If you picture a perfect ultraportable laptop that lets you comfortably work out of the office, a hotel room or a cafe, then the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon is probably the closest that comes to getting everything right in a thin and light package.
Among my favourite ultraportable laptops are the Dell XPS 13, which I have been using for five years, as well as the now-gone Sony Vaio 13. However, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon is another step up, thanks to the sheer amount of engineering involved to build it.
The first thing that strikes you is the under-1kg weight. For a laptop with a 14-inch screen and featuring full-sized USB and HDMI ports, this is surely one of the lightest to lug around. You don’t have to be a laptop geek to instantly know this is something unique.
Part of the reason for this is the over-engineered chassis, which includes the carbon fibre cover that protects your valuable screen. It’s notable that Lenovo hasn’t discarded ports you need to cut down on weight, so this is truly a machine meant for real work. No, you don’t need to bring along a load of adapters.
Another eye catching feature of Lenovo’s premium ThinkPads is the ability to flip open the screen with one hand. Plus, extend it all the way down flat. It’s a striking design that has been carried over from the old IBM days and as a former ThinkPad user, I’ve never stopped being fascinated by that.
If there’s one complaint, it’s that the ThinkPad X13 Carbon’s surface is mostly fingerprint-free but can still attract smudges from sweaty fingers. Having only tested the laptop for a couple of weeks, I also worry that the surface might get sticky under Singapore’s extremely humid conditions.
That said, there are many well-thought-out features. The camera cluster at the top of the screen overcomes the issue with a thin bezel, enabling Lenovo to include a 1080p camera with a privacy shutter that’s so simple to use.
This cluster extends a little out of the lid of the laptop, which means it acts as a sort of handle or lever for you to life the laptop screen from a closed position. Pretty smart design there.
Another great concept from the ThinkPad X1 Carbon series that is in this 13th-gen model is the keyboard. Like previous models, the keys here are slightly curved for your fingers to fit snugly when typing. The key travel is also one of the best I’ve experienced on an ultraportable machine.
As someone who types and writes a for living, I found myself touch-typing much faster, whether I was taking notes for an interview or banging out an article.
Of course, a ThinkPad has to have its idiosyncrasies. For better or worse, Lenovo has retained familiar ThinkPad features, such as the iconic trackpoint and physical mouse buttons. The buttons, notably, mean that you have a smaller touchpad than many premium laptops.
What about performance? The ThinkPad X1 Carbon model I got for review comes with an AI-capable yet power-efficient processor in the shape of the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V. This chip is found on all models sold in Singapore.
What you’d also find standard is 32GB of memory, which are integrated in the CPU itself, as Intel intended for its premium Core Ultra 200V chips. In other words, you can’t upgrade the memory, but then again, 32GB is plenty for the next few years for everyday apps.
The review unit I got also sports a decent 1TB solid state drive (SSD), which should be enough capacity for your files, since you’re likely to back up photos and videos on the cloud or a network drive.
Putting the ThinkPad X1 Carbon through the paces, I found it to be up to the mark with other ultraportables in its class.
In the GeekBench CPU test, which measures everyday performance in common tasks like file compression and image editing, the laptop scored 2,758 for single core performance and 10,863 for multi-core performance. These numbers are similar to those on the Asus Zenbook S14, which has the same Intel CPU.
I also ran the PCMark 10 benchmark, which runs through various apps like video conferencing, and the Lenovo laptop came back with a score of 6,511. Again, pretty close to its similarly-spec’d Asus counterpart.
What about AI tasks like image recognition and others? Running the Geekbench AI test using the ONNX AI framework, the Lenovo laptop returned with 2,411 for single precision score, 1,173 for half precision score and 4,724 for quantised score.
Again, this is similar to the Asus laptop. Compared to Qualcomm-powered laptops that have been used in other laptops, the Intel CPU wins some and loses some.
However, with the same Geekbench AI test with the OpenVino framework that Intel favours, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s dedicated neural processing unit (NPU) did better with AI tasks.
It came back with a score of 3,020 for single precision tasks, 19,042 for half-precision tasks and 25,660 for quantised tasks. That’s impressive again from an Intel Core Ultra 200V-powered ultraportable laptop.
Here, I need to bring up Lenovo’s Aura Edition features, which include an easy tap-and-share one that lets you quickly transfer photos from your phone to your laptop. No extra software needed.
Don’t forget, this is also a Windows Copilot+ PC, which means it has enough horsepower to run a host of AI-powered features, like live translation and image generation, right on your PC.
To be sure, not everyone will use these Copilot+ features all the time. The good news is that the efficient machine here also does a good job with graphics.
I fired up the 3DMark benchmark, which simulates real-life games, and the Lenovo laptop performs as you’d expect once again with the updated Intel Arc 140V integrated graphics.
It scored 2,921 in the Time Spy subtest, indicating that it’s fine for many casual games and even some AAA games with a slightly lower setting in visual effects.
Throughout all the tests, the 2,880 x 1,800 OLED screen showed good image quality. It’s sharp, fast at 120Hz and also pretty bright at 400 nits. However, in Singapore, it seems that is the only option on offer now and there isn’t a touch-capable display from Lenovo.
In other areas, the options aren’t that plentiful, either. You only get to choose between 1TB or 2TB for the SSD, Windows Home or Pro, and one-year or three-year support.
Other than that, most of the hardware is similar. That brings us to the price as well. Starting at a hefty S$3,534 for the base model with a Core Ultra 7 258V chip, 32GB of memory and 1TB hard disk, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon is one costly laptop, even as premium models go.
A similarly spec’d Dell XPS 13 with a slightly smaller 13.4-inch screen costs a lot less at S$2,899, and that is already not cheap. To be fair, the Dell machine is heavier at 1.18kg and doesn’t have some of the ports on the ThinkPad X1 Carbon.
At the same time, there are a lot of similar features to other ultraportables running the Intel Core Ultra 200V chips, which offer more than a full work day’s battery life with power pack like the ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s 57Wh battery.
So, should you pay more for this new Lenovo premium laptop? The greatest compliment I can give is that it’s the best ultraportable I’ve tested, a testament to the quality seen in previous ThinkPad X1s.
Costing twice the amount for a regular laptop, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon is a little too expensive for me. However, if you’re after the best thin and light PC out there, this is it.
