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The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme series of notebooks, in addition to a very impressive pedigree, has several advantages for those who need a powerful yet easily transportable laptop. The computer we tested is equipped with a fast 6-core Intel processor and GeForce GTX 1050 Ti discrete graphics. At the same time, «Extreme» is quite realistic to consider a compact model equipped with a 15-inch screen.
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme
⇡#Specifications, equipment and software
There are several modifications of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme on sale, but in any case, each of them uses the GeForce GTX 1050 Ti mobile graphics in the Max-Q design. All possible iron combinations are listed in the table below.
| Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme | |
| Display | 15.6″, 1920 × 1080, IPS, matte 15.6″, 3840 × 2160, IPS, glossy, touch |
| CPU | Intel Core i7-8750H, 6/12 cores/threads, 2.2 (4.1) GHz, 45W Intel Core i5-8300H, 4/8 cores/threads, 2.3 (4.0) GHz, 45W |
| video card | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Max-Q 4 GB |
| RAM | Up to 64 GB, DDR4-2666, 2 channels |
| Installing Drives | 2 × M.2 in PCI Express x4 3.0 or SATA 6Gb/s mode |
| optical drive | Not |
| Interfaces | 2 x USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-A 2 x Thunderbolt 3 1 x USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-A 1 x 3.5mm mini jack 1 x HDMI 1 × smart card reader 1 × card reader 1 x mini Ethernet |
| Built-in battery | 80 Wh |
| External power supply | 135 W |
| Dimensions | 361×245×18.4mm |
| Notebook weight | With FHD — 1.7 kg With 4K — 1.8 kg |
| Operating system | Windows 10 x64 Pro |
| Guarantee | 3 years |
| Price in Russia according to Yandex.Market | 2020$ for test model |
As you can see, perhaps the most upgraded version of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme has arrived in our test lab. So, the laptop is equipped with a 4K screen, a 6-core Core i7-8750H processor, 16 GB of RAM and a 512 GB solid state drive. Such a modification costs in Moscow retail on average $ 2020. For a model with a Full HD display, Core i5-8300H, 16 GB of RAM and 256 GB of SSD in the capital, they ask about $ 1,520. In all cases, a professional version of the Windows 10 operating system is installed on the laptop.
All Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme series laptops are equipped with the Intel Wireless-AC 9560, which supports IEEE 802.11b/g/n/ac standards at 2.4 and 5 GHz with a maximum throughput of up to 1.73 Gbps and Bluetooth 5 .
Extreme only came with an external power supply with a power of 135 W and a weight of about 400 g.
⇡# Appearance and input devices
Just one word — ThinkPad — is enough to understand what a Lenovo laptop looks like. The body of the «Extreme» is entirely made of plastic. All parts, except for the display frame, are provided with a velvety soft touch coating. The material is not easily soiled — after two weeks of working with the device, I boldly declare: only the touchpad attracts fingerprints to itself, while the rest of the parts remain clean.
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When turned off, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme appears to have a near bezel-less display. However, it is not. In the case of the test model, the 4K display is placed in a black frame. As a result, the total thickness of the frames on the left and right is 8 mm, on the top — 13 mm, on the bottom — 23 mm. The webcam is located on top.
The laptop lid in the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme opens 180 degrees, which is generally typical for this series. Unfortunately, you won’t be able to open the laptop with one hand: rather tight hinges are used in the design of the laptop, which, on the other hand, allow you to clearly and securely hold the screen.
As I said, the undoubted advantages of the ThinkPad X1 Extreme are its size and weight. So, any version of the Lenovo laptop weighs less than 2 kg, so carrying the device every day with you will not be difficult. The thickness of «Extreme» is only 18.4 mm.
On the left side of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme there is a connector for connecting the power supply, two Thunderbolt 3 ports at once, combined with USB 3.1 Gen2 type C, an HDMI 2.0 output, a mini-Ethernet connector (an adapter for a full-fledged RJ-45 is included) and 3 .5mm headphone jack. On the right side of the laptop are a smart card reader, a card reader that supports 4 formats of external storage devices, two USB 3.1 Gen1 A-type and a Kensington lock slot.
In my opinion, the model under consideration with functionality is all right. As you can see, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme supports up to four independent monitors. In addition, the optional IR camera supports Glance technology for comprehensive face, iris and eye movement detection. For example, with its help it is possible to move windows with just a movement of the eyes.
