Testing Lenovo's ThinkPad W700ds Dual-Screen Notebook

MojoKid writes "Lenovo's ThinkPad W700 is a unique product, targeted squarely at mobile professionals who require the power, features, and performance of workstation-class product in a notebook. The machine has a few stand-out integrated features, like a Wacom Digitizer Tablet and X-Rite Color Calibrator. In addition, the ThinkPad W700ds version and adds a secondary, slide-out 10.6" WXGA+ display, which increases monitor real-estate by 39% spanning across its two panels. HotHardware's video demonstrates the machine's arsenal of toys for the graphics pro, in a somewhat portable desktop replacement notebook."

Comments

Well

[ShooterNeo]

As usual, Portability = $$$$$$$$$

I'm sitting in front of a hand built desktop that runs at 3.2 Ghz (Lenovo runs at 2.53) with 4 gigs of RAM and a terrabyte of hard disk space. I'm using an IBM model M keyboard (long live the king!) with dual 27" monitors from Dell, with S-IPA panels.

      Total cost? about 2 grand, and I put together the CPU unit 2 years ago.

Re:Well

[abhi_beckert]

Ok, so your system is cheaper. But that's a *quad core* 2.53Ghz machine of the latest architecture. It's pretty damn fast. And the hard drives are 7,200 RPM and they're running on RAID 0, which is also very fast.

Plus it has a bunch of features yours is probably lacking:
  - webcam
  - fingerprint scanner
  - Wacom tablet
  - VGA/DualLink DVI/DisplayPort
  - Display Calibrator
  - FireWire
  - Express/Smart Card expansion
  - WiFi/Bluetooth
  - Not to mention... fits in your backpack

All in all, that thing isn't too bad a price for a truly mobile workstation. But it has a pretty small target market.

Re:Well

[MrMista_B]

Alright, now take it down to Starbucks to work on stuff while you have a coffee.

So much for boasting about '2 grand', huh? I agree with your point, but there are uses for expensive, portable computers, even uses that justify spending that kind of money.

Re:Well

[The Clockwork Troll]

Perhaps if you had a portable computer, you'd get out of the house more and have more exposure to people who know how to spell words like "hand-built" and "terabyte", and who know that while using "CPU" to refer to an assembled computer could be synecdochic, the term "CPU unit" is redundant and proof positive that you're just a housebound failure. You're also drawing a false comparison between what is most likely a Pentium 4 class rig, incapable of exploiting the 4 gigs you're running in it, and more modern hardware. Your 2 grand rig probably could have been put together for half that. Ironically, most of us probably agree with your conclusion, that the W700ds carries a ridiculous premium, but I for one wouldn't want to be on your debate team.

Re:Well

[V!NCENT]

Not to mention that Lenevo (read = IBM) laptops are not 'just for mobility'. The built quality is just insane(ly good).

Laptop makers like Dell & co are building their portables with predictable failure in mind. That ofcourse means the cheapest of the cheapest parts that they can get their hands on and it must die in a certain amount of years, while Lenevo is know for building laptops that last and can resist impacts (like the harddisk that stops working when the laptop sensing it is falling).

So in other words you pay more money for a laptop that is built to last for as long as you'd wish. Lenevo is known for making Linux friendly computers, so you pay extra for the additional Linux testing. You also pay for the innovation that is really innovative (like the 'falling'-sensor so your FS doesn't get corrupted by a HD shock). The only thing that doesn't work yet is the fingerprint reader and the GPU switcher on Linux, but you can't blame Lenevo for that because there is simply no such functionality in Linux.

The GPU switcher is software that is being worked on in X.org (but development/planning has stalled) that switches between the onboard GPU and the ATI/nVidia GPU based on power management.

Re:Dual Screen?

[conlaw]

I wonder if the dual screen will sell any better than the "butterfly" keyboard that was part of the IBM Think Pad in the 90's. Apparently, at that time, IBM thought that what laptop users wanted was a larger keyboard, so there was some sort of mechanism by which the keyboard on the laptop spread out. IIRC, this setup didn't work as well in practice as it did on paper, and didn't last very long.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Expandable+keyboard+puts+new+IBM+ThinkPad+in+a+class+of+its+own-a016694636

But will it ...

[AigariusDebian]

... run Linux?

And this time it is no meme, but a real question. What good are slide-out screens and fancy fingerprint readers if they are based on such obscene hardware hacks that a normal operation system would be unable to use it all.

That is something reviews would actually be useful for.

RAID-0?

[FSWKU]

I can understand having RAID-0 on there from a performance standpoint, but it's downright STUPID on its own. For one, there's the obvious pitfalls of running the entire thing on such a setup (queue the old "the 0 stands for how many bytes you can recover if something goes wrong" joke). Secondly, if I'm going for pure performance, I'm NOT putting my OS and my scratch space on the same volume. If they want to be serious about this, they need to ditch the optical drive altogether and have room for another HDD for the OS and non-throwaway things. Granted, you should be making regular backups. But at least if one drive fails, the data is still a lot easier to get back than if it were thrown across two drives.

And yes, this is honest constructive criticism here. I'm a proud ThinkPad owner myself (T60 to be exact).

Dual screen? More like 1 1/3 screen!

[syousef]

Calling this thing dual screen is not too different to calling an old tv with an lcd display of the channel number dual screen. Okay that's a _slight_ exaggeration. Only slight. The second "screen" looks like it's not worth the trouble. Good for task lists and the like but not much else, yet oh so breakable. The headline had me envision something like a tablet pc with a second screen - instead I see something about the size of a size mirror on a combi van. More gimmick than useful. Farq off.

Ummmm, why wouldn't it?

[Sycraft-fu]

Modems don't take up much space, nor cost much money. So unless you are dealing with a very small laptop (you aren't) or a cheap one (again not) why wouldn't you include a modem? The idea of laptops is to be able to take them on the go. Well guess what? Some places you go may not have high speed Internet. I know for the geek that has never left the city this might seem impossible but it happens. There are places where high speed just hasn't gotten to yet. However phone lines, well those are pretty wide spread. While it isn't impossible to find a location without a phone line, it is far more difficult than finding a place without high speed Internet.

Thus you include a modem, so that if it is needed, it's there. No reason not to when you've got the space and the $5 for the hardware isn't a major part of the price.

So while I wouldn't get a modem for a desktop, I'm glad my laptop has a modem, I've actually made use of it. My grandma finally did get high speed Internet because my uncle got tired of her not having it and set it all up, but until very recently she didn't. So when I went to visit her, it was dialup or no access.

It isn't as though the computer is just dialup. It also has a wired Ethernet connection, and WiFi. It just includes dialup as a fallback option.

Re:WTH

[DNS-and-BIND]

WTH with you, buddy? If I'm paying top dollar for a laptop, it better have every input/output port known to man.

Guess what? Outside of the giant city where I'm going to assume that you live and spend 99% of your time, modems are useful. Faxes and dialup get the job done. There's never any internet at the factories I visit in China, but just hook up the phone and dial 16300 and I can get my emails.