Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Touch Pro Reviews

There's no denying the portable nature of this thin 'n' light laptop, even if it is undercut in both metrics by a 13.3-inch MacBook Air. The ThinkPad's processor performance is fractionally faster thanks to its 0.1 GHz advantage over the latter, but the overall choice of CPU, operating system and display together compromise the X1 Carbon's battery life to provide less than half that of what's possible. In its favour, the X1 Carbon has better screen image quality and a characterful keyboard that can command a loyal following. Ultimately, the X1 Carbon looks overpriced and more cheaply constructed than the MacBook Air, and moreover loses out against the more affordable MacBook Pro with Retina display.

Almost everything about the new X1 Carbon is better than the original. But the company's engineers should have left most of the keyboard alone. We can also do without its speech- and gesture-recognition.

All in all, the new X1 Carbon has a lot to recommend it. Its lightweight, durable design makes it an excellent choice for frequent travelers, and the gorgeous touch screen is perfect for watching movies on a long flight. We also loved the laptop's innovative adaptive function row, which elegantly solves the perennial issue of whether or not to reverse the function keys. And like all ThinkPad notebooks, the Carbon provides an outstanding typing experience. For $1,529, however, we expect better audio and a battery that lasts a full workday on a charge. Moreover, the keyboard configuration could be better (the placement of the Delete key next to Backspace is especially annoying) and the mouse buttons at the top of the touch pad feel stiff. The competition is getting fierce, too: Though its screen resolution is lower, the HP EliteBook Folio 1040 G1 delivers eight hours of battery life and a load of business-friendly features in a durable aluminum chassis that's barely heavier than the Carbon for $1,299.Still, we have no doubt that business users who spend a lot of time on the road will love the new ThinkPad X1 Carbon. If you're looking for a thin and light ultrabook that doesn't skimp on performance or durability, the Carbon should be at the top of your list.

The Lenovo ThinkPad Carbon Touch (2014) makes some bold changes to one of our favorite business ultrabooks, but while it's still a good laptop, not every change is for the better.

As with Lenovo's other recent ThinkPad releases, there are a lot of things to like about the ThinkPad X1 Carbon: it is very thin and light, yet has the appeal of a classic ThinkPad all the way down to the red keyboard trackpoint. The display is phenomenal, and will satisfy digital artists, graphic designers, photographers, or anyone with a hearty appreciation for a high-quality display. Despite its thin size, the X1 Carbon has all the ports most users will need in a laptop, with the exception of Ethernet, though as there is an adapter for that, as mentioned.The battery life remains the laptop's Achilles heel, and is the only reason one might want to think twice going with Lenovo's svelte offering. If a long run time sans power cord is necessary for your job or comfort of mind, the newly released X240 or ThinkPad T440s would be a much better option, though they come with their own trade-offs: a heftier body and lower-res displays. This isn't to say that any one of these laptops are better than the others; on the contrary, it is just that when it comes down to it, depending on your needs, you won't likely have your cake and eat it too. Sacrifice will be necessary in some area, and if you're okay with that area being battery life, the X1 Carbon is a satisfactory option in every other way.

The third version of the ThinkPad X1 is the best to date, and it remains one of the only choices for a slim, high-design business laptop with premium features. The addition of both a 2,560x1,440-pixel-resolution display and the adaptive function key row is welcome, but these upgrades also drive the price up high enough that you're likely to have to twist some arms to get your IT department to get this as your next work laptop.

While the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon feels solidly built and impressively light, with pretty good battery life and a generally very comfortable keyboard, whether or not it’s a good fit for you depends largely on how you weigh the changes Lenovo has made to the laptop’s keyboard, and if you find the Adaptive Keyboard row compelling. What we can say is that the adaptive keys work well and can be quite handy. We particularly like the shortcut to the Snipping Tool, which allows us to quickly grab screenshots. But we’d really like to see Lenovo add some tactile feedback to these keys. Ideally, we’d like to see actual keys on this row that can change their underlying icons to match different tasks, as we’ve seen with the Switchblade UI on the Razer Blade Pro. That would also allow for the Function row keys to remain tactile for those who frequently use them. As it stands, Lenovo has moved enough keys around on the 2014 Carbon to confuse and annoy quite a few potential users—likely many of them ThinkPad loyalists with decades of touch typing and shortcut-key muscle memory under their belts. And the screen, while it generally looks good, isn’t very bright and generally doesn’t perform as well as we’d expect for a flagship notebook. Still, if you aren’t put off by the keyboard changes and like the idea of the Adaptive Keyboard, the 2014 Carbon is a light, well-built business laptop that also runs quite cool and quiet. Our review model certainly isn’t inexpensive at $1,679, but the $1,299 base model retains the same CPU and SSD, as well as the Adaptive Keyboard, while dropping the resolution of the screen down to 1,600×900 and ditching the touchscreen. Those are significant sacrifices to be sure, but that model should also get significantly better battery life.

