Lenovo ThinkPad S440 & S540

Lenovo just released the ThinkPad S440 and ThinkPad S540 Ultrabooks which are aimed at professionals who want to have a sturdy, but relatively light laptop that IT managers will love. As you may have guessed, the S440 is a 14” laptop, while the S540 is the 15” version. This kind naming is not really new at Lenovo, at least for those who follow their products on a regular basis.

Let’s start with what’s common to both: they come with the latest 4^th Generation of Intel Core processor, “up to Core i7” according to the specifications sheet, so we’re assuming that Core i5 is also an option. They have been designed to function with Windows 8, so touch screens have been integrated. By the way, expect all Windows laptops to be touch-enabled in the next couple of years: things have been accelerating nicely in 2013.

Lenovo claims 9 hours of battery (probably with the MobileMark test), but the more interesting part is that their Rapid Charge feature can get your battery from 0% to 80% in 45 minutes. We tried it with earlier laptops, and it is really nice for anyone who is on the go often and can’t afford to wait twice as much for charging. At order time, it’s possible to choose between HDD (500GB max for the S440, 1TB max for the S540) or SSD (250GB max for both).

They come with the following connectivity: Bluetooth, HDMI, Gigabit Ethernet, USB 3.0, 4-1 card reader. Finally, Lenovo has partnered with Dolby again and both system come preloaded with Dolby Home Theater, which is pretty effective at using the built-in speakers to the best of their capabilities (the demo is quite convincing if you have a chance to check it out).

At the moment, Lenovo doesn’t plan to ship these laptops to the U.S, but since they have been announced at IFA, we’re keeping you posted. Maybe Lenovo will talk about possible U.S dates later, if at all.

Hubert Nguyen
Categories: Breaking, Computers
Tags: IFA, ifa 2013, Laptops, Lenovo, thinkpad