Lenovo ThinkPad X200 Series From X200 to X280: An Overview

[@motif5775]

I have a x220 tablet version with 5 storage drives in it (1 sd and 1 usb, I use as external drives) Arch and window$ on their own hard drives, and a 1tb drive in the the dock where I store all media(movies, videos and music). The person I bought it from said it was too old and it's been sitting for years, lol. A lot of people don't know that these old thinkpads, both x and t models are gems. They are capable of soo much. I also have a t410. Thinkpads are awesome and I am so glad I came across your channel. Thank you!!

[@LaptopRetrospective]

I'm glad you enjoyed the video. I have lots of ThinkPad contact so enjoy your stay.

[@tokroni]

On form factor and build quality alone, x200 was the pinnacle of Thinkpad mobile design . Lack of trackpad is a plus point. My left nut for a modern x200 with AMD pro 7 and 1920x1200 resolution

[@harryvendryes]

For those specs... I'd gladly offer up the matching pair.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

I know there are people that mod modern Intel boards, but not AMD.

[@juanignacioaschura9437]

My favourite series of them all. Owned mostly the Tablet variants, with the X230 being my main choice. My brother still keeps the love alive with his X220, which I sold to him years ago. I would return to the X series, but the X13 just isn't the same, and the AMD variants are hard to find in my region and crazy expensive (and I wouldn't return to Intel now that I'm accustomed to AMD's IGP performance). The A285 could've been a choice, but it was a half-baked afterthought.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Love my X220 still.

[@archygrey9093]

I've got the X200S, the X220T and X270. very convenient laptop size, use it more than any of the 14, 15 and 17 inch laptops i own even when around the house. One big advantage of the X270 is that it can be used with usb-c so you only need to carry one charger when travelling and has NVME support, Its also the last to have upgradeable RAM, a hot swappable battery and a docking connector.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Yeah the X270 is pretty great. I doubt I'll ever own a laptop bigger than a 13" form factor ever again.

[@nickb3968]

Still use my X201 as almost daily as a home/evening surfing computer....running Ubuntu Mate with 8GB and a small 64GB SSD....it still flies compared to many a new laptop running Windows...

[@LaptopRetrospective]

It's hard to imagine but there are still companies shipping HDD out there which certainly doesn't help.

[@nickb3968]

@@LaptopRetrospective Yep, I have an x220 I'm replacing the IPS screen on right now too that's similarly configured....but I still prefer the x201's keyboard which has a slightly differnt trackpad.....both keyboards are better than the newer x200 series stuff IMO(I especially prefer the cursor/arrow key placement). The tactiliity(word?) is unbelievable in use.

[@fredericbandong8841]

Waiting for my x280 to arrive. That size is just perfect. I couldn't care less about upgradeability. 16gb is already enough for wfh

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Hope it arrived safely.

[@claudiaw9246]

Loved seeing this overview! Am watching this on my X240, which is still my daily driver, even though I have since acquired a more powerful laptop (not a ThinkPad, but an Acer). I just happen to love, love, LOVE the X240 keyboard, which is easily the most comfortable I've ever used.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Glad you enjoyed it Claudia, always good to hear from you. ThinkPad doesn't have a bad keyboard, one of the things that makes them great.

[@claudiaw9246]

@@LaptopRetrospective thanks again for steering me towards the X240 years ago! I may never be able to completely switch to another laptop; there are just so many wonderful design features I'd miss.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

One day you might, but having high standards isn't a bad thing. 😁

[@harryvendryes]

Love the X200. In fact, all parts just arrived to upgrade my X200 (two of them in fact) to the X201 i7 motherboard + a better AFFS screen. Already have 8MB of RAM installed + Arch Linux. At least I can have one running for a month, before attacking the second. Here's to not buggering it up!

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Good luck on your upgrades.

[@aaroncheah2088]

I have the X200 and X201 in parts awaiting restoration. Also, the X200s Celeron model as the NAS monitoring PC since it is slow as molasses. Lastly, the X200 Tablet for casual use. And too many X200 docks to boot. People seems to given it away.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Interesting. I need to try and track down more s models.

[@aaroncheah2088]

@@LaptopRetrospective My X200s is a Japanese model but I swapped out the keyboard from the X201 parts bin. I heard it is possible to install a X201 motherboard to the X200s chassis but heatsink need to be modified.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Yeah lots of compatible parts between those two.

[@harryvendryes]

Yes, you can pick up the X200 dock very cheaply. I believe they were costly back in the day. Have three scattered about the place. Bet there are people who never realize the rubber flap opens to charge an external battery. Nice feature. Be aware that if you Libreboot, any DVD drive will have to be physically ejected before you can reboot. With the above mentioned i7 upgrade, I'll be saying goodbye to Libreboot 😞

[@bflmpsvz147]

Still rockin' a modded X230 with 13.3" FHD screen, 16G RAM and 1T SSD :) Next step will be a Nano (Gen 1 probably) but let's see where the prices are in a year or so :) Nice video!