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme keyboard is a true classic. Of course, for those users who have never encountered such a keyboard, it will be unusual at first to deal with the left Ctrl, non-standard PgUp, PgDn and PrtSc, but you get used to this arrangement of buttons pretty quickly. But Extreme has very large and convenient Shift, Enter, Tab and Backspace. And, unlike many ultrabooks, the ThinkPad X1 Extreme has quite a lot of key travel, with a tangible clear pressure. Typing on this keyboard is very comfortable. The F1-F12 series works in combination with the Fn button by default, while priority is given to their multimedia functions.
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The keyboard in the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme is equipped with two-level white backlighting. On the right side of the case is a Match-on-Chip fingerprint sensor. Like all other full-fledged ThinkPads, X1 Extreme is equipped with two manipulators: a touchpad with three buttons and a TrackPoint mini-joystick. The manufacturer claims that the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme is not afraid of even getting liquid on the keyboard.
The touch panel of the device is quite convenient to use. The coating at first glance seems the same as on the case, but in fact it turns out to be more «rubber» and more pleasant to the touch.
As for the webcam, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme uses a 720p 30Hz sensor. This is enough for Skype calls — and nothing more. I will add that unlocking the operating system is possible, including with the help of face identification (Windows Hello technology), and controlling various functions using a voice command system (virtual assistant Cortana).
The webcam comes with a ThinkShutter privacy shutter for those who think Big Brother is watching them.
⇡ # Internal device and upgrade options
The laptop is quite easy to disassemble: unscrew a few screws and carefully remove the plastic bottom.
As you can see, the processor and mobile graphics are cooled by a single array of heatpipes and fans. Since the system uses a fairly powerful 45-watt CPU, there are some concerns about how efficient such a cooler will be. At the same time, the manufacturer claims that the device meets the requirements of twelve military standards, and has also passed more than 200 tests for performance in extreme conditions. The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme is said to perform reliably in arctic snow and dust storms, in zero gravity and in heavy rain.
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The test copy has 16 GB of RAM installed in the form of a single Samsung module. The die operates at an effective frequency of 2666 MHz with a latency of 19-19-19-43. The Windows operating system is installed on a 512 GB Intel SSDPEKKF512G8L NVMe drive. It is not possible to install a 2.5-inch hard drive or SSD in the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme.
Possible actions for the subsequent upgrade of the laptop are obvious: here one more 16-gigabyte RAM module is asked for. You will also be able to install a second SSD over time as the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme motherboard has two M.2 slots.
⇡ # Testing methodology
Since the laptop has far from the most productive graphic solution installed, it makes no sense to use only the maximum or close graphics quality settings. In addition, when testing the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme, only Full HD resolution was used, although the laptop is equipped with a 4K display.
| API | Quality | Full screen anti-aliasing | |
| 1920×1080 | |||
| The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, Novigrad and surroundings | DirectX 11 | Max. quality | AA |
| high | |||
| GTA V, built-in benchmark | Max. quality | 4 × MSAA + FXAA | |
| Without anti-aliasing | |||
| FarCry 5, built-in benchmark | Max. quality, HD textures off. | TAA | |
| high | TAA | ||
| Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, built-in benchmark | The highest | high | |
| high | Without anti-aliasing | ||
| Dota 2 match recording | Max. quality | Without anti-aliasing | |
| World of Tanks 1.0, EnCore benchmark | Max. quality | TSSAA HQ | |
| Total War: WARHAMMER II, built-in benchmark | DirectX 12 | Max. quality | 4× MSAA |
| high | Without anti-aliasing | ||
| Battlefield V, The Last Tiger Mission | Ultra | TAA | |
| high | |||
| Shadow of the Tomb Raider, built-in benchmark | Max. quality | SMAAT2x | |
| high | Without anti-aliasing | ||
| Metro Exodus, Volga | Extreme, NVIDIA HairWorks incl., Physics incl. | ||
| High, NVIDIA HairWorks on, Physics on |
Gaming performance was measured using the well-known FRAPS program. With it, we get the rendering time of each frame. Then, using the FRAFS Bench Viewer utility, not only the average FPS is calculated, but also the 99th percentile. The use of the 99th percentile instead of the minimum frames per second is due to the desire to clean up the results from random bursts of performance that were provoked by reasons not directly related to the operation of the main components of the platform.
