Weighty consequences
If time isn't of the essence, you can opt for the three-cell battery, but there’s no room for an UltraBay battery pack. Well, that's because there’s no UltraBay. Instead you can buy a battery slice that clips under the chassis which gives 5800mah in a six cell battery, taking it to 20 hours – although adding a kilo to the weight and a $229 hole in your pocket.
Take the tablet? The X220 laptop seems a more practical option
There are significant compromises to opting for the Tablet variant of the X220. It adds substantially to the weight and mass, and for some inexplicable reason, the usual Thinkpad keyboard light is absent (even though the keyboard decal indicates it’s there).
Tablet PCs have failed to win a mass market, but they maintain the following of a loyal and helpful user community. Yet, nine years after launch, Microsoft’s software still doesn’t feel like a coherent or mature product.
Verdict
Lenovo has consolidated much of the best of two product lines in the X220T. Potential buyers may want to consider the Thinkpad Air-killer, the forthcoming X1, before parting with your cash, but this model's compromises (no user replaceable battery) may not appeal to traditional ThinkPad customers.
With Windows 8 offering a revamp that is specifically designed around touch, and with cheap lightweight devices offering sit-back use, it is difficult to see the appeal of this hybrid design. Inside the Lenovo X220T is probably the best business laptop on the market, struggling to get out. ®
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Lenovo Thinkpad X220T 12.5in tablet PC
COMMENTS
Wide screen on a business laptop = fail
Have to agree with all the comments around this annoying obsession with wide screen 16:9 ratios.
It is pretty much useless on a business machine, and probably about 95% useless on a laptop for home use.
I've got a T400 at work, and that's the older 1280 x 800 size. At 800, this screen is only just high enough for most uses, but forces you to scroll up and down all the time when using normal apps, such as writing or reviewing documents in Word etc. Most of the width is wasted, as almost all apps don't utilise this extra screen estate. So this new 1366x768 size is actually making things worse! Taking away the hight, when you really need more, and adding to the width, when you really need less of this!
The only use I can see for having a 19:9 ratio, is for watching movies, and I'll never do that at work, and have only ever done that once away from work.
So that basically means, at least for me, all current laptops with a 16:9 ratio screen, are unsuitable for purpose for about 99.99% of the time.
Bring back 4:3 for business use, or at least give people the option. Even 16:10 is better, as at least there you don't loose all the hight!
Wide screen on a business laptop = fail * 2
Lenovo, stop copying everyone else. I want a 4:3 screen. This is a machine to work on, not play movies!
I'm still using the Thinkpad R52 which I've had more years than I care to remember because it has a 4:3 screen which is 1400x1050 pixels, and still only 15". Incidentally I bought it myself, with my own money to replace the Thinkpad A30 which I had also bought with my own money, but unfortunately stood on after many years of reliable service :'(
The only way I can get that kind of vertical resolution on a laptop these days is to buy something which is 1920x1080, and the size of a f*cking aircraft carrier's flight deck.
Please please please be a little different, stop being a sheep, and give me a good upgrade path, because at the moment I'm seriously looking at bi-passing the sata/pata bridge chip you put in this machine so I can install a sata SSD to get some more speed out of it and run it for another 5 years!
Screen Ratio
When was 1280 x 800 4:3?
Surely the shift is 16:10 to 16:9 for the resolutions quoted.
Exactly
I'm on my 4th Thinkpad X series laptop at the moment: all bought second-hand with my own money, run for a few years with Debian and then sold on still with more life left in them. I won't buy anything else.
Aside: nice to see Orlowski not trolling!
1366x768
The preponderance of 1366x768 laptops is disappointing....to think that the vertical resolution of most small-ish laptops today is *exactly* the same as it was in the 1990s when 1024x768 was the norm! And what's the point of a 16:9 laptop anyway? Is watching DVDs the only thing people use laptops for?
