Engadget: Lenovo Ultrabook in 2012. Profits up.

So Lenovo COO Rory Read says expect an Ultrabook in 2012. Unfortunately he wasn't more specific. I've been hoping to see a beautiful ultra thin Thinkpad design ever since I saw intel's Canoe Lake netbook design in June 2010 (see below if you've never seen it). Guess I'll have to keep waiting.

Nice to see Lenovo's profits are up.


Lenovo nearly doubles net profits in Q1 earnings report, not so certain about 'mainstream' Ultrabooks by end of year -- Engadget

What's an ultrabook?
ASUS outs UX21 ultrathin laptop with up to Core i7 CPUs (video hands-on!) -- Engadget

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Intel's Canoe Lake
Intel 'Canoe Lake' prototype netbook preview -- Engadget

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Thank god they're not trying to do it with the X1.

 

I kind of want them to do this with the X1 (or I guess refreshing it into a non-sucky "X2"?)
ULV processors are lame

 

The U300s.

 

As mentioned before, Ideapad U300s.

The Thinkpad E220s already meets most of the requirements for ultrabooks set by Intel. Make the battery life a bit better and shave off a millimeter or two and tada~ Ultrabook!

I doubt there will be an Ultrabook traditional Thinkpad though. Too many compromises to be made, the X1 is as far as Thinkpad engineers are willing to go with thinness and some of us already find the compromises required to get down to 21mm thin unacceptable, never mind what needs to happen to get it in to sub 20mm thicknesses. Maybe some day, though I don't value thinness as much as footprint and weight anyways for portability anyways.

 

Personally I'm fine with the thinkness of current thinkpads, like the T410s. I don't want to lose the keyboard just for the name of an 'ultrabook' and a grams which no one's gonna notice anyway.

 

Thinkpads have always been function over form and I hope they stay that way. No need to sell those ultrabook with expensive & slow ULV processors that can't run photoshop worth a damn.

 

Just looked up financial results, seems like apple makes more profit in a week than what Lenovo makes for the whole year. Amazing, how much has changed.

Edit: Didn't mean sidetrack the thread, but got interested after reading first post.

 

Current ULV chips are faster than every machine in your sig (well, depending what you have in your X201). They'll be fine.

 

Yeah, agreed. ULV chips are, at least for 95% of consumers, the way to go: plenty of speed, and lower power consumption and heat output. I'm actually more worried about battery life, heat, and noise in those ultrabooks. No point having a light, thin, and portable machine if it only lasts 2-3 hours on battery (ie: IdeaPad U260), and I'd also rather not have an elegant-looking notebook that sounds like a vacuum cleaner with its tiny fan.

 

For sure, yeah... I bought my e220s before the Ultrabook concept was announced, and that's pretty much what I was looking for. I have no qualms with its battery life, but it would be nice to have more. If they can keep roughly the same I/O ports and drive configuration but increase the battery life and slim it down 2mm, they'll have a winner.

 

If only they made an x220s model, that would be sweet. Hope they don't try to remake X1..

 

X2? Probably it would do the X300 -> X301 -> end?

These machines are market testers, a lot of the technologies and features would then trickle into other machines depending on how the customers like them.

X300 -> X301 -> T4x0s

 

What are the power saving benefits of ULV's though? The battery life difference between the X201 and the X201s isn't that much as the CPU isn't the main power eating component most of the time. The only real advantage of the ULV is becoming capping maximum heat output for very thin devices that can't dissipate the maximum heat generated by the SV CPU.

 

Well since with Ivy Bridge and Haswell bringing mainstream Intel cpu's down to 15-17W range, ULV is barely relevant anymore.

 

Oh gee, I didn't realize that Ivy Bridge and Haswell were already on the market...

 

Well it'd be nice for Lenovo to have kept the X30_ series as it competes with Dell's E4300/E4310. You would get a solid powerful machine, with an optical drive but it would still be portable. Unfortunately the X30_ were way too expensive to justify the premium, even now they are way overpriced on Ebay.

I've used an X1 before, it is like an Edge + x series (doh) but I cannot stand a glossy screen, I want a traditional keyboard. Also HD resolution only is a disappointment.

 

well Dell E43xx was not in a class of the X3xx, it was more of a shrunken E6400 machine.

ThinkPad X1 was not something that i originally planned to purchase, i bought a ThinkPad X220 instead of the X1. But i was given the ThinkPad X1, i am using it as my daily driver until my X220 arrives.

The only problem with the X1 are:

1. Very crap trackpoint buttons (the trackpad is better than the other Thinkpad trackpad, but it can't make up for the hard to use Trackpoint buttons).
2. Glossy screen does reflect a lot under the sun, which means you have turn the backlit up and thus it chews through the battery in a very short amount of time.

The keyboard on the system is alright, it is not half bad, but it is different to the normal Thinkpad keyboards. The resolution on this machine becomes less of an issue when you use it more, but it is definitely better with the 1600 x 900.

What i like about the ThinkPad X1 is how cool it runs and how silent it runs. The quality of this machine is also top notch, fit and finish i have to say is extremely good.

 

"Barely relevant".

 

haha whatever.. if that's what the mainstream chips will be, then it'll push the ULVs of the future lower, to the same market segment as now