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Glad you enjoyed the video!

[@john-scala]

2:07 I have x201 and still use that as my daily driver ,

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Cool, what do you run on it/use it for?

[@john-scala]

@@LaptopRetrospective lubuntu 20. Visual studio code and android studio. And email It fits with my whole two hands at the keyboard, better than x390 Note: i also use the ultra bay

[@obsessedcultist3012]

The photographic trickery is so neat! (No, I must hold myself back from buying more thinkpads)

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Must you though? 😂

[@IX_IX]

Watching this on my X201

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Excellent!

[@mrIpodmagic]

I’m looking at the x280 it’s so nice

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Yep, it's a nice unit.

[@cap6363]

love my thinkpad x260, it is compact in size and very sturdy, easy to carry anywhere

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Nice, what do you use it for?

[@cap6363]

@@LaptopRetrospective I often take photos outdoors, so I use my Thinkpad to save photos from the memory card. I also use it for presentations and use Office when im not at home, Thinkpad is very reliable.

[@MegaManNeo]

The X2x0 series is so nice. Still kinda want to have a 220 or 230 but as things look right now, my X240 much rather needs a new battery and the T420 that I also have new thermal paste.

[@ted-b]

Great stuff! Still entirely usable little machines, for not a lot of money.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Quite right!

[@motif5775]

Facts! Way better than paying a couple thousand for a laptop with 2 usb ports and one hard drive bay.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

All depends on your wants and needs. I've done both and been happy.

[@wofwof14]

I have x200 with a docking station and it is working good up to this moment, but my daily driver is my x230 which also working great with my multi-media and graphic softwares. Also, I always disabled my trackpad and prefer to use the trackpoint instead.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Those are some great classic machines.

[@Tjk918]

Where are you finding an X200 for a good deal? Ebay lisings are heavily inflated since the X200 is a popular option for librebooting

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Yeah, there aren't too many listed right now so local deals and other methods of purchase are recommended. What people are charging for some of them is nothing short of insane.

[@blauechips-pr6sn]

My personal choice is the x240 or x250. Both are basically the same laptop, so both can use parts from each other. I like both laptops because you can easily get a fhd toucscreen display on both of them. Both can have massive battery life and are cheap. But taking them apart takes time especially if you want to change the keyboard.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

I'd choose the x250 just to have the track pad with the TrackPoint buttons from the start.

[@trikeonabike4949]

I still have my old X200, but its a tablet convertible. Everything about it (aside from the battery, understandably) still works flawlessly. I mostly run Linux on it these days, otherwise that machine never let me down.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Fantastic machine for Linux.

[@archygrey9093]

Apparently having a touchscreen option on your laptop will actually reduce the battery life by 15-20% even if you don't use it or disable it in bios.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Yeah, it still draws power regardless that and some touch screens are higher brightness and resolution.

[@10lauset]

I'm using the X230 at the moment with a T430 and T500 hanging around. I recently bought a couple of new wi-fi/bluetooth cards but stopped short of installing them. The T430 has a newer BIOS which can't go back to the original to get the new card whitelisted. I wasn't quite sure about the X230. As such, I haven't bothered using the wi-fi nor bluetooth capabilities as the ethernet is directly connected and I'm in a small apartment so the bluetooth isn't necessary. What would I have to do to get the Thinkpads to work with the card or point to me the videos which address this situation. I usually power them directly since I have docking stations for them and dismiss installing batteries as they're used at home and not carries around. Thanks. ... Cheers. ...

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Have you read into ivyra.in at all and whether or not it can help you with the whitelist issue?

[@10lauset]

@@LaptopRetrospective I clicked onto the link you provided but I got a GoDaddy for it. Can you give me the site again. Thanks

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Sorry about that, looks like it's been changed. 1vyra.in/

[@10lauset]

@@LaptopRetrospective Thanks ... Cheers. ...

[@LaptopRetrospective]

You're welcome. Let me know how it goes or if you have questions.

[@gluttonousmaximus9048]

I'll be very excited to see the ThinkPad Yoga line overview because I think it has a lot of changes over the years Currently rocking the second hand Yoga 260 but I'm thinking of upgrading... This line is extremely niche... My drawing niche.

[@gluttonousmaximus9048]

Though I'm still keeping the extremely cheap X220 for tinkering with a wide variety of operating systems because it's modern enough to handle most modern websites and indie games, but retro enough to swap and play with parts.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

I'd love to do a Yoga overview but they aren't as common and around here, hold their value more. X220 is great, still using mine to this day.

[@doxanthropos]

Watching this on my x220, but still also using a x61 a lot.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Nice, what do you use them both for?

