Professional for journeys - with display weakness. Presumably designing a really good subnotebook is one of the most challenging tasks of mobile notebook development. It is essential to design a robust and light notebook which faces at the same time sufficient power and good battery runtime. Lenovo's preconditions are good, because of the recently acquired, first-class knowledge of IBM. As usual you can read about the Thinkpad X60s' capabilities at notebookcheck.net.

Whereas most subnotebooks are mean with input devices, these are a special strengths of the Thinkpad X60s.
The width as well as the length of the base unit are optimally used by the keyboard unit. So, it provides optimal overview and comfort at smallest available space.

The size of the keys are in general reasonable, only right beside the enter key, which extends over two rows, the space is rather narrow. The keys which are reserved for "ü, ä, +, and #" in the German keyboard layout were shrunk to about 2/3 of standard size. The same happened to the Windows, the Alt, and the Ctrl key in the front row.
Despite these losses the keyboard is first-class although you might need some practice to avoid typing mistakes. As usual the keyboard is tightly attached to the case, typing feels wonderful: the travel is sufficient and there is a clear pressure point.

Some further properties of the keyboard are noteworthy. The Thinkpad layout places the FN key is totally at the left border. Compared to other notebooks it changed the place with the Ctrl key.
Furthermore, a hot-key called "ThinkVantage" is provided, which allows direct access to the software tool package of IBM/Lenovo. This package allows to quickly and easily change the hardware and the software configuration by an easily understandable user guidance.

A nice gadget is also the Thinklight, a white LED, which illuminates the keyboard from the upper display edge without bedazzling the user.  So, it is possible to work with this notebook even if it is nearly completely dark, although the brightness of the display is not sufficient to also illuminate the keyboard, but we'll talk about this aspect later.
Another property of the X60s is that it misses out the otherwise usual touch pad. Because of problems due to only restricted space, and because of a design decision for a more spacious keyboard, the pad was missed out and the notebook was only equipped with a track point, which demands clearly less space.

This small red device, which most users are unaccustomed to and which likely  taxes the users' patience at the first, soon turns out to be the better mouse replacement.
It is not necessary to move the finger in order to reach certain regions of the display, and the mouse pointer can be controlled by a relaxed and still hand. The force controls the speed at which the mouse pointer moves, the direction of the force the directions of the movement.

Should this Thinkpad trademark still cause problems - you can still attach a mouse to one of the three USB ports, up-to-date optical mice work without problems at nearly all surfaces, no matter, if it is a polished metal table, or the cord off the comfortable sofa in the living room.

Another word regarding data security: The Thinkpad X60s is equipped with a fingerprint reader and can therefore, be protected against unauthorized use. Furthermore, the X60s uses the well-known active hard disk protection, which removes the head of the hard disk within seconds upon jerks in order to avoid data loss.
Software for data backup, TPM chip, and a possible Bios password can help you to further protect your confidential data. Comprehensive details about security provided by the X60s are available at the product web site.

Similar to other Thinkpads, also the X60s is offered in a variety of different configurations and therewith also of different performance. Regarding processor a number of energy saving versions of Pentium M, Core Duo, and Core 2 Duo CPUs, as well as powerful chips up to a Core 2 Duo T7200 CPU with 2.0 Ghz are offered.

The choice of the processor depends on the demanded performance and on the demands regarding emissions and battery runtime. As a rule of thumb: The more performance, the more emissions and the lower the battery runtime.

The notebook we reviewed was equipped with a L2400 CPU, the energy saving version of the Intel Core Duo T2300 processor. This is a good trade-off between performance and energy demand and provides the X60s with good and sufficient office performance.

The integrated Intel GMA 950 video chip is responsible for graphics. This provides a sufficient performance for office and internet applications, but its use for higher 3D demands is rather limited. Anyway, in total this notebook aims at office operation. It should also be possible to upgrade to Windows Vista later on, even if the higher memory demands of Vista will likely reduce the performance of this notebook.

The main memory can be easily upgraded to a maximum capacity of 4GB, however, we want to mention, that the current configuration allocates both of the easily accessible memory slots with 512MB banks. So a upgrade requires replacing at least one of them.

The 80GB Toshiba hard disk rated average regarding transfer rates and access times. Alternatively you can currently choose models with up to 120 GB capacity.

Further information about the video card can be found here or in our comparison of mobile video cards. Detailed information about the Core Duo CPU can be found here.

Please also look at our benchmark list of mobile processors or at our benchmark list of mobile video cards, in order to compare this notebook to other configurations.