.... WOW, it's really THIN! Oh, it's NOT silver. I really don't like eye-catching silver. The only thing wrong with the MBA. If it came in black you might be seeing me driving around with an Apple sticker on my truck.... OK, not really..... just sayin'. Anything else? Oh yeah, there's plenty. It's fast (well, duh you say), no it's really fast compared to the X301, The keyboard is great! It might be the best keyboard of any ThinkPad I've used since the legendary 600, and that's a company known for it's keyboards! Did I mention that it's back-lit as well? Not new for the Mac crowd, but nice for us plebes. The display is really bright and the 1366 x 768 is very kind to my aged eyes. It'll also nice to have an SD card reader onboard for when I'm using any of the cameras that uses that card. USB 3.0 is awesome. It's not as fast as Thunderbolt, but I'm so amazed by how much faster it is than 2.0, that I don't really care right now. Oh.... I love that it was $305! Which, by the way is about half of what I would have paid for an equivalent MacBook Air. After selling my X301, the cost of this upgrade will hover right around $0.... even after the 8Gb RAM upgrade on it's way from Israel!