Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon G12 laptop review: First major refresh in three years

The new chassis introduces several visual changes from the outgoing design. Firstly, the webcam portion has been redesigned with a small glossy bar on the outer lid to allow for a larger webcam sensor and to act as a grip for opening the lid. Secondly, the bottom and top bezels are now even thinner than before for a smaller footprint. Thirdly, the stereo speakers have been relocated to be hidden underneath the keyboard requiring no dedicated speaker grilles. And lastly, additional tactile markings have been added to select keys on the keyboard to aid users who may be visually impaired.

Additional changes can be seen on the clickpad and bottom panel as well, but overall chassis rigidity and texture remain the same as before for that familiar ThinkPad X1 Carbon feel. Keep in mind that Gorilla Glass protection is not available on non-touch SKUs and so the display is more prone to damage or twisting than say the display on the Spectre x360 14.

All ports from the G11 have returned for G12 albeit rearranged. The ports are packed rather tightly especially along the left edge. Charging must also be done via the left edge whereas the Razer Blade 14 design includes USB-C ports on both sides of the laptop for more freedom of charging.

An integrated SD card reader continues to be absent, but that is a trend we're also seeing on the latest Latitude 7440 and HP Dragonfly models.

The webcam sensor remains at 2 MP with no higher resolution options despite the chassis changes. Many HP systems like the recent Spectre x360 14 offer 5 MP options.

Both IR and a physical shutter come standard for privacy.

There are no extras in the box other than the paperwork and AC adapter. Disappointingly, only a one-year limited manufacturer warranty applies if purchased in the US instead of the base three-year warranty on some ThinkPad T options.

The ThinkPad keyboard is so iconic that Lenovo tends to make just minor adjustments between chassis redesigns. In this case, Lenovo has removed the dedicated PrtSc button along the bottom on the G11 keyboard for a fingerprint reader instead. The PrtSc button is now a part of the F9 button where the videoconferencing hotkeys have also been dropped in favor of Microsoft Snippet Tool and Phone Link. Otherwise, the typing experience should be crisp and familiar to existing ThinkPad owners.

The Core Ultra 7 series effectively replaces the older Core P series. Raw multi-thread performance from our Core Ultra 7 155H is only about 5 to 15 percent faster than the Core i7-1370P in the outgoing X1 Carbon G11 model, but the gap becomes significantly wider when accounting for throttling or when compared to configurations running on Core U-series CPUs. Even so, performance is roughly comparable to the Ryzen 7 7840U.

While upfront performance is good, the processor suffers from throttling when stressed for long periods similar to what we observed on the X1 Carbon G11. When running CineBench R15 xT in a loop, for example, the initial score of 2297 points would remain relatively steady at first before falling steeply to 1444 points halfway into the stress test for a deficit of 37 percent. Performance would recover thereafter at a very slow pace before steadily falling again which is an unusual behavior not seen on most other laptops. Repeating the stress test would not result in any major differences to confirm our findings. High Turbo Boost sustainability is never expected from thin and lightweight laptops like the X1 Carbon, but performance consistency should still be a target.

At the very least, the undesirable throttling behavior is not as steep as what we recorded on the 2023 X1 Carbon G11 with the Core i7-1370P as shown by the graph below.