CPU and memory performance was measured using the following software:
- Corona 1.3. Testing rendering speed using the renderer of the same name. Measures the build speed of the standard BTR scene used to measure performance.
- WinRAR 5.40. Archiving a folder of 11 GB with various data in RAR5 format and with the maximum degree of compression.
- Blender 2.79. Determination of the final rendering speed in one of the popular free packages for creating three-dimensional graphics. The duration of building the final model from Blender Cycles Benchmark rev4 is measured.
- x264 FHD Benchmark. Testing the speed of video transcoding to H.264/AVC format.
- x265 HD Benchmark. Testing the speed of video transcoding to H.265/HEVC format.
- CINEBENCH R15. Performance measurement of photorealistic 3D rendering in CINEMA 4D animation package, CPU test.
- Fritz 9 Chess Benchmarks. Testing the speed of a popular chess engine.
Display testing is performed using the X-Rite i1Display Pro colorimeter and the HCFR application.
The laptop battery life is checked in three modes. The first load option — web surfing — involves alternately opening and closing the tabs of the 3DNews.ru, Computeruniverse.ru and Unsplash.com sites with an interval of 30 seconds. This test uses the Google Chrome browser with the «Block data and cookies from third-party sites» and «Do not allow sites to save data» options enabled. In the second mode, x265 (HEVC) video is played in a standard Windows 10 player with the repeat function activated. The third type of load is running the Unigine Heaven benchmark at maximum graphics quality settings in full screen mode. In all three cases, the same display brightness was set to 220 cd / m2.
In games and other applications, the results of the following laptops are considered:
| Test participants | ||||||
| Model | Screen | CPU | RAM | Graphics | Storage device | Battery |
| MSI GE73VR 7RF Raider | 17.3″, 1920×1080 TN | Intel Core i7-7700HQ, 4/8 cores/threads, 2.8 (3.8) GHz, 45 W | 16 GB DDR4-2400 dual channel | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 8 GB GDDR5 | HDD, 1 TB, 7200 rpm + 2 × SSD, 256 GB, SATA 6 Gb / s | 51 Wh |
| MSI GE73 Raider RGB 8RF | 17.3″, 1920×1080 TN | Intel Core i7-8750H, 6/12 cores/threads, 2.2 (4.1) GHz, 45W | 32 GB DDR4-2400 dual channel | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 8 GB GDDR5 | HDD, 1 TB, 7200 rpm + SSD, 256 GB, SATA 6 Gb / s | 51 Wh |
| ASUS ROG Strix GL553VE | 15.6″, 1920×1080, IPS | Intel Core i7-7700HQ, 4/8 cores/threads, 2.8 (3.8) GHz, 45 W | 16 GB DDR4-2400 dual channel | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti 4 GB GDDR5 | HDD, 1 TB, 5400 rpm + SSD, 128 GB, SATA 6 Gb / s | 48 Wh |
| Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme | 15.6″, 3840×2160, IPS | Intel Core i7-8750H, 6/12 cores/threads, 2.2 (4.1) GHz, 45W | 16GB DDR4-2666 single channel | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 T Max-Qi 4 GB GDDR5 | SSD, 512 GB, PCI Express x4 3.0 | 80 Wh |
⇡ # Display and sound
As noted in the first part of the review, on sale you will find versions of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme with Full HD and 4K screens. In the second case, the display is equipped with a touch glossy finish — with all the ensuing pluses and minuses. The test instance uses an AU Optronics B156ZAN03.2 IPS matrix. The display is notable for the fact that it is claimed to support playback of HDR content.
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme is great for watching movies. So, the matrix contrast is 1467:1. Minimum white luminosity is 3 cd/m2and the maximum — 389 cd / m2. It turns out that the laptop is comfortable to use both in pitch darkness and in clear sunny weather. The gamma is 2.29, which is slightly higher than the reference value of 2.2.
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Color gamut |
Colorful temperature |
Measurements with a colorimeter showed that the color temperature of the display in the entire range is significantly higher than the reference value of 6500 K, but at the same time there is good stability in grayscale. Largely because of this, the average DeltaE error on the gray scale is quite high — 7.9 with a maximum value of 12. But the average in the ColorChecker24 test was 4.58 with a maximum deviation of 8.35. The color gamut of the AU Optronics B156ZAN03.2 is well above the sRGB standard, but due to color deviations it does not fully match the AdobeRGB standard.
