Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon 2020 Business-Laptop Review: 4K display costs battery runtime

[Redaktion]

Lenovo also offers the 2020 ThinkPad X1 Carbon with an optional glossy 4K screen, which is supposed to reach a brightness of 500 nits and also supports HDR contents. but how does the panel affect the battery runtime of the compact business laptop?

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-X1-Carbon-2020-Business-Laptop-Review-4K-display-costs-battery-runtime.482570.0.html

[Yngmar]

Still only 16:9? Dell is finally doing 16:10, time for the rest to wake up. And what is with the display anyways. Inferior colour space coverage and silly PWM flicker? Is it that hard to source quality panels?

I'd love to buy a Lenovo again, because I think despite everything they still have the better keyboard and I looove trackpoints. But this is not attractive and it'll probably be the Dell XPS 17 I'll have to get (despite charging issues and lack of connectors) unless someone releases something better by autumn.

It's a time of desperate options for mobile power users. You'd think someone would go and serve our corner of the market soon, but apparently not.

[Jenny]

What about the T15? I'm in a similar position and will go for it I think.

[Jesse]

Everyone needs to stop with the PWM nonsense.   It is annoying and hardly saves any battery life at all.

16:10 should be mandatory for laptops, and matte screens as well.   Save your glossy reflective crap for touchscreens.

Also, an AMD cpu option would have stretched battery life.   Every manufacturer should be dumping intel for AMD right now.   They might only be better for a year or so, but while they are... USE THEM.

[_MT_]

Everyone needs to stop with the PWM nonsense.   It is annoying and hardly saves any battery life at all.

16:10 should be mandatory for laptops, and matte screens as well.   Save your glossy reflective crap for touchscreens.

Also, an AMD cpu option would have stretched battery life.   Every manufacturer should be dumping intel for AMD right now.   They might only be better for a year or so, but while they are... USE THEM.

I don't think PWM is used to save energy. Perhaps thanks to its inherent simplicity, it might be more efficient. I think simplicity is the main reason why PWM is used. LEDs are not trivial to dim. It's a semiconductor device. But there is no excuse for a low frequency PWM. Well, I imagine higher PWM frequencies are also less efficient thanks to switching losses. But I doubt that's the reason for anyone choosing a 200 Hz PWM. Our brains can notice events in the 5 ms range. We might be able to ignore it, but it probably requires processing.

Drivers/ BIOS play a significant role in endurance. I'm pretty sure that the Latitude that recently managed almost 19 hours in the Wi-Fi test did so thanks to a relatively aggressive driver/ BIOS optimization. Decently sized battery helped, of course. And that was with an Intel processor. It's not even the first time an Intel powered laptop managed an outstanding time. This generation of mobile Ryzen is better. But that doesn't necessarily translate into endurance. Under high load, it translates into more performance in a given thermal envelope. But you might be draining battery just as fast, just managing to do more in the process. Under high load, consumption is dominated by CPU and GPU. Under low load, it's a death by thousand cuts. All the small things add up. And suddenly, keyboard backlight can rival CPU for consumption. Intel's mobile processors do have a decent power management.

[MSF]

How will I know if I'm sensitive to the PWM flicker, just by using it and seeing if I get a headache?

Are there people that it doesn't bother?  I've seen it mentioned in a few reviews but other than that there seems to be a lot of people that enjoy the 4k on the various message boards.

My 4k X1C7 comes in this Wednesday and now I'm having regrets.

[MSF]

I have the Gen 7 x1 with the UHD display, can I use the ICC profile you provided?