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I don't think it's a coincidence that author has picked a laptop whose processor came out in 2011. Intel has basically had a lost decade in terms of performance

I don't think it's a coincidence that author has picked a laptop whose processor came out in 2011. Intel has basically had a lost decade in terms of performance. I remember going from my 2012 Macbook Air (i7) to a 2015 Macbook Pro (13inch) to the 2014 Macbook Pro (15inch) to finally getting a Thinkpad X1 and I never felt like the 2012 Macbook Air was struggling in the way that the subsequent laptops struggled. Now my X1 doesn't have the build quality of the X220 - but it's still very good and I finally bit the bullet and did what someone well paid who relies on a tool for work should do. I bought the full 5 years support package for my X1. Any hardware issues? Send it in they'll fix it no questions asked. I need the laptop for work, I get paid good money, it's a good investment to have that business level support. The only area where the X220 is really showing it's age today though - you just gotta have USBC ports I'm afraid.

hypercube33 3y ago
I just grabbed a cousin of this model and have been having fun modding it and use it more than my new gaming laptop. It's a A285. I have a surface laptop 4 that's smaller and technically faster but I still enjoy typing on the Thinkpad more and other than ram everything is basically upgradable. There needs to be more 12in laptops imo.
- kramerger 3y ago
  A285 is probably the cheapest feeling thinkpad I've every used. It looks like a thinkpad, but feels "wrong"
icegreentea2 3y ago
Sandy Bridge was a really really good release, but it's also not useful to ignore that Intel really did keep improving their product for a while. While their product segmentation (keeping mobile parts pinned at 2 cores, and the quad core limit on desktop) definitely was a form of 'stagnation', Intel made real improvements in their micro architecture, at least up to (and including Skylake). The real 'lost years' were post Skylake, where we got like 5 generations of Skylake refreshes while Intel couldn't manage to get their new node online. Here's a review of Skylake (6700k) from way back showing IPC improvement from Sandy Bridge to Skylake - https://www.anandtech.com/show/9483/intel-skylake-review-6700k-6600k-ddr4-ddr3-ipc-6th-generation/9 https://www.anandtech.com/show/9483/intel-skylake-review-670...
- SilverBirch 3y ago
  I know we can point at benchmarks and things like that, all I'm saying is that my personal experience is that I spent a decade trying to find something as good as my top-spec 2012 macbook air, which is pretty depressing. Note obviously I also went via the horribly broken keyboard era of macbook pros. Eventually I settled on a X1 carbon, and then a couple of years later the ARM macbooks came out, but I can't justify buying a new laptop out of cycle if my current one works.
MSFT_Edging 3y ago
I bought an X1 around 2016, and its still super reliable. I think it was a 4th gen. It has a couple small issues, sometimes the USB ports fall asleep and never wake up regardless of OS, the lid has a couple hairline cracks where it takes the brunt of the open/close force. The fingerprint reader never worked in Linux. Aside from that, it still has 90% of its battery life after all this time, boots fast, does everything I need a laptop for. Even though RAM is soldered, 16gb still works and its a decent sacrifice for a laptop so light and thin.
jeffbee 3y ago
> Intel has basically had a lost decade in terms of performance. This is a pretty goofy take. A current mobile Intel CPU is 4-20x faster than a mobile Sandy Bridge depending on application.
- 7speter 3y ago
  Haven’t been on r/hardware lately, have you?
jeroenhd 3y ago
Intel CPUs definitely got better over the years, but Macbooks were nerfed by Apple's mediocre CPU cooler designs. Their power curve was tweaked so users wouldn't notice (boost to extreme speeds extremely quickly to respond to clicks and such fast, then come down fast because the cooling can't sustain the boost speeds) but the CPUs never came out their best in any Macbook design, no matter how expensive they were to buy. Most Thinkpads haven't been struggling, except maybe their netbook counterpart. Some "workstation" ones with Nvidia hardware in them do put out unreasonable amounts of heat and noise, but that's hard to prevent when Nvidia is the only one making GPU hardware that performs well in laptops. I must say the Dell and Lenovo support packages are great. Few people buy them, but the knowledge that the company will send someone to your house within 24 hours to either replace a broken part or give you a new laptop should placate a lot of anxiety.
- 7speter 3y ago
  I think the unspoken story of the apple intel relationship in the latter half of the 2010s was that Apple was waiting on intel to release cooler and more efficient chips (by means of smaller processes), and intel might’ve made promises causing apple to adapt smaller and smaller designs for cooler running chips, and intel didn’t deliver.
  - jeroenhd 3y ago
    Intel could've failed their promises in the 2012 Macbook and the blame would fall squarely on them, but when the 2015 Macbook came out, Apple still fell for it. In fact, they got worse over time. Something tells me they were starting to design for M1 before the M1 was ready. The 2020 Intel Macbook Air ran effectively passively cooled by dumping heat into the motherboard and chassis and cooling a whole different part of the machine. Apple machines and heat have always been a complicated story. The trash can Mac was innovative in its cooling design, but that same design made upgrading the machine tough. One Macbook model blew hot air right into the place the cover around the screen was glued to, and at one point Nvidia's shitty hardware managed to desolder itself inside a Mac machine because of its bad design. I'm glad they've found a way to produce cooler chips because it seems Apple's fetish for sleekly designed machines conflicted heavily with their cooling performance.