The test model has a pronounced backlight in the upper left corner of the screen. At the same time, it is not at all a fact that this applies to all instances. Therefore, before buying, it is better to personally check the laptop for such shortcomings — I boldly assert that they are strictly local in nature. The glow effect, like most IPS matrices, is present, but it appears mainly on a black field. The AUO screen has excellent viewing angles both vertically and horizontally. Finally, the matrix used belongs to the category of Flicker-Free solutions in the entire working range of brightness.
The sound of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme speakers is flat — there are no low frequencies, and there is nowhere for them to appear in a laptop with a thickness of 18 mm. The mids and highs also sound inexpressive, especially the upper ones. And the speakers of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme can’t be called loud.
⇡#Laptop performance in resource-intensive applications
For a long time, the factor that determines the performance of any laptop is the efficiency of its cooling system. This dependence became especially critical with the advent of 6-core Coffee Lake processors. Starting this year, I decided to study in more detail the capabilities of the laptop cooling system, as well as to identify the dependence of the level of performance of the CPU, GPU and RAM on the quality of the cooler used in the system. In particular, from now on, testing takes place not only in the default mode, but also after manual tuning in the Intel Extreme Tuning Utility program. But soon Intel will also introduce 8-core laptop chips …
Programs of the caliber LinX and Prime95 are a litmus test for modern laptops built on Coffee Lake chips. As you know, the clock speed of the Core i7-8750H is 2.2 GHz, but in Turbo Boost mode, when all six cores are loaded, it can increase to 3.9 GHz. Only now the TDP level of this chip is 45 W, and in some cases this power limit is not enough for the mobile CPU to work to its fullest.
Confirmation of my words is in the screenshot above. The Core i7-8750H used in the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme drops the frequency from 3.9 to 2.0 GHz in the LinX program — we observe throttling at 200 MHz. Such a sharp drop in frequency is primarily due to the 45-watt TDP limit. However, to work at a frequency of 3.9 GHz (for example, if we had the opportunity to increase the level of typical CPU power consumption) in the case of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme, the 6-core Intel still could not, since the temperature of its hottest core reaches 98 degrees Celcius. But, by the way, in this mode, the laptop behaves quite quietly — from a distance of 30 centimeters, the sound level meter recorded 39.7 dBA.
Well, in the Intel Extreme Tuning Utility in Offset mode, I managed to reduce the CPU voltage by 0.185 V. As you can see, the Core i7-8750H has a rather high VCore parameter in default mode. Such downvolting significantly reduced the appetites of the 6-core — in the same LinX, its frequency was now reduced to 2.5 GHz with the same Core Max parameters and noise level. It turns out that we accelerated the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme by 500 MHz by pressing just one button.
In other programs, in the default mode, the Core i7-8750H worked at a frequency of 3.3 GHz — Turbo Boost turned on, but not at full strength. In this case, the cooling system is to blame, which, as we have already found out, consists of only two heat pipes. Reducing the processor voltage allowed the chip to operate at full capacity, which led to a noticeable increase in performance in almost all programs. For example, in x265 Benchmark the laptop is 11% faster, and in CINEBENCH R15 it is 12%.
It so happened that the 6-core Core i7-8750H processor is used mainly in gaming laptops, which, as a rule, cannot boast of light weight and compactness. In particular, we compared the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme with MSI’s 17-inch model. As you can see, the drawdown of the clock frequency of the central processor leads to the fact that «Extreme» in some tests seriously lags behind a laptop with a more efficient cooling system. However, self-lowering the CPU voltage paid off — Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme began to work noticeably faster.
Do not forget that the RAM of the laptop in question operates in single-channel mode. The manufacturer’s logic is clear: a free SO-DIMM slot on the motherboard is left for a subsequent «painless» upgrade of the system.
⇡#Laptop performance in games
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme is notable for using GeForce GTX 1050 Ti mobile graphics in a Max-Q design. This means that the laptop has a more energy efficient GPU that runs at lower frequencies. See for yourself: the frequency of the graphics core of the «regular» GeForce GTX 1050 Ti in the ASUS ROG Strix GL553VE in games varies from 1696 to 1734 MHz; in the Lenovo device, the GPU operates within 1342-1658 MHz. Naturally, such a decrease in frequency will affect the performance of the laptop in games.