[@doxanthropos]

@@LaptopRetrospective Bought the x220 because I wanted to have a lightweight laptop for my everyday private use. It fit fine for that. Then I toyed with the idea of having a device that is intentionally limited in what I can do with it, so I can use it for note taking while reading and similar tasks, without it being able to distract me with easy access to the web. That's why I looked into the older x series, but without much success. Even a x60 is still powerful enough to let me run Firefox, Thunderbird, etc and is not limited to terminal+vim+git. The only thing that I really need that it doesn't do is run Signal-Desktop, because there is no 32bit binary. But I also realized that I like the dimensions and the haptics of the x60/61 much more than even the ones of the x220. So most of the time, I'm on my x61 for all web stuff, programming, note taking etc. and only use the more powerful one, when I want to have either drm content (that slows down video playback a lot on old devices) or good bluetooth to watch videos while doing the dishes.

[@doxanthropos]

And I also have two x60. One for having a completely Free computer, with LibreBoot and Trisquel Linux and the other to play with Plan 9.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

I've yet to have the pleasure to look at the x60 line but I hope to soon. I've heard your observations from a few different people.

[@doxanthropos]

@@LaptopRetrospective The x60 has the nice benefit of the BIOS to be able to be flashed from inside the operating system, so no soldering required to put LibreBoot or CoreBoot on it, while the x61 comes with a 64 bit cpu. Otherwise they are basically identical. Nice 4x3 display and a keyboard that feels a little more solid and good than the one of the x220 (which still is a great keyboard, I think). Good luck in getting one or more!

[@jundropshot]

any review of the x270? thanks

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Not yet. Very similar to the X260 but newer CPUs I believe.

[@freespeechfinland]

I would watch that review for sure! :) I'm currently waiting for an X270 (FHD) to replace the X260 that i got instead by mistake. I have concluded that the X270 overall is the best choice for me. Too bad it doesn't have that old superior keyboard and trackpoint parts that all worked so well. Have been doing well without a computer for quite a while now. My last one was an X61s. Loved it. Except it would get hot and the fan could get a little noisy. Oh, and i did briefly have a T420 also, but it was so bulky and had that cheaper screen that (even with the classic keyboard) i just never wanted to use it..

[@TechyySean]

I've accumulated: X201, X220i, X230T, X270. IBM/Lenovo shined with these IMO.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Great collection.

[@jo-vrn]

I was using Devuan Chimaera in my Thinkpad x220 and everything was perfect. The new 500gb 870 evo SSD has arrived and I reinstalled the operating system but at the end of the installation, when the PC restarts, it does not boot / uefi. I can't start Devuan. I tried to install Mint lmde 5 and on reboot it crashes, there is some problem with Uefi, I have tried many times but during the installation by downloading the new kernel and updates on reboot there is some incompatibility with uefi. I tried Mint 21 based on Ubuntu 22.04 and it worked, it boots. Then by chance yesterday I saw peppermint that I had never used, I chose Devuan based peppermint and everything worked, it starts up. Peppermint with the uefi bios of my Thinkpad x220 is ok

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Never heard of Devuan which doesn't surprise me as there are so many distros out there.

[@jo-vrn]

@@LaptopRetrospective In the past I have had problems with Mint "Ubuntu," sometimes a "kernel" update would come and break the operating system. Mint Lmde 5 is very stable and is much better than Ubuntu based Mint. Devuan I use it with Sysvinit and it boots faster than Debian with systemd. I have had a lot of satisfaction installing Devuan with netinstall on old PCs/laptops and have created many minimal systems with xfce xorg, "450mb of RAM used on 64 bit systems and 250mb of RAM in 32 bit systems, and using icewm on a laptop with 512mb of RAM is very fast . Mx-Linux is great but is very clunky. Peppermint Os based on Devuan with Sysvinit I have been trying it for a few days on several PCs and it is performing very well. Un saluto dall'Italia

[@brokenspine66]

The line up is missing probably the best and maybe the most popular of the bunch the X230.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Yep, simply because I didn't have one when I filmed the video. I don't have one in my collection.

[@wnewbury4]

I have a X240. I know it is not the best of the X series but it is a good computer and it was DIRT CHEAP.

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Price is always a factor.

[@goldibollocks]

I bought a used x200s about 5 years ago and it is still serving me well 👌

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Awesome, what do you use it for?

[@goldibollocks]

@@LaptopRetrospective I mainly use it to check my mail and a few websites in the morning. It's a nice size for the bedside table!

[@LaptopRetrospective]

Agreed!

[@Nearnface]

woowoww

[@AM-mk3zc]

i've just found a thinkpad x200 on ebay and bought for 50 euro. Now i can finally install libreboot

[@LaptopRetrospective]

That's a good price, they often go for more because of that very reason.

[@AM-mk3zc]

@@LaptopRetrospective yes, prices are insanely high in this period. I was torn between x200 and t61 15.4 but the x200 for portability is on top also considered the same cpu!