Another review: X220

This is my forst post here, so: Hello everyone!

I finally had the time to write up a little review of the X220 I purchased a couple of weeks ago, and I think more is better with respect to reviews. So far I have been browsing this forum and reading reviews, which I found very helpful - so this is my attempt at giving something back.

The X220 I purchased goes by the name 4290-W1B. The most important characteristics of this machine:

- i5
- IPS
- mSata & HDD, but no operating system

The requirements I have with regard to this machine are: (i) mobility, (ii) screen and (iii) performance, specifically CPU power for tasks requiring intense computation, but only over short periods of time. Additionally, (iv) durability.


(i) mobility

The low weight and long battery life certainly meet my expectations. I am not sure how long this laptop goes on its 6 cell battery, but about enough for a day – of course, there is always the optional 9 cell or slice battery should I require more. The computer idles at around 4 – 5 Watts power consumption (according to TVPM), that is with a screen brightness of around 8 and Wifi enabled.


(ii) screen

This was a main reason for choosing the X220 over other computers. At home I have access to an Eizo screen, I again wanted something with good readability. I value my eyesight, and starring at a screen for the better part of some days can be really straining and kills my productivity.
The screen has an issue and cannot live up to my expectations. There is a slight flickering, barely noticeable and just enough to irritate. This is most visible on solid colours, such as white but even more on grey backgrounds. I am not sure how to describe the effect and it seems to occur sometimes only, but it looks like horizontal lines moving vertically up the screen. In fact, this reminds me rather of CRT monitors.
If I can fix this somehow, the screen would be pretty good. The only thing I miss is an automatic brightness adjustment. This is a convenience I got used to with my Eizo. Without having experienced it, I would never have known how valuable this can be and probably not missed it.


(iii) performance

Compared to my 5-year old Apple, performance is not comparable. I am running everything from the Intel mSata SSD using AHCI. The HDD I took out, because I don’t need it. The CPU is throttle is very good and the computer remains passively cooled throughout editing texts and similar tasks. For some webpages the fan sometimes spins up for a while. The CPU is at around 40 degrees Celsius.
For tasks requiring more performance the CPU peaks at around 90 degree Celsius. The fan is audible, but appropriate considering the size of the machine. Surprising is that the exterior remains cool under all circumstances, not so my old Apple. Only where the CPU/GPU sits the bottom of the laptop is slightly hotter than at other parts, even when really hot air is expelled by the fan.


Bottom line

The screen issue is bothering me. Apart from that this is a really good machine. It combines portability and provides sufficient performance when needed (for me, at least).
Regarding (vi) durability: only time will tell. My Apple suffered from various issues right from the start, and I have suffered with it. This was, maybe, bad luck, but bad luck for me and bad luck for Apple. Another laptop I have a long personal history with is a Sony laptop, the best laptop I ever possessed: 11 years old (give or take) and still kicking (slowly nowadays, in comparison). Hence my decision was between waiting for an updated Sony Vaio Z and purchasing a Lenovo X220. I opted for the X220 for no reason obvious to me, but good experiences of people I know and trust definitely helped.
I can recommend the X220, but beware of the possible issues (see other reviews for more details).

Another point for those interested or affected: The only recent bios/ version that does not occasionally create bluescreens is 1.15. Both 1.16 and 1.17 do not without problems. This may become an issue when an update supporting the fingerprint reader and UEFI is available.

Hope it was worth reading this.

Edit: Three points that slipped my mind before concerning the webcam, portability and opening the laptop.

webcam: That little diode signaling when the webcam is operating is more like an interrogation light. A very bright green spot! I thought of putting some transparent tape over it, should fix the problem without making the LED completely superfluous.

portability: The battery is perfect for carrying this machine around. Usually I would feel bad for gripping a laptop at the battery, but this one has such a low weight. In fact, there is no other way of carrying it because of the shape, apart from on the flat hand maybe.

opening the laptop: This can be a little more difficult than on heavier laptops. There is a small part where it is possible to get a grip on the lid, but that still leaves holding the other part of the laptop in place. Not perfect, but acceptable.

