subject: The Freedom To Do Business [print this page] Business owners rejoice! The first affordable ThinkPad ultraportable laptop has arrived. The Thinkpad T60 Battery is an 11-inch notebook packed with a low-voltage AMD processor, powerful ATI integrated graphics, and one of the best keyboards we've tested on an ultraportable Thinkpad X60 Battery. Is this the ideal companion for road warriors? Take a look at our review to find out.
If there is a single laptop brand name that is synonymous with business it has to be Thinkpad R60 Battery. Extremely solid build quality, excellent keyboards, precision TrackPoints (that red dot in the middle of the keyboard) and fantastic warranty support have been the cornerstones of the Thinkpad T61 Battery legacy going all the way back to the days when IBM still owned the brand. The Thinkpad X61 Battery continues this tradition with one of the best built ultraportable notebooks we've seen in our office.
With a starting weight around three pounds and a simple black industrial design, the designers of the Thinkpad R61 Battery attempted to deliver the ThinkPad heritage at an extremely affordable price. Lenovo Laptop Battery admits that their customers have demanded a "ThinkPad netbook" for several years now, but the ThinkPad engineers debated whether it was possible to deliver a durable, reliable, business-class laptop at "netbook" prices.
The Thinkpad X300 Battery features a dual-core Pentium processor, up to 4GB system memory, 15.4" widescreen high-definition display, CD/DVD burner, and built-in webcam and microphone.The Thinkpad T400 Battery is a toned-down version of the more rugged T-series notebooks designed for the budget-conscious business consumer. Configurations include up to an Intel Core 2 Duo processor, up to 8GB DDR3 system memory, and a high-definition glossy 15.6 inch display.
Although the 3000 V200 Battery offers as much (or more) performance than the Intel Atom in day-to-day tasks, the AMD processor simply didn't deliver as much in the way of battery life. In our 3000 N200 Battery test with the screen brightness set to 70%, wireless active, and Windows 7 set to the "balanced" profile the system managed 3 hours and 41 minutes before shutdown. This is more than enough battery life for business travelers who are only crossing a few time zones during a flight, but if you need "all day" battery life you aren't going to find it here.
Granted, it wasn't too long ago that we used to praise any notebook that delivered more than three hours of battery life. Unfortunately, the 3000 V100 Battery competes against netbooks and ultraportables that get six or more hours of battery life on a single charge. Three and a half hours might be "acceptable" to most business professionals, but it isn't as impressive as the competition.
The 3000 C200 Battery is an extremely well-designed business ultraportable that will no doubt meet the needs of most business travelers who are looking for a small, ThinkPad-quality laptop at a low price. That said, this configuration of the 3000 Y410 Battery falls short in two key areas: processor performance and battery life.
Lenovo Laptop Battery should have avoided using last year's single-core AMD processor and stuck with the latest generation of low-voltage dual-core processors from AMD. Lenovo will begin shipping the Thinkpad Battery with the dual-core AMD Turion Neo processors soon, and the higher performance and better battery life of the new processors will make the X100e a far more compelling option.
As it currently stands, the Lenovo Battery is a surprisingly solid little netbook (Yes, I called it a netbook. Sorry, Lenovo.) that would have been perfect if it delivered just a little more in terms of performance and battery life. This configuration falls just a little short of earning our Editor's Choice Award, but we still think it will be a popular choice for a number of business buyers.
