Lenovo intros carbon-fibre ThinkPad Ultrabook It's ThinkPads a-go-go at Lenovo, with dozens of the black-clad laptops announced today in four families: the T, X, L and W series. Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon ThinkPad X1 Carbon The highlight is the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, built around a carbon-fibre chassis and intended to be the lightest pro-oriented Ultrabook there is. It's …
I own an X201 and used to have an Edge 13 and I've got an E520 at work.
Both types of keyboards are good, they're different certainly but both good.
I always think it's a bit of a shame that I've got it perched on a pile of books and use an external keyboard at work, it's just not as good as the internal one.
And you don't even mention that they've replaced their excellent keyboards with cichlet keyboards. More rubbish. People buy ThinkPads because of their design legacy and quality legacy from IBM. Don't try and change that design or quality. It's like trying to redesing a Jag E-Type. 99 times out of a hundred you'll mess up, as Lenovo have here.
Exactly. I can accept the changes to the keyboard between, for example, the 365xd and the X60 or X201, lose ~50% height and you don't have the space for full height keys, but this new "island" keyboard is rubbish. First saw it on the Thinkpad Edge from last year when the office gave me one to work on during the winter holidays, it was unusable. I had hoped that the premium lines (like the real X series) would have kept the proper keyboards but this looks like it won't be happening.
Worst bit is that since they are primarily bought as large institutional orders there isn't likely to be enough of an impact from any drop off in sales from the people who refuse to accept crap replacements for real laptops.
same stupid issue, after all these years the ctrl + fn keys are still the wrong way round. Lenovo have fixed this on their other laptops but the thinkpads are remaining the same.
If it wasn't for this stupid mistake the X1 looks great, would have prefered 1680x1050, those extra 150 pixels make a lot of difference.
Totally agree. The Fn key being in the bottom left is a major issue for me.
I'm told you can swap their functionality on software, but unless you can physically swap the keys themselves too then it's still a show-stopper.
Yes, I know it doesn't sound like a compelling reason not to purchase but it is for me personally.
The wrong way round Fn key is a woeful mistake and I can honestly say it frustrates me at least once a week by not actually copying something because I've pressed Fn+C. I've used them for about 6 years and still can't do it without thinking about it first.
Worse still is the new trackpad that the X1 seems to have, we've got some new(ish) T420's in the lab with the same one and basically the bottom of the whole pad is hinged as the left / right mouse button, doesn't sounds so bad until you try to click and drag, it is a finger bending feat of impossibility, plain and simple bad design. They've lost what it was that made them good.
-- By the way, this post was brought to you from my old, buckled and battle scared T60, definitely the toughest laptop I've ever used.
> The wrong way round Fn key is a woeful mistake and I can honestly say it frustrates me at
> least once a week by not actually copying something because I've pressed Fn+C. I've used
> them for about 6 years and still can't do it without thinking about it first.
I just took the Fn keycap off on the Lenovo laptops I've had. It still works, you just press the rubber dome in, but your finger seems to automatically look for the first proper key, which is now Ctrl. Can you still easily flick the keycaps off on chiclet keyboards?
They put a function in the BIOS to swap it over, but that doesn't help when the control freak IT department put a password on the BIOS...
> basically the bottom of the whole pad is hinged as the left / right mouse button
> doesn't sounds so bad until you try to click and drag, it is a finger bending feat of
> impossibility
Can't you double-tap and drag, like you could on the old trackpads? That's the end of my plan to buy an X121 if you can't. The other thing you can do is use the track-nipple buttons with your other hand.
Christ. Here we go again with the Lenovo function keys. The control key is in the correct place, next to the Windows key. Which is where there used to be a space on old keyboards. Yes, it would be better if control was a bit further to the left, but it has to go somewhere.
Why does no-one bitch about the right control key not being below right shift? Or the fact that F1 is no longer above 2? Keyboards don't have function keys. Wherever it goes it will be in the wrong place. Loads of laptops have everyday keys like home, end, page up and page down relegated to function key combos, which is far worse.
And as has been said, just switch them over in the bios if you need to. Nobody who uses computers daily has to look at the keys, so it's not a big deal. If it is, get some Tippex and write on the keys.
Lenovo should just make the keys the same size so the whingers can swap them over.
And the reason they don't change it is because there are people who are used to where it is, because this is where it's been for years.
What's more important is the fact that current generation Lenovos have crap displays. If this is fixed then great.
> The control key is in the correct place, next to the Windows key.
Yes, but a standard keyboard doesn't have the Fn key.
I'd argue that it's more important for Ctrl to be the left-most key than to be next to the Windows key.
You use things like Ctrl-Alt-Del and Ctrl-C/Ctrl-V regularly, and without thinking. The Fn is rarely used (by me, at any rate), and when you do you have to stop and look for the icon on the function key to press with it anyway.
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