hypercube33 3y ago

I just grabbed a cousin of this model and have been having fun modding it and use it more than my new gaming laptop. It's a A285. I have a surface laptop 4 that's smaller and technically faster but I still enjoy typing on the Thinkpad more and other than ram everything is basically upgradable. There needs to be more 12in laptops imo.

kramerger 3y ago
A285 is probably the cheapest feeling thinkpad I've every used. It looks like a thinkpad, but feels "wrong"

icegreentea2 3y ago

Sandy Bridge was a really really good release, but it's also not useful to ignore that Intel really did keep improving their product for a while. While their product segmentation (keeping mobile parts pinned at 2 cores, and the quad core limit on desktop) definitely was a form of 'stagnation', Intel made real improvements in their micro architecture, at least up to (and including Skylake). The real 'lost years' were post Skylake, where we got like 5 generations of Skylake refreshes while Intel couldn't manage to get their new node online. Here's a review of Skylake (6700k) from way back showing IPC improvement from Sandy Bridge to Skylake - https://www.anandtech.com/show/9483/intel-skylake-review-6700k-6600k-ddr4-ddr3-ipc-6th-generation/9 https://www.anandtech.com/show/9483/intel-skylake-review-670...

SilverBirch 3y ago
I know we can point at benchmarks and things like that, all I'm saying is that my personal experience is that I spent a decade trying to find something as good as my top-spec 2012 macbook air, which is pretty depressing. Note obviously I also went via the horribly broken keyboard era of macbook pros. Eventually I settled on a X1 carbon, and then a couple of years later the ARM macbooks came out, but I can't justify buying a new laptop out of cycle if my current one works.

MSFT_Edging 3y ago

I bought an X1 around 2016, and its still super reliable. I think it was a 4th gen. It has a couple small issues, sometimes the USB ports fall asleep and never wake up regardless of OS, the lid has a couple hairline cracks where it takes the brunt of the open/close force. The fingerprint reader never worked in Linux. Aside from that, it still has 90% of its battery life after all this time, boots fast, does everything I need a laptop for. Even though RAM is soldered, 16gb still works and its a decent sacrifice for a laptop so light and thin.

jeffbee 3y ago

> Intel has basically had a lost decade in terms of performance. This is a pretty goofy take. A current mobile Intel CPU is 4-20x faster than a mobile Sandy Bridge depending on application.

7speter 3y ago
Haven’t been on r/hardware lately, have you?

jeroenhd 3y ago

Intel CPUs definitely got better over the years, but Macbooks were nerfed by Apple's mediocre CPU cooler designs. Their power curve was tweaked so users wouldn't notice (boost to extreme speeds extremely quickly to respond to clicks and such fast, then come down fast because the cooling can't sustain the boost speeds) but the CPUs never came out their best in any Macbook design, no matter how expensive they were to buy. Most Thinkpads haven't been struggling, except maybe their netbook counterpart. Some "workstation" ones with Nvidia hardware in them do put out unreasonable amounts of heat and noise, but that's hard to prevent when Nvidia is the only one making GPU hardware that performs well in laptops. I must say the Dell and Lenovo support packages are great. Few people buy them, but the knowledge that the company will send someone to your house within 24 hours to either replace a broken part or give you a new laptop should placate a lot of anxiety.

7speter 3y ago
I think the unspoken story of the apple intel relationship in the latter half of the 2010s was that Apple was waiting on intel to release cooler and more efficient chips (by means of smaller processes), and intel might’ve made promises causing apple to adapt smaller and smaller designs for cooler running chips, and intel didn’t deliver.
- jeroenhd 3y ago
  Intel could've failed their promises in the 2012 Macbook and the blame would fall squarely on them, but when the 2015 Macbook came out, Apple still fell for it. In fact, they got worse over time. Something tells me they were starting to design for M1 before the M1 was ready. The 2020 Intel Macbook Air ran effectively passively cooled by dumping heat into the motherboard and chassis and cooling a whole different part of the machine. Apple machines and heat have always been a complicated story. The trash can Mac was innovative in its cooling design, but that same design made upgrading the machine tough. One Macbook model blew hot air right into the place the cover around the screen was glued to, and at one point Nvidia's shitty hardware managed to desolder itself inside a Mac machine because of its bad design. I'm glad they've found a way to produce cooler chips because it seems Apple's fetish for sleekly designed machines conflicted heavily with their cooling performance.