 

Thanks for posting and welcome to NBR. As for the screen, I've never noticed anything like you've described. I wonder if it's one of those things where only a subset of people will ever see it?

 

Your refresh rate is probably at 50 Hz instead of 60 Hz. The power manager changes it apparently when in battery saving mode. I'm not convinced it saves much power. Right click on desktop to get into your screen settings and change it back to 60 Hz or choose a performance power mode.

 

Yeah, try changing your refresh rate to 60 Hz if it is not already. If you are concerned, do contact Lenovo.

 

In the graphics properties there is an automatic brightness option...

I'd really be curious to know how you idle at 4-5. I idle at 7-8.

 

As others have mentioned, what you're probably seeing is the screen refresh rate changing from 60 Hz to 50 Hz. This is meant to save battery life, but is just perceptible enough to be annoying.

There's a bug with the lenovo/intel graphics driver that changes the refresh rate to 50 Hz when the laptop is unplugged, even when it's set not to change in power manager. There's a hack to fix this here:

X220 uncontrollably switches to 50Hz refresh rate ... - Page 3 - Lenovo Community

 

There is a long thread on the Lenovo Community called: Faint Ghosting on X220 IPS screen - Lenovo Community

 

Thank you for that suggestion. I already suspected that the refresh rate was changed in some way, so I turned the automatic 60 -> 50 Hz off. If there is such a suftware bug, this may explain what I experience. Strange though that it is noticeable.
I will observe things a little longer and see whether this really occurs only when unplugged.

The power draw may be lower, because I use only the mSata SSD and only one DDR3 bar. Not sure this explains 4 Watts, but maybe 2 Watts and so sounds quite like the order.

PS: I updated the first post with some random information that slipped my mind that time.

 

You need to turn it off in the Intel HD Graphics screen though. If you only changed it under the Lenovo Power Manager, it doesn't actually do anything.

 

Even if you turn off refresh rate switching in power manager and the Intel HD graphics properties, 60 -> 50 Hz switching will still sometimes occur. This is a known bug, and there's a long thread devoted to it. The fix is to apply the hack linked above or delete the Intel process responsible for switching. Hopefully this will be addressed in the next video driver release.

 

As far as I know, no matter what you do, unless you disable a part of the Intel driver from running, it will switch from 60Hz to 50Hz when you unplug it.

 

Why not just carry it like a textbook? That is usually how I do it. Generally I don't like to hang on to the battery like that with worry that it will damage the prongs. Of course that may just be in my head. I find the laptop tacky enough to just grip it in my hand without it slipping out. But usually I just carry it like a textbook.

Ditto, even on 50 hertz I don't see it.

Me too. With just the mSATA in my computer I idle at ~5.35w (I thought I was doing good). But that is with the wireless radio disabled, ethernet on... brightness low. As soon as I plug in the HDD, it adds about 0.5w when spun down.

That is nuts. With just the mSATA in (no HDD) I idle at 5.35w with no wireless and low brightness.

I wonder what voltage you are running at? Mine tends to be at 0.8005 when it is idling at 800 mhz. Could you check?

Are you running Windows? Thought maybe if you weren't running windows that could cause the drop down. I have yet to see someone say they were idling that low with the x220, that is impressive.

I have the 2520 with 1 stick of 4gb also. Also using the Intel 310 80gb. Which one are you rocking (maybe I missed that)? Which BIOS? I'm rocking 1.16.



P.S. This is with a factory install. I did have a clean install, but found it idled about 0.8w higher.

 

It is.

I wonder if those same people would have a tough time with mains-powered lights in many countries...

 

If you tell me how to find the CPU voltage, I may be able to tell you. Though I would not expect the voltage to be very different from yours, might rather draw less Amps?

POWER DRAW: Regarding the by comparison lower power draw of my X220 may be due to several things I might have done differently than other users here:

- screen brightness: I am usually at around 9, and even less now (see below). Going above a brightness level of 10 the power manager shows a draw of 5 Watts or more.

- deactivated all components I do not use in BIOS, such as fingerprint reader (not supported using UEFI). There might be a culprit here.

