Lenovo expands laptop offerings
Enterprise users (ThinkPad X; ThinkPad T; ThinkPad W)The ThinkPad series has always been synonymous with reliability and toughness. For the business traveler, the X series offers portability and long battery life while the T models provide larger screen sizes and greater performance. The R range is an affordable option for users who do not need the roll-cage protection present in the T chassis and the W lineup caters to the the workstation clients. A common feature in ThinkPads is the ThinkVantage technology, which backs up the machine as well as handles the maintenance and security of the portable.Joining the existing ThinkPad X300 laptop is the new X200 notebook, which replaces the older X61. Besides bumping up the chipset to the newer Centrino 2 platform with vPro, the most obvious difference is that the X200 now sports a 16:10 widescreen instead of the 4:3 aspect ratio of its predecessor. This might be upsetting to some business users who prefer the latter as it is easier to read long documents on a taller display, though fortunately the new model still maintains a matte coating on the display which makes it more readable in bright environments than its transflective equivalent. According to Matthew Kohut, Lenovo's worldwide competitive analyst, this change was driven by the fact that widescreens are cheaper to manufacture and hence its penetration rate will only increase in the future. However, one of the advantages is that, thanks to its wider dimensions, Lenovo was able to fit a full-sized keyboard similar to the one in the larger T series in the new X200. It is also thinner and lighter than the X61, though there is still no integrated optical drive under the hood. Unlike the older T61 models which might have confused users since it came in both 14.1-inch and 15.4-inch variants, the new T range clearly differentiates between the two. The T400 has a 14.1-inch display while the T500 goes with a larger 15.4-inch screen. Thanks to the new Centrino 2 chipset, these laptops can be equipped with switchable graphics (available in some configurations) which allow the machine to use the integrated video card when battery life is paramount. But when performance is key, the discrete graphics card can be activated instead. One aspect which we did not like about the new T series was the fact that it did not have a HDMI port to supplement its VGA output. Though there are adapters to convert the available DisplayPort into other digital standards, this adds another item which a user might lose. Moreover, each adapter adds about US$50 to the buying price. According to Kohut, the reason why a HDMI port was not integrated was because there is a royalty fee attached to the standard. This would have increased the initial capital outlay for a feature which caters more to consumers than enterprise users. The 14.1-inch R400 and 15.4-inch R500 are cheaper, thicker and heavier versions of the T equivalents. The extra weight and size are due to the fact that they do not incorporate an internal "roll-cage" to protect the mainboard and LCD. As such, more material had to be used to ensure that the exterior can hold up to the same torture tests as the T series. In addition, as there is no HSDPA antenna built into the R models so this capability is not an option. The ThinkPad W500 (15.4-inch screen) and W700 (17-inch screen) are workstations for professional designers. Instead of the gaming-standard ATI Mobility Radeon or Nvidia GeForce video cards, the W series are equipped with FireGL or Quadro chips from the respective manufacturers. These video cards work better for OpenGL rendering applications and is Independent Software vendors (ISV) certified for popular design programs such as AutoCAD and Adobe Premiere. So with such an extensive offering, just which market is Lenovo missing out? We'll give you a hint: Try finding a Lenovo system which can run faster than the Toshiba Qosmio X300 or Dell XPS M1730 for Crysis. New enterprise ThinkPads
|
|
- Talkback
-
There are currently no comments for this story.
To post comments, you need to become a member. It's FREE.
