The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
Apparently, the whole world's gone crazy for tablets (or, at least one of them). A tablet makes the perfect ultraportable companion for browsing the Web, checking e-mail, and watching movies on the go. But if tablets represent the future of portable computing, they'll need to become robust business machines, as well.
Lenovo's ThinkPad Tablet isn't the thinnest or prettiest tablet out there, and its $499 (16GB) base price doesn't make it a bargain, but it fills a niche with business users that no iPad or Honeycomb slate has been able to claim.
Editors note: For details on the advantages Android 4.0 offers over Honeycomb, check the Android 4.0 section of the "="" target="_self">Lazy Susan. An additional icon at the center of the wheel allows you to add or delete apps from this quick list. We like the concept, but it ultimately ends up creating more clutter and confusion. With the standard app drawer accessible from the upper-right corner, and recently used apps accessible from the lower-left corner, Honeycomb has no need for a third app menu in a third corner.
Business features
We don't see the Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet as the kind of tablet most consumers would order for themselves. No, like many ThinkPads, this is more likely to be the sort of thing your company orders for you.
Lenovo has deep ties with corporate IT and enterprise customers, and a tradition of providing customized packages and reliable support. In that same tradition, the ThinkPad Tablet software can be completely tailored, down to customized app stores.
The standard configuration comes with a complete set of business software applications, including a full version of Documents To Go, Citrix Receiver, and a Computrace Mobile app that makes it possible to remotely freeze, wipe, track, or restore the tablet.
McAfee Mobile Security comes preinstalled, which is a first for any Android tablet we've reviewed. There's also a PrinterShare app for sending documents to any networked printer.
But the coolest trick the ThinkPad Tablet performs is on-the-fly handwriting conversion. Any time that Android's onscreen keyboard pops up, there's an option to use Nuance's FlexT9 input for hand-scribbling text, using either your finger or the optional stylus. The software transforms your letters into text in real time and is capable of recognizing 27 languages. In our tests, we found that the handwriting recognition tracks accurately so long as your penmanship is tidy. It's not a feature we ourselves would use much (in part due to our sloppy handwriting), but considering the specialized nature of this tablet it makes perfect sense to have it included.
It's also worth noting that Lenovo offers an optional $99 keyboard folio case that connects to the IdeaPad tablet's full-size USB connection. The keyboard includes the ThinkPad's trademark red optical trackpoint and offers control keys specific to Android system features such as volume, mute, microphone mute, home, back, menu, play, and search. If you're looking for a middle road between tablet and laptop, this folding keyboard case would seem to be the way to go.
Performance
As you might expect, Lenovo's top-of-the-line Android tablet comes with an impressive spec sheet. Many of the features are par for the course, such as an Nvidia Tegra 2 dual-core 1GHz processor, 1GB of RAM, Mini-HDMI output, Micro-USB sync, Bluetooth 2.0, and a 1,280x800-pixel screen resolution. What puts this tablet ahead of the pack is the use of a high-quality IPS screen with excellent viewing angles and a rated battery life of 8.9 hours.
Unfortunately, the screen's brightness is a bit of a disappointment. To match the brightness levels we've come to expect from the iPad 2 or Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, we had to crank the ThinkPad's brightness settings up to its maximum setting, which probably isn't optimal for battery performance.
Here are our official CNET Labs-tested battery life results. More tablet testing results can be found here.