LENOVO THINKPAD T400S TOUCH REVIEW

The new Lenovo ThinkPad T400s Touch is the first standard notebook to feature a touchscreen panel. It doesn’t come cheap: buyers have to shell out an additional $400 to buy the touchscreen version.

Specifications
Operating System: Windows 7 Professional
Display: 1440 x 900 WXGA+ with MultiTouch LED Backlit (Matte finish)
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo SP9600 (2.53GHz, 1066MHz FSB, 6MB Cache)
Memory: 4GB DDR3 RAM (2GB x 2)
Storage: 128GB Toshiba SSD

Build and Design
The new ThinkPad T400s is slimmer and lighter than the original T400. Lenovo has coated the exterior of the notebook with a rubberized black paint. Build quality is excellent. The chassis shows absolutely no sign of flex at all.

The hard drive is now 1.8 inch instead of the 2.5 inch found on T400. Upgrading this notebook is really easy, as the chassis provides easy access panels to all user-replaceable components.

Screen and Speakers
The T400s Touch has more or less the same panel as the regular T400s with the only difference being the addition of a multi-touch surface. The touch surface allows you to manipulate screen objects without using a mouse or a touchpad. The display is OK, but it does have those minor flaws associated with all touch-screens. For instance touch-screens appear to be hazy, but the problem is not that apparent on T400s Touch.

The display itself is good. Colors are bright and vivid. Contrast is also good. Viewing angles are average. Lenovo has also added new software to take advantage of the multi-touch features. Speaker performance was far from being perfect, but this is a problem with most business notebooks.

Keyboard and Touchpad
The keyboard on this notebook looks and feels different from the keyboards on previous models. But the changes are mostly for the better. The T400s Touch has relatively larger ‘escape’ and ‘delete’ keys. The keyboard is comfortable to type on.

The touchpad is different too. The T400s Touch has a raised touchpad with a softer texture. It seems less sensitive than the touchpad on T400s.

Ports and Features
Port selection is good. There are 2 USB 2.0 ports, 1 eSATA/USB combo port, VGA port, DisplayPort out, built-in web camera, Bluetooth, DVD+/-RW

Performance
Performance is quite satisfactory. Boot times and application load times are fast. The machine can handle most tasks. Despite this being a business notebook with no discrete GPUs, it can easily decode HD movies.

Battery Life
At about 6 hours, the battery life is quite good.

Conclusion
With T400s Lenovo has brought a Touch-screen interface to a standard notebook. The notebook performs reasonably well with its touch interface. The only problem is its prize. The T400s Touch starts at around $2000.

Pros:
First standard notebook to feature a multi-touch screen
Good battery life

Cons:
Pricey