I would like to draw your attention to the fact that in games the GPU heats up to 75 degrees Celsius. The temperature of the hottest core of the CPU rises to 97 degrees Celsius, and the frequency of the Core i7-8750H drops from 3.9 to 2.4 GHz. At the same time, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme works quite quietly — from a distance of 30 cm, the sound level meter recorded a value of 39.2 dBA.
Reducing the CPU voltage by 0.185 V, by the way, was also beneficial in games. In the same Dota, the Core i7-8750H frequency now dropped only to 3.3 GHz, and the maximum chip temperature was already 91 degrees Celsius.
Of course, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme in games will be inferior to laptops with a full-fledged mobile version of the GeForce GTX 1050 Ti. For example, in the 3DMark Time Spy test, the score difference reaches 4% in favor of the ASUS ROG Strix GL553VE.
The table below clearly shows that the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme and its GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Max-Q are now fast enough to comfortably play modern games in Full HD resolution using mostly medium and high graphics quality settings. However, it is quite possible to indulge this model, because it is not positioned by the manufacturer as a purely gaming machine. It would be more correct to say this: Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme is suitable not only for work, but also for games.
| Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme | |||
| Graphics quality | AVG FPS | MIN FPS | |
| The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, Novigrad and surroundings | Max. quality | 33 | sixteen |
| high | 41 | 29 | |
| GTA V, built-in benchmark | Max. quality | 32 | 20 |
| high | 41 | 28 | |
| FarCry 5, built-in benchmark | Max. quality, AA incl. | 31 | 17 |
| Max. quality, AA off | 33 | nineteen | |
| Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, built-in benchmark | Max. quality | nineteen | 13 |
| high | 38 | 27 | |
| Dota 2 match recording | Ultra | 86 | 54 |
| World of Tanks 1.0, EnCore benchmark | high | 58 | 43 |
| Total War: WARHAMMER II, built-in benchmark | Max. quality | 21 | 17 |
| high | 44 | 31 | |
| Battlefield V, The Last Tiger Mission | Max. quality | 34 | 24 |
| high | 38 | 26 | |
| Shadow of the Tomb Raider, built-in benchmark | Max. quality | 27 | nineteen |
| high | 33 | 27 | |
| Metro Exodus, Volga | Extreme | 22 | fourteen |
| high | 34 | nineteen | |
⇡#Performance of the disk subsystem
The main storage device in Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme is unlikely to want to change — 512 GB is enough to install all the main programs, as well as, for example, a few games. According to the technical specifications, the Intel SSDPEKNW512G8 linear read speed reaches 1500 MB / s, and the sequential write speed is 1000 MB / s. This drive belongs to the 660p series, a detailed review of which was recently published on our website.
⇡#Offline work
The laptop has four battery cells with a total capacity of 80 Wh. According to the manufacturer’s internal tests, the laptop can last 15 hours. I noticed that our battery life tests load the system noticeably more. In particular, this is due to the fact that I set the screen brightness to a fairly high level, at which it is comfortable to work during the day. Many laptops have already been tested by this method. If the device can last 6-8 hours in web surfing mode, then its autonomy can be safely considered good. As you can see, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme for a 15-inch laptop with 4K display is all right with more than six hours of video playback and web surfing.
And the laptop supports the fast battery charging function, which allows you to replenish the charge by 80% in just one hour.
| Battery life, 220 cd/m2 | |
| Web (opening tabs in Google Chrome) | 6 h 6 min |
| Video viewing (4K, x265, HEVC) | 6 h 12 min |
| Games (UNIGINE Heaven, max settings) | 1 h 7 min |
⇡#Conclusions
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme can be treated differently. Some of the advantages of the considered laptop are undeniable: in front of you is a rather light, compact and easy-to-handle “fifteen” that you can always take with you, for example, to work. The device received a high-quality case, a comfortable and time-tested keyboard, modern interfaces, a capacious battery, and a high-quality 4K screen. Perhaps a potential owner of the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme will benefit from a whole mountain of security features: FIDO authentication, dTPM 2.0, Match-on-Chip fingerprint sensor, Windows Hello with face recognition, ThinkShutter, smart card reader and Kensington lock. It turns out that the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme perfectly combines the features of both corporate and multimedia laptops.
However, some advantages of the device gave rise to its disadvantages. In particular, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Extreme 6-core processor gets very hot and does not always operate at the frequency set by Intel. The cooling system of the laptop can be called quiet. If you are satisfied with such rules of the game, then you can safely look at the purchase of this device. If you’re ready to part with $2020, of course.
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