Living With a ThinkPad X1 Carbon

For the by several weeks, I've been traveling with the 6th-gen ThinkPad X1 Carbon, Lenovo'due south ultraportable aimed at business travelers. I've liked previous versions of the machine a lot, but the newest version improves on last year's version in two large ways: it has a newer and much faster processor; and it's now available with a bear upon screen.

The bones pattern really hasn't inverse much at all. Information technology still has the classic black matte cease, with a 14-inch display, 1,920-past-1,080 IPS display with a minor bezel in a rather thin and light bundle. Information technology measures 0.63 by 12.74 past 8.55 inches (HWD) and weighs simply under two.5 pounds. For travel, the charger adds most ten ounces. It's still one of the easiest laptops to carry, admitting not the flashiest.

1 large difference is the new processor. The unit I tested had an Intel Core i5-8550U (Kaby Lake R), with 4 cores and 8 threads running at a nominal speed of 1.8GHz, with a turbo maximum of 4.0GHz, along with 8GB of retentivity and a 256GB SSD. (Every bit always, you tin can upgrade to higher processors, memory, and storage for more money.) Integrated Intel 620 graphics are fine for most business applications; as expected, this is non a motorcar aimed at serious gamers.

Previous models always seemed pretty snappy for most applications, but going from a dual-core processor (the i7-7600U in model I tested terminal year) to a quad-core one did make a huge departure in some applications. PCMark 8 benchmarks, which are mostly single-threaded, were downward slightly compared with the X1 Carbon with an i7-7600 U (Kaby Lake) I tested concluding year, only still higher than an X1 Yoga with an i5-7300U. I nonetheless found it more than fast enough for all the basic applications I use, such as word processing, light image editing, and spider web browser. But the big difference came in multi-threaded applications. Cinebench Open GL scores were notably higher.

To me, the biggest difference comes with the nearly intensive applications. A portfolio simulation in Matlab completed in ane 60 minutes, four minutes compared with 1 hour, 39 minutes on last year'due south version. That itself was a big step up: merely a few years ago, a model with a Core i5-6300U (Skylake) took 2 hours and thirteen minutes. Given that we're still talking about the same bones footprint and 14nm Cadre i5 processors in all cases, that's pretty stunning.

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon

Bombardment life was quite expert likewise. As always, information technology depends on what y'all are doing. PCMag's review showed an astonishing 17 hours, 26 minutes; when I ran PCMark 8 on a balanced setting with Wi-Fi on the screen at mid-brightness, I got 4 hours and 12 minutes. In the real earth, I notice that if I cull the "best battery performance" choice from the battery menu in the toolbar, I nonetheless can have Wi-Fi on, reasonable screen brightness, and do word processing and web browsing and nonetheless exist able to go a whole day at a conference and not worry most it.

The other big departure is that this year'southward X1 Carbon is at present available with a touch screen. This was bachelor on some before versions of the model but was last year's version; Lenovo made touch screens available just on the iii.ii-pound X1 Yoga. I didn't understand that then; I similar the Yoga simply find I don't actually utilise the tablet feature much, so I'm happier with a version that weighs 20 percent less. You find the weight if you're actually carrying it effectually all twenty-four hour period.

The other features haven't changed much, if at all. It all the same has a decent only unexceptional webcam on the heart of the bezel higher up the screen, and the speakers are adequate, but nothing special. It continues to have a fingerprint reader and supports Windows Hello. Like most ThinkPads, it has one of the all-time keyboards I've used in a thin machine. On the display side, you can also upgrade to a QHD (two,560-by-1440) brandish, with some other pick offer HDR capabilities. (I didn't try these.)

1 interesting alter is the addition of a mechanical shutter than covers the webcam when you aren't using it, which is very useful for those worried about malware snoops.

The port configuration has changed merely in a small variation where a connection for an Ethernet dongle is located—a alter that didn't make much deviation to me, as I near ever use Wi-Fi. If you utilise wired Ethernet a lot, you'll still wish information technology had a traditional connector. As with terminal year'southward model—and most new portables—information technology uses USB-C for charging. It as well has a second USB-C port with Thunderbolt support and two USB-A ports, along with an HDMI connector.

I'chiliad glad to see the USB-A ports—at that place are all the same a lot of accessories that utilise them. Hidden below the hinge on the back of the machine is a slot for a microSD bill of fare (which I find very useful for uploading photos from a photographic camera) and a SIM menu should you choose the version with an internal 4G modem.

Overall, the current ThinkPad X1 Carbon is the best lightweight notebook I've tested, perfect for executives who want a motorcar that is easy to carry and can give them neat battery life about of the time, and great functioning when they demand it.