Upgrading a 4 year old Lenovo X1 Carbon Laptop

54and56

Hi all,

I've a Lenovo X1 which will be 5 years old in a few months. It's been an absolute weapon for me and I use it for hours each day both for my business and then personally at night for browsing, content watching etc.

It's specs are:-

i7-3667U CPU @ 2.00GHz 2.50GHz
128GB SSD
8GB RAM
Win 10 Pro

The machine is still rapid fast for what I use it for (+/- 20 Chrome browser tabs open at any one time) + Dropbox syncing in the background + 3 or 4 MS Office apps open (Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint) + some IM apps open + Spotify + + +

I've never experienced any delay or degradation in performance but I'm thinking of upgrading to an X1 Yoga for primarily three reasons:-

1. My existing X1 isn't touch screen capable (nor is the current version of the non Yoga standard X1 laptop) and I'd like to have that capability.

2. The battery on my current machine is dwindling fast. I get less than 2 hours use out of it now and even less if I'm watching a movie. (This is somewhat mitigated by the availability of power charging on most flights these days)

3. I'm currently running MS Office 2010 and could do with an upgrade to the latest version in order to keep up with new features etc.

The X1 Yoga I spec'd is as follows:-

• Processor : Intel Core i7-7600U Processor (4MB Cache, up to 3.90GHz)
• Operating System : Windows 10 Home 64
• Microsoft Productivity Software : Microsoft Office Home and Business 2016
• Display : 14” WQHD (2560x1440), IPS, 10-point Multi-Touch
• Memory : 16GB LPDDR3 1866
• Graphics : Intel HD Graphics 620
• Body Color : Black
• Keyboard : ThinkPad Backlit Keyboard Euro English with Finger Print Reader and C-cover, Black
• Hard Drive : 256 GB Solid State Drive PCIe-NVMe OPAL2.0 - Capable
• Power Cord : 65W AC Adapter (3pin) - UK (USB Type C)
• Adapter : RJ45 Extension Connector
• ThinkPad USB 3.0 Ultra Dock

The above all comes to €2,926 inc VAT.

Thoughts on whether I should be upgrading at all at this point and/or whether the X1 Yoga is the way to go? If so is the configuration well balanced?

I also have a few questions relating to the configuration which perhaps some of the Lenovo guru's on here might be able to help with:-

- I prefer matt finished screens as I hate glare so I've gone with the IPS rather than the OLED screen. Correct move?
- Is it worth paying the extra €100 or so for the 2560x1440 res screen Vs the 1920x1080 screen?
- Is it worth paying an extra €118 for 16GB Ram rather than 8GB? (I primarily use MS Office type apps + VLC for video consumption)
- What's the difference between the Euro English and UK English keyboard layouts? There's no image of the layouts on the Lenovo website that I can find.
- Any reason to choose the 65w charger over the standard 45w charger? It's only €3 more!

All help and feedback much appreciated.

Alanstrainor

For that kind of money I am surprised you're not getting a larger SSD. 256GB is fairly bog standard, I know if I was spending that kind of money I would want 512GB at very least.

16GB of RAM is the way to go for future proofing.

The screen sounds great and I think I would go for that higher resolution too. I have read others saying that Windows does not scale well on high resolution screens however. So that might be something to research more. Nothing wrong with 1080p if that is what you end up with.

I notice this machine comes with Windows 10 Home, which strikes me as strange for a business orientated machine. If you connect to any work domains you'll need Pro.

The rest of the spec is good, but the machine strikes me as very expensive for what you're getting. You would be getting a serious Macbook Pro for that cash (I know its not what you need, but it's a worth comparison in terms of price.)

And as for the touchscreen. I just don't know that it is something that I would use. I have a Windows tablet and I actually prefer to use it with a mouse, you may like using the touch panel but worth thinking about what you intend to use it for. It may not be as useful as you'd imagine.

54and56

Thanks for the input Alanstrainor,

Alanstrainor wrote: »

For that kind of money I am surprised you're not getting a larger SSD. 256GB is fairly bog standard, I know if I was spending that kind of money I would want 512GB at very least.

I currently have a 128GB SSD and use Dropbox to store non current files + I use a 128GB SD card for loading video content off a local NAS for when I'm off travelling (Always good to have an entire box set of Soprano's or similar available to binge watch on long trips!) so that was my logic but you're probably right. 512GB is probably worth the extra investment.

Alanstrainor wrote: »

The screen sounds great and I think I would go for that higher resolution too. I have read others saying that Windows does not scale well on high resolution screens however. So that might be something to research more.

Will do. Happy to stick with 1080p if there's any issues with Win 10 scaling as I don't need any hassle and don't think I'd physically notice the difference. 1080p for me is perfect on a relatively small screen.

Alanstrainor wrote: »

I notice this machine comes with Windows 10 Home, which strikes me as strange for a business orientated machine. If you connect to any work domains you'll need Pro.

I'm not sure what the bit in bold means. If it means connecting to corporate exchange servers etc then that won't be a problem. I'm a small business and will never be plugging into the big corporate world other than as a guest on their Wi-Fi or whatever. Is that the only practical difference between Home and Pro?

Alanstrainor wrote: »

The rest of the spec is good, but the machine strikes me as very expensive for what you're getting. You would be getting a serious Macbook Pro for that cash (I know its not what you need, but it's a worth comparison in terms of price.)

Wash your mouth out. I'm the anti Mac

MS Excel just doesn't play nice with the Mac version of Excel. I know they are compatible in theory but the reality is they are not and I use Excel every day.

Alanstrainor wrote: »

And as for the touchscreen. I just don't know that it is something that I would use. I have a Windows tablet and I actually prefer to use it with a mouse, you may like using the touch panel but worth thinking about what you intend to use it for. It may not be as useful as you'd imagine.

Yes, the jury is out on that for me too. I used to think I wouldn't but I increasingly think I will. An equivalent X1 Laptop (no Yoga hinge ability and no touchscreen) with more or less the same spec would only be about €300 cheaper so the extra functionality of the Yoga appears to be worth it and would make it a much more useful hand me down in 3-4 years when my son (hopefully) starts college.

Alanstrainor

There are some differences between Home and Pro as far as functionality, but asides from connecting to a work domain I can't think of what they are off the top of my head. Given what you've said I wouldn't worry!

I only mentioned the Mac because they are crazy money, it just seemed like this machine was almost even more crazy given some of the spec you were getting.

Also I would be a bit wary of using a SD card as storage, well at least for anything important. I suppose having a few shows on it isn't too bad, it's just that I would be worried about it failing and you losing everything on it. They would be far more prone to failure when compared to an SSD/HDD.

Another thing to note about the higher resolution screen is that it will limit the battery life to a degree. It takes extra processing to drive that many pixels, and it will be apparent in the run time. I would almost think it would be worthwhile saving on the screen and going for 1080p and then upgrading to a 512GB SSD.

54and56

Alanstrainor wrote: »

I would almost think it would be worthwhile saving on the screen and going for 1080p and then upgrading to a 512GB SSD.

I think that piece of advice is bang on. I won't notice the increased resolution but I will notice the marginal reduction in battery performance over time and the money saved will pay for the SSD upgrade which will negate the need to use an SD card at all.

FYI I'd only ever use an SD card for non essential storage. I've been down the road of SD card failure before and it wasn't fun!!