- did a clean install of Win7: this may be regarded as somewhat controversial, because the general attitude seems to be that the factory install does better. I included as little software as possible; after the Win7 installation the device manager did not list a single unidentified piece of hardware without any additional software installation, because I included all of the necessary driver in the Win7 installation. This may come with less overhead than a proper software installation necessary for drivers later on.

- deactivated non-essential services, though I have bloated the system to about 60 active services recently by installing more software in order to use features such as InstantResume. This is my first Win7 computer, I have been using WinXP until recently and was used to a bare 19 active services!

- BIOS is 1.15. All other versions, as previously stated, occasionally result in BSOD when booting from the mSata SSD.

- Power Manager settings: I do not set System Performance to “Low”, but rather to “Balanced”. Somehow low seems to affect picture quality. Looking at the text on the Power Manager window, it seems to blur slightly when I set it to “Low”.

Maybe someone here has more expertise and can judge these points. Anyway, hope this helps! In fact, I simply believe the following: TVPM might not be the most accurate software to measure/compare.


SCREEN: The issue I had with the screen I managed to resolve. Using the device manager to install the latest Intel driver for the HD3000 did the job. While I did start off with an Intel driver, I might have messed things up by using the Lenovo update utility.
I do not think this has anything to do with the 50Hz/60Hz software bug that people describe. Going to 50Hz poses no problems anymore.

One more point: After installing the Intel driver, the screen brightness increased. About same magnitude as increasing it manually by 1 or so.

 

In my case, your assumption is indeed correct!

 

You are just using the msata right? No HDD installed? Were you using the Intel 310 or another?

I'm still shocked at how low you are idling considering you are running W7 and pretty much identical to me. Ha, crazy. Thanks for the input, this helps us slightly obsessed with maximizing battery life

 

Moral of the story: people have different eyesight, based on genetics, age and how updated their prescriptions are! I would add, people have different levels of tolerance for issues: born and raised in the USA, when I spent a summer in London, I couldn't believe how annoyingly the "mains" made lights constantly flicker. My flatmate, a Briton, laughed and said: "when I went to the states I thought 'strange the way the lights have this constant glare; I actually was more comfortable with the occasional dimming!' "

As for the X220's IPS screen: as a $700 laptop screen, I'd take it over the washed out, low contrast, low viewing angle non-flickering/non-ghosting $700 laptop screens. Compared to a MBP, a Sony Z or other high quality screens, the X220 isn't in their league, even though the former two are TN. Compared to any other IPS screen I've seen (eg, hp dreamcolor, dell premiere), well, apples and oranges, the fact that the X220's is IPS does not mean it compares to all other IPS screens.

Quality always costs more, and there's only so much you can expect from a $700 laptop.

IMO, of course.

 

I've done some more testing...

I did a plain Win 7 install and then added in important lenovo drivers, and my power usage is about the same as my fully configured set that I brought over from my T60P. So, in that sense, if I start from scratch with a clean install it won't do me any good.

I then did a factory restore so it loaded up the pre-configured X220 setup that's customized by Lenovo. That config seemed to idle .5w - 1w lower than my config. The only difference is that my config runs on a 1st gen SSD drive and the Factory config I tested was with the included 250gb seagate 5400 HDD. The factory config also has 89 processes active which is a lot, my config only has about 70.

So, after doing some research, I'm beginning to think it's my SSD drive drawing the extra power. It looks like SSD drives can vary between .1w and 1.5w from idle to moderate usage, so I'm going to upgrade my ssd to the Intel 320 that's supposed to idle at .1w. We'll see if that makes a difference.

Edit:
I did a test yesterday using my laptop straight through with a fairly typical usage pattern for me and I got 6:00 hours when I the 5% mark and my battery warning popped up.

I'd love to get 7 hours. I only need to find 1 watt!!!

 

Could be the drive.

Frankly I'd stick an msata + hdd drive combo. I would think that would draw the least power compared to a dedicated SSD only. However I may be off. I thought my hdd was consuming .5w idling, but frankly it only seems to be drawing .1w. The Intel 310 seems to be the lowest power consuming msata out there. I believe this one only draws .175w while active.

