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Lenovo X1 Extreme

hajime said:
Am I correct that the new Air can drive 4K display at 60Hz and have a battery life of about 10 hours? If they were in store, I would just buy it on tomorrow and test it myself. Based on experience, can we speculate that the 10 hours battery life is realistic? Also, as it is very thin, I don't know if it will have noise issue (one video mentioned that it is fanless?). I will have to deal with that bloddy butterfly keyboard though.

I may need to build a powerful workstation for CUDA work later but no need of the power at the moment. So, the X1E is kind of a workstation that is portable and powerful for current teaching and research work. The keyboard is nice and the 4K screen is beautiful. Windows 10 is not as scary as I thought. I can live without Mac OS. I need to take it out for long hours to determine the battery life. Of my one day test, I used it for about 5 hours and there were still battery left. Probably the battery life is not as good as the new Air. If I build a workstation, it will be another $5-6K.

Thanks to your suggestion, the noise issue of the X1E is greatly reduced. Not sure if I should keep it, exchange for the same model, get one with i5 CPU but 4K screen (now this option is available) or just get an Air. Somebody on the internet mentioned that he exchanged but his subsequent two X1E ended up worse than the original. Mine has no coil whine, perfect screen. Perhaps just poor application of thermal paste from Lenovo or just the limitation of current technology.
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Personally I wouldn't entertain swapping out the X1E for the new Air, again terrible keyboard with questionable reliability and a weak duel core CPU that will be easily over loaded. New Air is more like a larger 12" Retina MacBook than anything else, with increasingly poorer value for a meaningful specification.

IMO for CUDA your far better to purchase time from a provider than employ a single workstation, if you want the solutions anytime soon...

Q-6
 
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Queen6 said:
Personally I wouldn't entertain swapping out the X1E for the new Air, again terrible keyboard with questionable reliability and a weak duel core CPU that will be easily over loaded. New Air is more like a larger 12" Retina MacBook than anything else.
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Agreed, I was just typing in my $.02 about the X1E when I saw your post come through.

So here goes, my wife and I were talking this morning about apple updating the MBA and mini. I told her, while I am happy with my MBP, I feel its a "delicate" computer and it will not have the longevity that I enjoyed with my 2012 MBP. If I had to do it all over again AND the X1E was available when I was ready to buy, I would have purchased that. She mentioned she used Lenovos before and confirmed what I already new, solid computers that will last a long time.

@hajime, you have long complained about the keyboard, and that's fine, that's your opinion (I dislike the keyboard but I tolerate it), so why give up such a great keyboard now? I understand that fan noise can be a bit aggravating in some circumstances, but if you stop focusing on that, and just use/enjoy the laptop its less of an issue. I'm sure there will be occasions where you want a dead quiet laptop but if its like me, those times will be a rarity and putting up with a small amount of fan noise shouldn't be a huge hassle.

Food for thought.
MBA
Pros:
Apple ecosystem (I don't minimize the sway of this).
Small light laptop

Cons:
Sealed computer that cannot be repaired or updated.
Thermal management is unknown right now, it may be no cooler then what you've dealt with on other models.
Keyboard, you stated you absolutely hate the butterfly keyboard, so why spend a lot of money on something you hate? The fan noise is more of annoyance but you're looking to return a solid computer for a minor annoyance to get a laptop with a major problem.
CPU performance, this is going to be a slower computer and will most likely require a desktop by your own reckoning. Why over complicate matters when the X1E does it all for you.
i understand its not perfect, nothing is, but it seems the imperfections are minor imo.
 
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When my 17.3 is running at full tilt, like 3.9GHz across 6 cores continuously I either turn up the music or just leave the thing to get on with it.

Get a BT KB & mouse and move it further away. If the current MBP keyboard is disliked the new Air is going to be no different, only it will be attached to a CPU with the fraction of the performance. New Air is just another disposable Apple appliance, ThinkPad X1E is a very decent computer that one can get a lot mileage out of, and that's a significant differentiator...

Q-6
 
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I have a pair of noise cancelling headphones that I enjoy while I am working or watching a movie. You don’t realize how loud your regular household daily noises are until you cut them out for awhile. Mostly I listen to music, other times only to the silence they provide. In either case computer noises become a non-issue :)
 
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c0ppo said:
Funny how people are different. I can't code without music. I won't crank up Iron Maiden, but I will turn on some instrumental music or some classical music. I get in 'the flow' really easily like that :)
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I don’t code, but I do have music on most of the day. I find it helps compress the hours during the day :)
 
I heard that in one country, people need to read books for them to accomplish their tasks when sitting in a toilet.

Anyway, I was running Linux on my X1E in the library. The fan was so noisy that people looked at me several times.
 
hajime said:
Anyway, I was running Linux on my X1E in the library. The fan was so noisy that people looked at me several times.
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What distro are you running?
Maybe try out some Arch based distro like Manjaro. Easy to install, in package manager enable AUR for searching, and find whatever you can on Lenovo or Thinkpads. But don't install automatically, read a little bit to make sure that the package is for your laptop.

Manjaro works like a charm on my X1C. But I don't have dGPU. But with Manjaro I've managed to fix fans issue really easily. Give it a try.
 
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c0ppo said:
What distro are you running?
Maybe try out some Arch based distro like Manjaro. Easy to install, in package manager enable AUR for searching, and find whatever you can on Lenovo or Thinkpads. But don't install automatically, read a little bit to make sure that the package is for your laptop.

