Crave’s Most Notable Notebooks from 1H 2008
July 1, 2008
Matthew Elliott hast posted an article about what he considers to be the most noteworthy notebooks to have passed through CNET in the past six months. This isn’t necessarily the highest-ranks of the review notebooks either, but ones that instead introduced something new or that did something that helped differentiate them from others.
Ultraportable laptops listed:
- Apple MacBook Air
- Lenovo IdeaPad U110
- Lenovo ThinkPad X300
- Asus Eee PC 900
- HP Compaq 2133 Mini-Note PC
- Asus Eee PC 901
Out of the 10 notebooks listed (including honorable mentions), ultraportables captured six of those positions (with three being “netbooks”).
Read: Crave / CNET
Lenovo ThinkPad SL300 - Official
June 24, 2008
Looks like Lenovo officially acknowledged yesterday, the existence of the Lenovo ThinkPad SL300, a small-business oriented laptop, and the smallest member of a new ThinkPad line.
We first heard about the SL series ThinkPad X61 have. It’s also missing a few other features (the infamous Think Light, Ultrabay, etc.), but it will allow for 4-cell to 9-cell batteries, which depending on what Intel Core 2 Duo CPU is running, should provide plenty of battery life (no word on weight when the 9-cell battery is installed).
It does offer a few things previous ThinkPads did not - a lower price, an online backup service, and an HDMI out port.
More details as well as model numbers and model pricing, will be announced in the coming weeks.
Read:
PC World
SSD Versus Hard Drive
June 23, 2008
Over at the Lenovo “Inside the Box” blog, Matt Kohut reported on swapping his existing 7200rpm 2.5-inch hard drive for a 1.8-inch 64GB Solid State Drive (SSD) in his ThinkPad. It did involve using an adapter from a 1.8-inch form factor to a 2.5-inch form factor.
This was the same 1.8-inch 64GB Samsung SSD found in the 13.3-inch Lenovo ThinkPad X300.
Using Acronis’ Migrate Easy software, he copied everything over to the SSD using an Ultrabay adapter, then replaced his existing mechanical hard drive with the SSD.
His comments on performance, heat, and battery life are interesting:
The difference was immediate and dramatic. Boot time was cut in half. Our corporate email program and instant messaging program also load in one half of the time they used to. Even opening and closing large MS Office PowerPoint files is a much faster operation than ever before. Though all of those were enough to make me go “Wow!,” here is the most surprising thing of all: my web browsing has become noticeably much zippier. Pages literally just snap into place. I never thought browsing was slow before, so the difference is all the more dramatic. A few more observations:
# This drive definitely runs cooler. I can’t even feel it under my palm rest like I could with my old drive.
# Battery life has definitely improved. When I am actively using my PC, I get about an extra 20 – 30 minutes per charge. When I’m doing something more passive (at least from a system perspective) like email, my battery life is now about an hour longer than before.
Read: Inside the Box (LenovoBlogs.com)
Lenovo ThinkPad X200 - More Details, July 14th Release
June 19, 2008
In a follow-up to details leaked last week about the upcoming 12.1-inch Lenovo ThinkPad X200, more images, specifications, and a release date have been leaked through 51nb.com.
Among the new details, an updated Magnesium Alloy-based chassis that houses a ThinkPad T-series size keyboard (probably due to the 12.1-inch widescreen display) that will be thinner than the existing ThinkPad X61 series.
It will be based on Intel’s Centrino 2 + VPro platform and will handle either 667MHz DDR2 or 1067MHz DDR3 Memory.
Drive options include a 64GB Solid State Drive (SSD) or up to a 7200rpm 200GB Serial ATA (SATA) hard drive.
A July 14 release date is mentioned.
Read:
- 51nb.com (Chinese)
- 51nb.com (translated)
ThinkPad SL300 - Details
June 9, 2008
Along with details about the ThinkPad X200, it would appear that Lenovo is also intent on launching a cheaper, more consumer-oriented 13.3-inch ThinkPad that would represent a new line sort of - it’s the low-end version of the ThinkPad X200 series, but it won’t be competing with the ThinkPad X300 which is a premium/high-end 13.3-inch laptop and which targets a different audience than the X200 series.
Details about the ThinkPad SL300:
- Low-end version of the ThinkPad X200 Series
- 13.3-inch Widescreen
- Intel Core 2 Duo
- Optional Blu-ray optical drive
- Two graphics options - Intel GMA or NVIDIA GeForce 9300 (similar to what some Dell models carry)
- Possible integrated GPS module
Read:
- ThinkPad.cn (Chinese)
- ThinkPad.cn (Translated into English)
Via: Forums.ThinkPads.com
ThinkPad X200 - Details
June 9, 2008
More details about the Lenovo ThinkPad X200 have finally surfaced. The X200 is the widescreen 12.1-inch replacement for the well-respected ThinkPad X61 / X61s lineup. Previously, the 12-inch ThinkPad X series were using a 4:3 “square” display and when the 13.3-inch Lenovo ThinkPad X300 was released, it was expected that the ultraportable end up of the X series would follow suit.
Models:
- ThinkPad X200 - Mid-range
- ThinkPad X200s and X200T (X200 Tablet) - high-end
- ThinkPad SL300 - Low-end (13.3-inch)
Details that emerged yesterday:
- 12-inch widescreen display
- 45nm Intel Core 2 Duo, including 2.4GHz (which means it’s probably the Core 2 Duo T8300 with 3MB L2 Cache and an 800MHz FSB)
- Depending on CPU, settings, and battery pack, up to 9+ hours of battery life
- Choice of drive storage, including Solid State Drive (SSD)
- DDR3 Memory (we are iffy about this)
- Weight starts at under 2.93 pounds
It’s also being mentioned that it will have a DisplayPort connector, a relatively new video/audio connector.
We have some additional details that we are trying to confirm and will post them tomorrow (June 10, 2008) once we have confirmation.
Read:
- ThinkPad.cn (Chinese)
- ThinkPad.cn (Translated into English)
Via: Forums.ThinkPads.com
