I recently decided to "pimp" Ebay to find my first laptop computer. You see, I'm a computer tech, but I've only used desktops, and relied on Pocket PC devices up until now. I really loathed working on clients' super-slow computers, however-especially when a broadband Internet connection was available, and I experience a lot of down-time in my day job, as a substitute teacher. I just wanted something reasonably fast, for web browsing, word processing, and maybe some light games--something comparable to my ancient, trusty steed of a 750 Mhz Athlon desktop. So, I went ahead and took the plunge...

The result was TWO X-22's--one for me, and one for my college-bound sister. The first arrived with an X2 Media Slice, with a DVD player and floppy drive, 10 Gb hard drive, as well as the usual ports--mouse, keyboard, power, monitor, stereo speakers, and serial/parallel ports. This detachable unit is fairly light, and is hot-swappable off of the laptop. The laptop itself, which weighs 3.5 pounds, can get a bit hot, so the media slice offers some relief. The other one arrived sans the media slice, but I'm already expecting another.

You can swap out the optical drive in the media slice for other devices, up to and including a DVD-RW, 2nd hard drive, and, I believe, a 2nd battery. The very useful video at the Lenovo website shows this being accomplished in about 2.5 seconds--very nice.

One arrived with Windows 2000 Professional, and the other, with Windows XP Home. Both were very stable, but I upgraded the 2000 to XP Pro. On occasion, the upgraded one gets stuck at "Windows is starting up," and has to be rebooted--it then loads normally. The XP Home unit can boot slowly, but it has a 30 Gb hard drive.

They are both 800 Mhz Pentium III units--fast enough to multitask, and comparable to my Athlon desktop (except the graphics card-an ATI Mobility Radeon which only has 8 Mb of memory); other reviews point out that the 1.13 Mhz X4 models have a barely perceptible speed advantage.

The ATI Mobility Radeon 8-megabyte display adapter performs well, especially for its age. I spent a long time looking for the right driver, to resolve driver conflicts, "device not starting," etc., issues, but I finally did. At this point, the ATI 6.13.10.6278 driver is working perfectly, and providing myriad modern options under the "advanced" tab/display settings, including multiple monitor support (I successfully tried the dual monitor display), the ability the extend your desktop onto another monitor, Open GL, Direct X, video overlay, and Direct 3D support--pretty much everything any other contemporary driver supports.

One problem I was having (and I don't know how I could've been so stupid..!) is, while following directions for the driver installation from a website-it told me to open the "Win98" folder and start the installation program, after extracting the files to C:\drivers-I kept getting a failed installation, due to "missing INF files." I was directed to revert to a default display controller driver and retry the installation. In the 11th hour, while trying for the umpteenth time, after juggling drivers, I noticed a "WinXP" folder next the the "Win98" one (I'm running Windows XP). I simply ran the installation program in there, and everything ran to completion! Now the display is reasonably crisp, windows move smoothly instead of jaggedly, and DVD playback is impressive, for a machine this old--none of the stuttering I had been swapping stories and researching about. Even some graphics-intensive games, such as Kyodai Mahjjhong and Mortal Kombat 4, which simply wouldn't play before, play smoothly, and I don't expect any problems with other games, as long as they don't require more than 8 Mb of graphics memory.

The units have grippy, graphite-look tops, which look slightly "sparkly," but absorb stains easily--especially oil-based ones. They look a bit bulky (about 6.5 lbs) with the media slice attached, but it is useful for raising the height if you are at a low desk, although I prefer typing without it.

They have titanium-reinforced frames and, although sturdy, will not be candidates for "America's Next Top Model." Comments garnered include, "How old is THAT?" "That's an old-school laptop!" The most generous was, "What is THAT?" But I would be remiss if I didn't include my computer teacher friend's comment,"Yeah--the Thinkpads are NICE." I should add that he has a top-of-the-line Compaq laptop, and he just bought his son a top-of-the-line Alienware gaming laptop with dual-SLI video cards.

The keyboard seemed a bit smallish to my larger hands at first, but I've fully-adjusted, and it feels very natural now. Besides the standard keys, there is a function-unknown (probably programmable) "Thinkpad" button, up/down/mute volume buttons, a subtle microphone, 6 LED status indicators, and a very accessible power button, all across the top.

The base units have 2 USB 1.1 ports, a standard PCMIA card slot, a compact flash type I slot, a mono speaker, a db-15 monitor out, power connection, 10/100 Ethernet port, modem/phone port, a security keyhole, an IR (infra red) port, and one of my units has a mini-PCI wireless LAN card built-in--some come configured with this. Some also reportedly come with a mini-firewire port, and it looks like a remnant of one is under the IR shield. I haven't been able to detect one in the device manager, or by other methods, however.

