Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 9

The ninth generation of the X1 Carbon brings yet more refinements to this most luxurious of business laptops

- TIM DANTON

PRICE As reviewed, £1,808 (£2,170 inc VAT) from lenovo.com

From Lenovo's point of view, the great thing about Apple's new we'll review next month - is that they make its ThinkPad X1 Carbon series look like good value. The top-end 14in MacBook Pro costs £2,399, but you can currently purchase this flagship and mobile broadband version of the X1 Carbon for £2,170.

For that, you enjoy a three-year on-site warranty and premium components. A Core i7-1165G7 CPU, 32GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD make for a potent combination, with the latter returning blistering sequential rates: 5,384MB/sec reads and 3,581MB/sec writes. Multicore scores of 5,229 in Geekbench 5 and 4,756 in Cinebench R23 aren't as extraordinary, but the X1 Carbon has enough power and capacity for any office occupation.

The range gets its name from the carbon fibre in the otherwise magnesium alloy chassis, and the result is a unique, softened feel that not only exudes quality on the day you buy it but several years hence. It's also ludicrously light for a 14in laptop, weighing 1.2kg, and so slim that pieces of cardboard look at it wistfully.

Lenovo squeezes in a 57Wh battery, which kept our test model going for a slightly disappointing 7hrs 13mins when performing office duties. Note too that the 65W power supply weighs 350g with its UK plug attached, and spoils the lines of a tight-fitting bag.