This quietly elegant executive notebook is small, slim, sturdy and a dream to use. It's expensive, and its battery life is short, but it's one of the best business-travel companions we've seen.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Touch is a wonderful piece of design and engineering that offers a fearsome performance in a sleek and classy chassis. However, the staggering price and underwhelming battery life make the touchscreen Ultrabook hard to recommend.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X Carbon Touch is the ultrabook your executive users will want.

Ultimately, if you're still smarting from what Lenovo has done with the ThinkPad brand like I am, it can be difficult to appreciate the X1 Carbon. It bears repeating this really is an excellent Ultrabook, falling short primarily in battery life and price but otherwise pretty tough to argue with. And Lenovo has been thriving compared to some of the competition, so they must be doing something right. I just don't like how they've sacrificed the ThinkPad brand on the altar of consumerism, and the X1 Carbon doesn't buck the trend. It's a fantastic Ultrabook, but it's not enterprise.

It's a shame every touchscreen Ultrabook we've tested delivers such skimpy battery life. It forces us to recalibrate our expectations, and not necessarily in a good way. One of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon's biggest shortcomings is that its built-in battery only lasts five hours on a charge. That's a disappointment but again, we don't know of many touchscreen laptops that fare better. Leaving battery life aside, then, we can instead focus on things like the keyboard, trackpad, performance and build quality -- all areas where the X1 Carbon excels. Starting with ergonomics, this has one of the best keyboard / touchpad combinations we've seen on a laptop, and that's not even counting that signature red pointing stick. We're also enamored with the design: aside from being well-made, the X1 Carbon Touch is also notably thin and light for a 14-inch machine, especially one with a touchscreen. The display is hardly our favorite, what with the narrow viewing angles, but at least the 1,600 x 900 resolution is nice and crisp.

Lenovo adds multitouch to its business Ultrabook, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, but it’s far from an essential upgrade

Lenovo doesn't clear the field without a fight and, in our opinion, again faces the customer with a premium and virtually complete business ultrabook. The competition has failed to release an equal, mobile slim device to date. Neither HP nor Dell offer a touch ultrabook for this demanding target group and other manufacturers are currently only upgrading their midrange or high-end contenders with input devices of the third dimension. Considering only the screen quality, i.e. resolution, contrast, color space, viewing angles, the HD+ screen upgrade in our X1 Carbon cannot compete against Asus' UX31A, Acer's Aspire S7 391, Lenovo's IdeaPad Yoga 13, Samsung's 900X4C / 900X3C or Dell's XPS 13 consumer devices. An IPS or PLS screen would have looked much better regarding the 14-incher's price. However, the X1 still sports a non-glare screen and no competitor ultrabook featuring touch can afford that. The TN screen's viewing angles easily defeat the (few) real business ultrabooks in this regard (Latitude 6430u & HP's Folio 9470m). HP's EliteBook 9470m disappoints with a color-weak HD screen, Dell's Latitude 6430u optionally available with HD+, that we have not yet tested. The casing is thicker and the runtime is shorter.

Like all Ultrabooks the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Touch offers decent performance in a portable package. We love the Carbon Touch's build and design, and the screen is great. Performance is solid. If you need a portable touchscreen laptop for your working life, this is a great option. But like all Ultrabooks it is far from cheap.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Touch is a good successor to the first generation X1 Carbon. It retains almost everything that is good about the original while adding the touchscreen many people value in a Windows 8 machine. You’ll get a an excellent keyboard, a larger than average display without a bulky or heavy chassis, and performance that’s good enough for heavier tasks. The system’s weak points are mostly due to the touchscreen itself. And if the lower battery life, heavier weight, and poorer viewing angles are deal breakers for you, at least there’s a good alternative in the first-gen X1 Carbon. Even with those issues, this is one of the better Windows 8 touchscreen laptops we’ve tested.

Adding Windows 8 and a touch screen keeps the X1 Carbon in the running as one of the only really high-end crossover thin laptops you can find right now. Lenovo itself does some more inventive stuff with the Yoga, Helix, and other models, but this is a sharp-looking business machine for serious PC users.

Lenovo got a lot of things right with the ThinkPad X1 Carbon, and all the advantages carry over to the Carbon Touch: it's light, gorgeous, functional, and powerful enough for every realistic ultrabook task. But like the X1 Carbon, the Carbon Touch gets too hot, comes with too much bloatware, and just costs too much. You could spend your $1,500 on an Asus Zenbook Prime and get a better display, or spend it on the MacBook Air. If Lenovo could either improve the battery life or sell the Carbon Touch for about $200 less, buying it would be a no-brainer. But as it is, you're paying a huge premium for the fit and finish of the X1 Carbon Touch, and unless your pockets are deep, that might be hard to justify. I really like the device, but when I have to send back my review unit I don't think I'll be buying one. I'll say this, though: if you're going to buy the X1 Carbon, buy the touchscreen. As Windows 8 matures, it's going to become even more touch-friendly, and I don't care what Steve Jobs said — touchscreen laptops are awesome. The fingerprints all over my MacBook Air's screen, left as I prodded the display in vain, can attest to that.