Lenovo X220 Tablet as a development machine?

[abubakarm]

Hi all,

I have wanted a tablet PC for a long tim but I didnt buy because they always seemed out of range of the money that I was ready to pay for them. Now I'm looking to buy a new laptop (old one is dell vostro 1500). And I stumbled upon the reviews of a lenovo x220 multitouch tablet. Its going to cost me around $1300 with 8gb ram and a core i5 2520M processor. All the specs seems pretty fine to me. Only thing is that I have always used ~15" laptops, and these days I'm doing full day work on my laptop. This tablet/laptop is only 12.5" in screen size but I think it has a full size keyboard (keys are the size of a normal laptop's kb). I'm pretty sure that from the software point-of-view this tablet can handle anything (i'm a windows dev, will be using visual studio/sql/ vmware etc). But i want suggestions from people who have used something like this as a development machine. Please share your experiences. Is it going to be inconvenient for development? One of my friend loves this form factor and he says 13" or 12.5" is the way to go, it adds a lot to the mobility, and I'm all about mobility, its very important to me, vostro 1500 is a pretty heavy machine and I want my next machine to be light weight.

Thanks,
plz reply soon.

..ab

 

[kevinsbane]

I do not have the tablet version of the x220, but I do have the laptop version. Since you speak of the keyboard with glowing praise, I am going to assume you will not be using it as a tablet for software development.

That aside, the x220's keyboard is awesome. It really is. The keys are the size of a full-sized computer keyboard. Typing on it simply rocks. The keys feel good and you never really notice it's a laptop keyboard.

The non-tablet x220 has a very short palmrest; myself, i'm ok with it but for some it may be uncomfortable. The tablet version has a slightly larger palmrest as it is also slightly larger and heavier overall.

Some people complain about the screen resolution; I have no problems with it except for the sole issue that it's too short 768 horizontal is not good enough. Would prefer more. That being said... I run AutoCAD on it (surface modelling) without too much trouble.

Weight-wise, this thing is really light. With a 6 cell battery, it's light enough that I can hold it upside down, gripping the top, without much effort. Not that that's a very smart idea... but it gives you some idea as to the weight. Of course, the tablet is slightly heavier. The tablet also has less battery life. The 9 cell is about ~200 grams (4 ounces) on top of the 6-cell.

Battery life is ridiculous. On a 6-cell, I can get in a full day's worth (8 hours, wifi on, moderate brightness) of writing (office work) on a single charge. Unfortunately the tablet loses ~25-30% of the battery life (so 5-6 hours) on a 6-cell.

 

[beginner99]

I order a normal x220 but has not arrived yet. The main concern with the screen is the resolution of only 768 vertical pixels. (BTW, what resolution did the vostro have?).

I will have to "optimize" your applications to waste as little vertical space as possible. On windows: taskbar at side instead of bottom, auto-hide anything that takes vertical space in visual studio and so on. I just say lots of scrolling...when couch-surfing the touchscreen can be very handy for scrolling.

 

[abubakarm]

thanks for the replies. Vostro is a 15.6 inch wide screen, but its resolution is just 1280*800. So vertically there is not much difference from 800 to 768, and this means I'm already used to it in Visual Studio since that is what takes most of my time . I keep the taskbar on autohide.
Good to hear about the nice keyboard, that confirms what I have heard about its keyboard from other places as well.
I just hope the device is very durable. I have used the vostro for a little less then 4 years now, and it is still in a very good and solid condition.

More experiences welcome.

 

[beginner99]

thanks for the replies. Vostro is a 15.6 inch wide screen, but its resolution is just 1280*800. So vertically there is not much difference from 800 to 768, and this means I'm already used to it in Visual Studio since that is what takes most of my time . I keep the taskbar on autohide.
Good to hear about the nice keyboard, that confirms what I have heard about its keyboard from other places as well.
I just hope the device is very durable. I have used the vostro for a little less then 4 years now, and it is still in a very good and solid condition.

More experiences welcome.

I will pic-up my normal (non-tablet) x220 today but i suggest you visit notebookreview.com forum. Tons of infos there already.