Manjaro works like a charm on my X1C. But I don't have dGPU. But with Manjaro I've managed to fix fans issue really easily. Give it a try.
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I am using Pop OS. Ubuntu and Suse all have video related issues. How did you manage to fix fans issue easily using Manjaro?

By the way, I bought a mStand. X1E under Windows 10 used to be less noisy. However, since I put it on the mStand, I hear noisy fan more often even I am just sending emails. How come? Could it be because since the laptop is raised, the fans can be heard more clearly?

Do you think switching to X1E with i5-8400H or i7-8700H would reduce the fan noise noticably? The price difference between the top of the line model with i7-8850H and same configuration with i5 CPU is very small.
 
hajime said:
I am using Pop OS. Ubuntu and Suse all have video related issues. How did you manage to fix fans issue easily using Manjaro?

By the way, I bought a mStand. X1E under Windows 10 used to be less noisy. However, since I put it on the mStand, I hear noisy fan more often even I am just sending emails. How come? Could it be because since the laptop is raised, the fans can be heard more clearly?

Do you think switching to X1E with i5-8400H or i7-8700H would reduce the fan noise noticably? The price difference between the top of the line model with i7-8850H and same configuration with i5 CPU is very small.
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What process is contributing to to the fans? Have you installed TLP?
I got PopOS running on a T470 and I rarely hear fans
 
hajime said:
I am using Pop OS. Ubuntu and Suse all have video related issues. How did you manage to fix fans issue easily using Manjaro?
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I really can't remember what packages I've installed, but when searching thru AUR there really aren't many. Just check them out, take 3-4 mins to read them. But once again, my laptop has just integrated GPU.

But I've removed Manjaro since then, because Unity3D under Linux is still in beta, and I got some weird bugs. Using Windows 10 until Unity finally decides to give Linux some more love :)
 
I wonder if there is any point to get a Windows laptop with 4K screen. Surely, it is beautiful but even at 15", I keep the scaling at 200%. In this case, do I have larger screen estate than HDR WQHD at 100-150%?
 
hajime said:
I wonder if there is any point to get a Windows laptop with 4K screen. Surely,
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Screen real estate.

hajime said:
I keep the scaling at 200%. In this case, do I have larger screen estate than HDR WQHD at 100-150%?
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That's the downside of windows scaling
[doublepost=1541073745][/doublepost]Let me just add, that was why I got the FHD version of the Razer, but after using it, I felt FHD to be too constraining. I was concerned that the un-scaled 4k screen would be too small, but in hindsight I think 4k gives you freedom and many people are content with a smaller scaling factor.
 
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maflynn said:
Screen real estate.


That's the downside of windows scaling
[doublepost=1541073745][/doublepost]Let me just add, that was why I got the FHD version of the Razer, but after using it, I felt FHD to be too constraining. I was concerned the un-scaled 4k screen would be too small, but in hindsight I think 4k gives you freedom and many people are content with a smaller scaling factor.
Click to expand...
I have 4k on my 13 inch dell xps and scaling is not an issue for me
 
I am considering to return my current X1E. I am trying to decide if I should get a X1/P1 with lower end CPU but 4K screen, X1C6 or X1 Yoga Gen 3 (both at HDR WQHD). Any suggestion? It seems that people with P1 also complain about noise and coil whine issues.
 
hajime said:
I am considering to return my current X1E. I am trying to decide if I should get a X1/P1 with lower end CPU, X1C6 or X1 Yoga Gen 3 (both at HDR WQHD). It seems that people with P1 also complain about noise and coil whine issues.
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If you really don't need the X1E's discrete graphics, maybe the X1C or X1 Yoga Gen 3 would be the better fit? The only difference between the P1 and X1E is going to be the GPU and ECC memory, so I am guessing the fan noise will be about the same for the two.
 
SDColorado said:
If you really don't need the X1E's discrete graphics, maybe the X1C or X1 Yoga Gen 3 would be the better fit? The only difference between the P1 and X1E is going to be the GPU and ECC memory, so I am guessing the fan noise will be about the same for the two.
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At the moment, I don't do CUDA related computations so I don't need Nvidia GPU. I may need it later but don't know for sure. It depends on what projects I will get next. Is the iGPU in X1C6 anc X1 Yoga Gen 3 powerful enough to drive an external 4K TV at 60Hz? Which CPU do you recommend of getting?

I don't know if Lenovo would allow me to return the X1E for a model with lower end CPU and if still noisy, return and get a X1C6 or X1 Yoga Gen 3. Any experience?
 
hajime said:
At the moment, I don't do CUDA related computations so I don't need Nvidia GPU. I may need it later but don't know for sure. It depends on what projects I will get next. Is the iGPU in X1C6 anc X1 Yoga Gen 3 powerful enough to drive an external 4K TV at 60Hz? Which CPU do you recommend of getting?

I don't know if Lenovo would allow me to return the X1E for a model with lower end CPU and if still noisy, return and get a X1C6 or X1 Yoga Gen 3. Any experience?
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I have only had familiarity with the returns, not an exchange for a lower priced model, but my guess is that they would rather work with you on doing that then have to return in full because you chose to go a different route. I would definitely chat with them. I have found the online chat works well and you get assigned a representative # who can then help track your order and follow up.

Specs for the X1C 6th Gen. indicate it will support up to 5K via USB-C @ 60Hz

Specs for X1 Yoga Gen. 3 seem to indicate the same.

I have no experience with either model
 
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