Beware of the 2nd generation (2014) X1 Carbon. The HDMI port doesn't support audio (in either Windows or Linux), the click pad rattles and requires too much force/travel for something you're supposedly to do as effortlessly and frequently as clicking, the mouse buttons that correspond with the trackpoint are practically non-functional, and the "adaptive function row" is an endless source of frustration. And for reasons that I may or may not be able to fix eventually, wifi on Linux Mint with this laptop is so unreliable that I spend most of my time in Windows despite otherwise preferring Linux. I'm typing this on one right now, so I know from experience.

I've read that the 2014 T-series clickpads and trackpoints have similar issues too. Generally, when people recommend Thinkpads for their quality they're referring to the X and T series. The 2014 models are frequently showing up in the Lenovo outlet store with surprisingly low prices because of low sales and high returns. Not a good deal. I would have gotten a refund if it wasn't a refurbished purchase.

I have the 2014 T440s and it's the best laptop I've ever used, though I guess that's not a particularly large sample size. I definitely think the 2015 T450s should be much better because they brought back the buttons but the clickpad is not really that hard to get used to. I think this year's Thinkpads should be really awesome, and if I could justify it I'd easily get a 2015 X1C now that they fixed the keyboard and trackpad.

It does have a wifi issue, it seems to me that the Intel 7260 wifi chip has serious issues across multiple laptops from what I've read online. But I found that for my home network switching to 5ghz fixed all my issues so it might just be an interference thing.

By the way, you can replace the trackpad assembly on your T440s with the T450s version that has clickpad buttons.

> The HDMI port doesn't support audio (in either Windows or Linux)

Are you sure? This seems very odd, and I cant find a single mention of this in a review. Does the mini-DP port carry audio? My X240 works perfectly fine with audio over mini-DP in linux (there is no full size HDMI). I dont know about windows, I dont use it.

>click pad issue

The clickpad sucks on the X240 too -- but I never actually push-to-click it. Do people not tap to click on laptops in 2015? This complaint is a strawman IMO, the push-to-click sucks on Apple and every other laptop I've seen it on as well. As a standard trackpad, its fine.

>wifi

Zero issues since day 1 on the X240 with the default intel 7260 card. Not sure which card you have, but I've yet to see a laptop with an intel wifi card that has issues in linux. If you have a different vendor's card and its giving you issues preventing you from using linux, it might be worth the $30 to pick up an intel card.

I wish I had gotten an X240. The model of my X1C is 20A7/20A8 and all my complaints are legit, thank you.

I was also surprised about the HDMI audio issue. You're right about the reviews not mentioning it. I've read that the mini DisplayPort works properly. But the expected behavior of an HDMI port is to output audio and I'm just glad I wasn't entertaining guests or giving a presentation when I discovered the problem.

https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/X-Series-ThinkPad-Laptops/No-so...

Read the whole thing, if that's what you're into. The Lenovo support specialist should have admitted that he only had general advice about computer troubleshooting and did not have a solution to the problem. Anyway, the only person claiming to have found a solution was the last post, who only offered an irreproducible solution. I actually tried everything everyone suggested in that thread and wasted far too much time for nothing. And even if any of those solutions worked, this is a thread about Linux laptops.

I don't like tapping, but sometimes I prefer it over clunking down the whole pad. The dedicated clicking buttons of older models worked perfectly well and Apple laptops have wonderful touchpads.

> This complaint is a strawman IMO

A strawman argument is actually when one side of a debate lies about what the other side's argument is so they'll have have an easier argument to refute. I don't think you were accusing me of that.

>wifi

Lots of issues since day one on this laptop with an Intel 7260 card.

I know HN typically discourages "me too" comments, but in this case: Me too. I previously owned one of the 2014 X1's and I will also attest that the mouse was so unbelievably bad that I continuously carried an external wireless mouse, even to meetings.

Other models from Lenovo remain excellent; I have a T530 from several years prior, and I love it.

I second the Thinkpad. I've been using a X1 Carbon w/ Archlinux and it's great, almost everything works straight out of the box - and the archwiki for Lenovo products is quite comprehensive (https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Category:Lenovo).

The one thing to be wary off is some alterations they made to the keyboard/trackpad in a few of the models (I think they may have reversed the changes most recently, but make sure you are getting the classic one).

You're right about keyboard/trackpad. Previous Year models didn't have classic three buttons above the trackpad which are quite useful when you use trackpoint.

But at least with X250 they did bring those buttons back. I guess same is true for the rest of the newer models.

Ditto this. I've been using an X240 as my primary home/work computer with Arch Linux for 18 months or so, with 8-12 hours of use a day. I have no complaints. Everything worked day 1 with linux and all the hardware is supported. Lenovo is active with BIOS updates to fix things like the rowhammer exploit, as well as linux-specific issues, which is nice. There have been 10+ BIOS updates since I got the machine, and it doesnt require Windows to update.

If you have a need for multiple VMs or top or the line performance, you might want something a bit bigger (RAM is limited to 8GB on the current X250 and processors top out at 15W models). That being said, I have yet to feel even remotely limited by the capability of this laptop -- it is my primary machine.

edit: I should add my 2 batteries have 77% and 78% capacity after 18 months of extremely heavy use, which I consider to be excellent.

+1 on thinkpads. Been using a X230 for three years on Linux Mint. Used a T410 on Ubuntu before that. Aside from the very rare fail on wake from a suspend, it's been great.