Keep Zenbook or return and wait for X1 Carbon?

Originally Posted by jrbroad77 

X1 Carbon will be more like $1200-1300. In terms of build quality, nothing can beat that X1 - carbon fiber and magnesium have a much higher strength/weight ratio than aluminum. It's footprint, weight, and thickness are all roughly the same as a Macbook Air 13".. but of course, it has a 14" panel. Keyboard on the X1C will almost definitely be better than the Zenbook Prime's (not that the Zenbook Prime's is bad.. you just can't beat a Thinkpad keyboard in terms of feel and ergonomics). Nobody knows on battery life, but I'd guess the X1C will have less battery life by 30 minutes to 1 hour. Asus will probably win on the screen, but there's more physical area on the X1C screen so that might be helpful, and you'd have to scale the Asus to 125% to make it readable (reading at native res on a 15.6" 1080p panel for a couple hours causes eye strain for me, and I have great vision; 13" 1080p is 37% denser), making the real estate closer to 1600x900. Going off past Thinkpads, I'd wager that the X1 Carbon will be one of, if not the easiest Ultrabook to upgrade internals (RAM, SSD) in. Lenovo is pretty smart about this stuff.
So it's hard to say. Zenbook is probably a better deal on paper, Lenovo has a lot of "intangibles" (build quality, service, driver support etc.) which add to the cost. As an example on the drivers.. Lenovo still releases new drivers for pretty much any Core 2 laptop, and those are 5 years old. It's hard finding much/any laptops with new drivers more than 1-2 years after release. Example, Thinkpad T40 from 2003, with new drivers from this year, with support for Windows 7(proof: http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/research/hints-or-tips/detail.page?&DocID=HT036127 ) . OTOH, Asus G1 from ~2006 or 2007 has a Core 2 Duo, and NO Windows 7 drivers, only XP and Vista 32-bit drivers. http://www.asus.com/Notebooks/Gaming_Powerhouse/G1/#download . Not that anyone keeps laptops for so long, but you won't have to worry about finding Windows 9 or Windows 10 drivers for a new Thinkpad.

Originally Posted by Kota 

I'm looking forward to the X1 Carbon as well. If you'd like another option to consider while you're waiting on the new X1, the Samsung Series 9 (NP900X3C) is the current leader in my tests. It also sports a 1600x900 resolution and is smaller (12.3" x 8.6" x 0.5" vs. 12.8" x 8.8" x 0.7") and lighter (2.55 lb vs. 2.87 lb) than the ASUS ZENBOOK. It uses a unique dual-channel heatsink+fan solution for CPU cooling that is very quiet. The only negative mark it received from me is that it also has non-upgradeable RAM soldered to the motherboard.