The ThinkPad X1 Carbon Ultrabook from Lenovo is certainly shaping up to be a great choice for a premium business laptop; it weighs in at 1.36kg with a 14″ screen and ample enterprise options. Now the anticipated Ultrabook is available for purchase. With good marks from early reviews, the lightweight X1 Carbon’s only downside might be the price!
Ok, maybe more than price — the port set is pretty weak. You get just 2 USB ports (1x 2.0, 1x 3.0), and Mini DisplayPort as your only output option. Looking beyond this, the X1 looks like quite the business device. However, price might stand in the way of success for the X1 Carbon.
Lenovo is offering 4 variants of the X1 Carbon with no options for customizing hardware except choosing between a 128GB and 256GB SSD.
The low end unit starts at $1,329 with an Ivy Bridge Core i5-3317U processor @ 1.7GHz, 4GB of 1333MHz RAM, and a 128GB SSD. Add $100 and you get the next step up which is a slightly faster Core i5-3427U @1.8GHz. Moving up to $1,579 you get to the Core i7-3667U @ 2.0GHz as well as Windows 7 Professional (over Home premium on other models). The final offer adds $100 from the previous one (totaling $1,679) and pulls a rather strange move by downgrading from the i7 on the $1,579 model to the same i5-3427U processor as on the $1,429 option. It also drops down from Windows 7 Professional to Windows 7 Home Premium. In place of these you get 8GB of RAM, double that of the other models. It should be noted that RAM offered in all models of the X1 Carbon is 1333MHz which is not the fastest RAM support by the chipset — other Ultrabooks offer max speed 1600MHz RAM. And no, it doesn’t look like you can upgrade the i7 model to 8GB of RAM.
Lenovo is accepting orders for the ThinkPad X1 carbon now and all models are expected to ship on the 30th of September. Like other Ultrabooks and Laptops, the X1 Carbon is eligible for a $14.99 Windows 8 upgrade through WindowsUpgradeOffer.com.
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This thing looks Awesome!! Way more features, more everything than my U300s… price is hard to stomach though.
Hopefully I’ll help sell this to clients and get to test it out in person.
I am now waiting for mine: 3427U with 8 / 256 GB storage.
Not cheap, but I’m sure it’ll be pretty amazing.
I am a computer programmer, so keyboard & general build quality was of topmost concern – Lenovo appears to have this down pat as the market leaders.
X1C keyboard isn’t as good as the X/T/W/L keyboards. Shorter throw. Sad that they couldn’t add an extra mm or two to get the keyboard up to par with the rest of Thinkpads, but still by far the best ultrabook keyboard though.
bt X/T/W/L I meant X2xx/T/W/L.
The myriad swappable battery options and the battery slices made the thinkpads the ultra mobility DREAM for a long time. I had my company spend an INSANE amount of money on one years ago and besides being butt ugly it is still the all-time mobility champion. -What are the battery and battery slice options on the X1 Carbon?
Adam
Adam, there are no battery options on the X1C. Battery time is limited to around 6 hours for normal usage, however it _will_ charge to 80% in 35 minutes.
If you need more battery options, explore their other products.
Oh… So the great Thinkpad of old’s gravestone is shaped like an X1 Carbon, in that case…
My Thinkpad X60 from years gone by got 8 hours out of the larger capacity extended battery then 4 more out of the slice and I had a 2nd 8 hour battery. -It was a DREAM. The port replicator was pretty small and together it was a mobility monster that let you compute as long as you needed. Fast forward to 2012 and there’s no battery options and only 6 hours…
Poor Thinkpad; what have Intel and the Chinese done to you! *CRY*
Adam
Shipping delays of over a month. I placed an order on August 14th and my original estimated ship date of August 24th was changed 3 times without notification.
The current estimated ship date is September 26. Over a month behind schedule. If you’re in the same boat, Lenovo is offering a $150 concession for the delay – you just have to ask for it.
Ordering directly from Lenovo has a reputation of delay… sorry to hear it.
I recommend ordering from a 3rd party like Amazon or Newegg. I ordered my U300s from Newegg and got it in 2 days, great experience.
Starting at 1,000 EUR? I wish. In Finland, the i5 model starts at 2,300 EUR (3,000 USD). What a ridiculous price for a laptop that doesn’t even have a dedicated GPU! Meanwhile, them MacBook Pro Retinas start at 2,100 EUR. I really wanted to get the new X1, but at these prices.. no way.