There is no touchpad, but only the "stick," as well as 3 buttons on the bottom-center of the keyboard. The middle button has a "scroll" function, which works pretty intuitively with the stick. I prefer to use a mouse myself, though. The "function" button can turn the monitor on/off, adjust brightness, switch between external monitor and LCD, enter a battery-save/hibernate mode, and a lighter sleep mode. Lastly, there is a very neat "Thinklight"--an LED light that illuminates the keyboard, for usage in a dark environment, such as a plane. Nice touch. Optional is a Thinkport--a special USB connector at the top edge of the LCD that could be used to attach special accessories such as a clip-on camera, or ordinary USB devices. The unit is secured by 2 latches, and one must grip both sides of the unit, slide these outward, and flip the screen up somewhat, which is easier than it sounds.

The DVD-ROM on the media slice is 8X speed, with a 24X CD-ROM speed. The floppy wasn't used or tested, and doesn't appear to be removable/swappable. There is an eject button on the media slice, which is supposed to integrate with a software-based "safely remove hardware" function on the unit. I downloaded about 100 MB of updates from the excellent Lenovo support, and, although I get nice consumer
electronics-style head-up-(overlay) display, in a pleasant wintergreen, of volume and brightness settings, I have not yet elicited the "remove" feature.

Swapping devices entails first removing the media slice, which involves sliding the lock button on the bottom to the "unlocked" position, pulling two latches on opposite sides of the unit, and tilting the laptop forward while holding the media slice down, which, again, is a LOT easier than it
sounds. Then, you just slide a front-located latch to the side, pull the unit out, slide in the other one, close the latch, and reverse the uninstallation instructions for the media slice. Simplicity itself!

From the moment of first boot, I felt like I was on my older desktop (my goal), with regard to everything but gaming or video editing, which I haven't tried, but am only extrapolating about. I was able to rip some of my DVD collection, which took 35-50 minutes per disc using DVD Decrypter; I haven't attempted to rip any CD's. Microsoft Office 2000 works great with the XP Pro-updated unit.

The screen was reportedly replaced on the XP Home unit, and has a very noticeable increased color depth, although the settings have been synchronized, and all of the hardware has been identified as identical. I suspect the screen is either just plain newer, or is an improved version. Both displays are bright and crisp enough, though can be a bit hard to see clearly under fluorescent light,unless you get just the right angle. I was able to get good usability in a car on a sunny day, using Microsoft Streets and Trips 2006 (with GPS)-see my review at http://www.epinions.com/content_348782956164 -and they exhibit great viewability at any angle in my apartment, under tungsten light.

Update--installation of the above-discussed video driver pretty much equalized the displays, and provided options for making the screen bright enough to require some to wear sunglasses, as well as other adjustments.


The nicer-looking unit feels noticeably heavier, and I'm fairly sure it's the screen. Both units are displaying 32-bit color depths, from an "unlimited" pallette, and I'm running at 1024X768. Fresh Diagnose- http://www.freshdiagnose.com -tells me I can display 1600X1200 on an external monitor, but I haven't tried this. Copying 8 Gb to an external hard drive took a few hours, the same as it took across a USB 2.0 connection on a new desktop, before I updated the driver--I suspect that both ports were operating normally, as a 1.1 would.

The Lenovo update and support site is great. There are update utilities that integrate into the system almost seamlessly, and all of the drivers were easily located, as well as video instructions for everything from removing the media slice, to removing the hard drive and battery. I can remember poring over the Internet trying to figure out how to remove a Compaq laptop's hard drive. It's a no-brainer
here (and involves the removal of a single screw, slide-out, and 2 more screws to remove it from the caddy. Very nice and user-friendly.

Once you've downloaded all the updates, you get some extra functionality. One is a battery applet in the system tray, which graphically tells you the power level, in 1% increments, beeping each time (muting the sound is the only way I've found to defeat this). You can set at which level you want the "low battery" warning(s) to go off, and whether you want the unit to hibernate or sleep.

The battery life is fair. I get 2 hours on one, and about 8 0 minutes on the other (keep in mind that they are used).

The naked units are barely noticeable in my Eastpak laptop bag. The lighter one feels only slightly heavier when docked with the media slice unit, but the other one brings along that proverbial, back-breaking "straw." Even docked, they are considerably lighter than most other laptops I've carried.

There are several accessories available. There is a docking station, with pretty much the same connections as the media slice, but which stays connected to an external monitor, printer, network, etc. There is the camera attachment, and the several additional hard & optical drives, and higher-capacity main and auxiliary batteries.

I'm writing this review on the 30 Gb unit. I love being connected almost everywhere, and the increased productivity. I see now that, aside from working out of one's connected house, the only way other members were able to rack up so many reviews was through a portable device such as this. I also use it to take notes, keep a daily diary, track stocks through http://www.ameritrade.com, and write reports. Other than the occasional stall on boot-up (probably my fault, as it's "designed for Windows 2000 Professional"), I've had no failures or problems. It just works.

Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 225
Operating System: Windows
Processor: Intel Pentium III
Processor speed: 701-800
Screen Size: 12 inches
RAM: More than 256
Internal Storage: DVD