For me with the msata + hdd combo, a clean install idled higher... almost a whole watt. My idle now when the hdd is spun down is 5.35 with wireless disabled and brightness low. At full charge, my battery reads 10.5 hours... lol I wish it would consistently drain from that.

 

I have a WWAN card otherwise I'd try the msata route. I can get 5-6 with wireless on and brightness at 1, but that's as low as it'll go. Just for fun I checked my T60p with Flexview display and it's drawing about 20 watts with the same power settings

 

Ahh, yes I had the WWAN originally too. I know this isn't an option for everyone, but figured I'd throw it out. Have you considered just tethering your phone to your laptop and tossing the WWAN? For me at least, I was paying about 110 for WWAN and cell phone. Now that I just tether it only costs me 75 a month. Granted I use a Webos phone with freetether so they can't tell I'm actually tethering lol. For me it was idle since now I only have a single bill, costs less and really simplifies things.

So 5-6 watts with brightness at 1 and wireless on? That actually isn't too bad though. So you are around 7-8 watts when browsing the internet?

 

yeah, I can tether to my j/b iphone, but having it built-in and it auto switches to wwan when it doesn't detect wifi, it's just sweeeeeet.

I have the $30/unlimited data plan from my old iPad that I just popped the sim card into the X220 and voila.

Surfing speeds really vary based on web content, thinking about running a no-flash plugin or something to control the power draw. Also tempted to look at running a dual boot with a linux option thinking maybe that would do well.

Just still experimenting at this point, but love the laptop.

 

Yah if you do use the WWAN a lot it is hard to beat the internal card. Only time I really use WWAN is on vacation/traveling.

I'm still messing with things to lower watt usage. I found that a few services that were disabled lowered usage, but not by a lot. Seems most has to do with the components and the screen. Sometimes when I boot I'll see it at 5w even and it actually stays there. But usually it stays around 5.35. Don't really know what that variance is, but I'd like to find out. Wondering if it has something to do with scheduled tasks or something?

 

Well Windows is always doing stuff in the background, just the way the system works.

I've gone through my services with a fine-toothed comb and am at 52 active processes after a boot and running everything I need.

I'm running the i3 on Adaptive with Max Battery for everything (wireless, display, etc) with the Intel 6300. WWAN disable. Running very old toshiba 128gb SSD drive.

Display at 0 here are my idle watts from the Battery tab on Power Manager.
5.2
4.83
4.63
5.43
4.87
4.72
4.78
5.0
4.8
4.83

If I let the screen blank and then pop it out by moving the mouse, I can see the watts at 3.6 - 3.8'ish, so it looks like the display at 0 takes about 1 watt. Going up to Level 13 takes another 2 watts as I hover in the 7's there.

Web browsing is a completely mix bag based on what's loading on the page. I spike to the 18-20 range typically then it drops back down to the 7-9 range (still at 13 on brightness).

I'm running Firefox 5 and have the noscript plug-in to control how much stuff is getting loaded on the page and it seems to help, although sometimes is annoying.

Running low-res youtube (360p) in the window has me at 10watts, running Netflix in a window has me in the 12's.

Ran Crystaldiskmark on my SSD (man is it slow 80read/30write) but watts only spike to the low 9's doing the benchmark. With the Intel 320 (which is freaking fast) the watts spike to 10.86 during the test.

Trying to find the slice battery, just ordered via telesales and it's about 6 weeks out.

 

Good informative post.

Ok, so you are running the i3 and seem to idle about .3-.5w less (average) than me on the 2520... which makes sense.

I know it is a step backwards, but you should consider running Firefox 3. I found it actually does idle 1w lower with the same usage. I just use Tabs on Top and Hide Caption Titlebar Plus to make it almost identical to Firefox 4. Just a thought, might not be worth it to you though.

Browsing is definitely a toss up. I find I'm around 7-8 just doing general stuff.

I've got my processes actually down to 38 running at startup which I thought was pretty good. Nothing like the 13 I had running on xp, ha.