The thought of a ThinkPad netbook is enough to make anyone even vaguely familiar with Lenovo suspicious, but according to ThinkPadToday that’s exactly what the company have up their corporate sleeve. They’re claiming that the rumored ThinkPad X200e will actually drop as the Lenovo ThinkPad X100e on January 5th 2010, with the tagline “Entry level ultra portable, the first ThinkPad of its size”.
There’s no doubting that multitouch is a key buzzword of today, and with the arrival of Windows 7 PCs gain at least software support for two-fingered control. Lenovo have responded by updating their well-esteemed ThinkPad X200 Tablet with Windows 7 and a new, multitouch-friendly display, the former as standard and the latter a paid option. Has the technology come of age, or is it a case of hype overtaking substance? Check out the SlashGear review after the cut.
We’re just a few weeks away from the formal launch of Windows 7 and I’ve been using the final build for some time now. It’s very nice and I’m sure most of you have seen it, used it or read about it to death. What I want to talk about over the next few weeks is various parts of Windows 7. One of the most intriguing parts of the new OS that Microsoft has talked about for some time has been the integration of touch features. While vendors such as HP have done their own touch implementations in the past (HP has gone as far as to offer their own touch-based SDK for developers) this is the first time since Microsoft unveiled their touch platform offering, Surface, that we’ve seen the OS vendor incorporate true finger-touch features directly into the OS.
Lenovo isn’t the only manufacturer with multitouch on their mind; Fujitsu have just announced an update to their LifeBook T5010 that adds two-finger touch sensitivity to the convertible notebook. The LifeBook T5010’s 13.3-inch display will now support pinch-zoom, rotate and other two-finger gestures in Windows 7, as well as more traditional pen-input using an active digitizer.
Lenovo have announced two new ThinkPads, each with multitouch-capable touchscreens. The ThinkPad T400s and ThinkPad X200 Tablet can recognize four and two finger touches respectively, and come with Lenovo’s new SimpleTap control panel that offers chunky, fingertip access to volume, system settings, applications and bookmarks.
Lenovo Canada are offering ThinkPad X200 Tablet PC buyers a newly-expanded range of processor options, more than twice as many as US buyers can configure their touchscreen ultraportables with. The Canadian X200 gets not only a choice of the original SU9300 1.20GHz and SL9400 1.86GHz CPUs as the US model, but up to a 2.13GHz Core 2 Duo SL9600 low-voltage chip.
According to a leak, Lenovo is apparently working on a new ThinkPad X200 that features a CULV processor. While this rumor is not confirmed, it would make sense since Lenovo has themselves admitted they are thinking about creating a CULV ThinkPad in the future, though they did not commit to a timeframe.
The ThinkPad X200 models currently feature a SL-series Core 2 Duo processor. This has made the price go up considerably, but with a 1.2GHz Celeron M chip, the cost would decrease, as would the voltage use. The new system would also have a 160GB hard drive and 2GB of memory.
Pricing is not known, nor is a release date. It may not even come to pass. We’ll just have to wait and see. But it would make sense in this economy for Lenovo to be looking to drop their price point a bit.
Lenovo has announced that eight of its ThinkPad notebooks have passed military-standards for ruggedization, making them not only resistant to pressure, humidity, temperature, dust and vibration, but to a greater extent than some “mil-spec” rivals. The ThinkPad X200, X301, X200s, X200 Tablet, T400, T500, R400 and SL300 all passed durability tests despite not being specifically marketed as ruggedized models.
Lenovo’s X200s, announced at the same time as the X200t Tablet PC, aims to take the ethos of the company’s standard X200 ultraportable and instill some stamina into it. By switching out the standard CPU for a low-voltage processor, using an LED backlight for the display and strapping in a 9-cell battery, Lenovo claim 13.2hrs continuous runtime; Laptop Mag have have it on the bench, and under normal conditions it coasted to 10hrs 43 minutes.
Lenovo have announced their WiMAX-enabled notebooks, intended for use with Sprint’s high-speed XOHM network officially launched today in Baltimore. WiMAX options will be available from today on ThinkPad X301, T400, SL300 and SL500 models, with options on the ThinkPad W500, W700, SL400 and X200 models later on this year. Lenovo will also make WiMAX optional on the consumer-focused IdeaPad Y530.
SlashGear Japan
