THE BEST THINGS COME IN SMALL PACKAGES!! (Lenovo Thinkpad X60s 1702)

Member Name: jojopillo

Product:	Lenovo Thinkpad X60s 1702
Date:	07/09/09 (156 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: COMPACT, LIGHTWEIGHT, GREAT FEATURES!

Disadvantages: NO CD DRIVE

Firstly let me just say that if you've opened this review expecting to find detailed Geek-speak and computer techno-terms then I'm sorry to disappoint you. I do, however, feel that most of us in this day and age are looking to read something a little bit more down to earth and understandable to the average person! So, hopefully that's what I've done!

I loved my old laptop but after taking many knocks, and probably a few more that the kids didn't tell me about, it finally gave out and decided to start rebooting every time I moved it. Because it was so old the memory was only 768mb and it took nearly 15 minutes to reload!

So after a windfall I decided to treat myself to a new one. Well, not a new one, but a good reconditioned one. My old one was an IBM T42 Thinkpad and I absolutely loved the lightweight, compact design. I once owned a Sony Viao but found it to be really heavy and cumbersome!

My old T42 was purchased many years ago from a site called tier1online, and with the excellent service I received first time round I thought it'd be a good idea to check them out first.

Obviously as technology has improved a great deal in this time I was rather hoping to get something to keep up to today's specifications but hopefully at a reasonable price!

What I was looking for?
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* Compact
* Lightweight
* Good specs
* Built-in wireless
* Good battery life
* Value for money

What did I find?
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The IBM Lenovo and Thinkpad series all seem to look quite similar; black in colour slimline, compact keyboard and a curious little red button between the G,H, and B keys. My initial thought upon opening my old T42 was that it was there to stop the screen touching the keyboard in transit! So I tried to take it off! Doh! Turns out it's something called trackpoint (I'll explain more in a bit!).

So, searching on tier1online I came across something that looked very similar to my old T42. It was called a Lenovo X60s 1702 Thinkpad by IBM. I was very impressed by the specs; 2Gb RAM, 60Gb hard drive and an Intel Core Duo processor - sounded good to me!

Add to basket - checkout - £199.00 including VAT and free delivery - Bob's your uncle! It also came with a 3 month warranty. Now I know this doesn't seem a lot but having used this company and a similar product before, I had no hesitation in making this purchase.

How was it for me?
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Upon opening my eagerly awaited box I noted that it was much smaller than I originally envisaged. The 12.1" screen being slightly smaller than my old laptop's 14". I had purchased it knowing that there wasn't a built-in CD drive but thinking that I could use my old one (although I can't remember using my old one's CD very often, apart from watching the odd DVD). After examining it more closely I realised that there isn't enough room for a CD drive as it is basically a notebook. Apparently I can attach an external CD drive but, to be honest I rarely use one.

What I didn't bargain for was how I was going to load the software for some of my hardware; webcam, digital camera, printer etc. All of which came with CD ROMs to install them! I have managed, however, to obtain the software for these via the internet, it's just the webcam I'm having trouble with now - although I'm sure other notebook users have had this problem too!

As I opened the lid of my new acquisition I once again noticed that little red button. Only this time I didn't think it was there for transit purposes. For those of you who have never seen one of these 'trackpoints' before alls it does is enables you to place your finger on top of it and with a slight movement from side to side your mouse pointer moves in sync. I only discovered this after my mouse pad stopped working on my old one after yet another bashing! It was a bit strange to get used to at first, but like anything, I much prefer it now I'm used to it. In fact, I was lucky it had one or I wouldn't have been able to use my old laptop at all! So the fact that this little notebook only has this trackpoint and no mouse pad did not put me off. Although I must say, if I'd not used one before I doubt if it would have appealed to me.

One of the features I really like about this brand of computers is there is an inbuilt light at the top of the screen, so when you're in poor light, or you don't want to disturb anyone (I'm picturing businessmen on a night flight or something) it lights up the keyboard just enough for you to function. I've used this many times when it's actually gone dark as I'm typing and I don't want to get up to switch the light on because I'm on a roll!

There's loads of slots in the sides for various things, the most common and easily recognisable being the USB ports. This model has three, one of which is 2.0 which I believe is faster than the old 1.1 version. Strangely enough, they advertise this as having four USBs but I can't see the other one. I'll have to look into that! There's also the microphone and headphone sockets, and only just this minute while inspecting further I have noticed there's an SD card slot, which just so happens to be what my digital camera uses, and I've just tried it and it works great, wayhay!!!

I'll give a detailed list of all the other holes (lol) at the bottom of the review...

I've been really impressed with the start up time so far too! It only takes about 30-60 seconds to get going and for me that is very fast (although there's probably plenty reading this thinking "mine loads faster than that") but compared to my old one it's lightning!

The best thing of all though is the battery life this provides. I was astounded to discover that it lasts about 7 hours. I used to hate being constantly attached to the AC adapter with no option to move around for too long, or indeed to be able to sit on a train or in a car and know that it's not going to run out in no time.

You may expect - with the overall size being much smaller than a laptop - to find the keys smaller but they've actually managed to keep full size keys on nearly all but the lesser used ones, so the letters and numbers are the same size as they were on my old one.

Something this model has is fingerprint recognition, with a cell placed just below the left and right-click buttons to run your finger over. I haven't set this up yet, and I'm not really sure if I will, but it is very intriguing nonetheless!

At just 1.6kg in weight I find it to be very light and easy to carry, as well as not crushing my legs while using it!

Overall
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So far I've found this very easy to use, and with the lightweight and compact design I was looking for fitting the bill perfectly for my needs, I am very impressed with my new Lenovo X60s 1702.

I've searched online and found these to be between £1,100 & £1,200 new, so, on the whole, I think I've got myself a right bargain!

I think they were probably designed with the business person in mind, so if I take it out on a train one day, maybe everyone will think I'm a high powered businesswoman or something!

A few details
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* Dimensions 26.8cm(w) x 21.1cm(d) x 2.8cm(h)
* Intel Core Duo 1.66Ghz L2400 Processor
* 2Gb RAM
* 60Gb Hard drive
* 12.1" TFT
* Built in 802.11 a/b/g (wireless)
* Built in 10/100/1000 (networking)
* 4 x USB, 1 x PCMCIA
* 10/100/1000 Gigabit networking
* External VGA, audio out, modem, fingerprint reader
* Firewire port

(Hardly any of the above I understand! But I'm sure there's one or two that might like to know!)

I'm going to have to give it 5 Dooyoo stars because so far it's been my greatest laptop ever!!!

Summary: A GREAT LAPTOP WITH ALL I NEED.

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