Pens are one of those personal things – either an OEM got it right or they totally messed it up. Fortunately, if your tablet pc uses a Wacom digitizer, there are plenty of pens to choose from if you don’t like the one that came with your system. Unfortunately, the only one that will fit in the pen slot is the one that shipped with it. For Dell XT owners, you only have one choice due to the N-Trig digtizer: the square black one.

Pens are important for Tablet PCs, and they often have small differences between makers. Those differences and how one feels about them vary from user to user. What may feel good in my hands may not in yours. Some come with erasers. Some do not. Some have buttons easier to find with your fingers, others do not. Here’s a run down on what I think of the pens that come with the HP 2730p Elitebook and the Lenovo ThinkPad X200 Tablet PC.

The pen that comes with the Lenovo is slightly larger than the HP. Consequently it feels better in my hand. The HP pen is an adequate size and I don’t have any problems Inking with it, but I do prefer the Lenovo pen when it comes to size.

Power adapters are one of those things that mobile workers get very picky about. The size of the power brick means a great deal when packing a gear bag. Fortunately, both the Lenovo X200 and the Dell Latitude XT both have pretty small adapters and should appeal to the gear-packing folk among us. In addition to their small size, both adapters feature wrap straps to help keep the cords neat and tidy. Both adapters are exactly the same length in cord size. All of that said, I do have to give it up to Dell for their 45 watt slim-line adapter – that is one sweet and thin adapter.

Many of our readers have asked for head to head comparison photos between the Lenovo X200 Tablet PC and Dell’s Latitude XT Tablet PC. Here is the first set of comparisons. I’ll post pictures of the docking stations next, as well as some benchmarks and battery life comparisons later next week.

Follow the Read More link for impressions of the two tablet pcs, as well as a lot of comparison pictures.

I’ve been living vicariously through Warner and his awesome Lenovo X200 Tablet PC reporting – man, he has done a fantastic job reporting on the X200, comparing it to the HP 2730p, and more. I believe a full X200 review is just about ready to get published, so stay tuned.

Fortunately, I no longer have to rely on Warner’s reporting – Lenovo just sent me a X200 Tablet to evaluate and I’m going to be doing just that over the next 90 days: giving my own impressions of the new design, the ultra-base, and also comparing it to the Dell Latitude XT.

Sprint officially rolled out its XOHM WiMAX service in Baltimore, MD today and Lenovo has jumped in what I’m sure will be a race to offer WiMAX connectivity by announcing that several of its models will now have WiMAX as an option. They include the SL300, SL500, X301, and T400 at present and look for the W500, W700, SL400, and X200 models and the IdeaPad Y530 to feature that option later this year.

Kevin Tofel of jkOnTheRun was at the big rollout and was given an evaluation X301 with WiMAX, so I look for Kevin to have some interesting reports on how things worked in the land of great seafood eating. (He’s also going to like the X301 I predict. I do.)

Look for a slew of announcements announcing WiMAX capability from OEMs to rival the uncountable number of netbook announcements we’ve had this year, as we head into the fall and CES in January.

Press Release after the READ MORE link.

We are pleased to announce that Lenovo has signed on as the Exclusive Sponsor of GottaBeMobile.com's CES 2009 coverage!

CES is a very demanding event to cover. Not only are we highly mobile, but we also produce a TON of video content - some on the spot, others later at night. Needless to say, the equipment we bring to CES has to be up to the job. That is why Lenovo is such a great fit to sponsor our coverage: their mobile solutions are light weight, give us the tablet pc features we need, as well as providing that power we demand to crunch out the content. Most of our team will be using the new X200 Tablet PC, but Lenovo will also be outfitting us with some of their other ultra-mobile solutions. We are very thankful of Lenovo’s support of our CES coverage.

Join me in welcoming Lenovo as our newest sponsor.

I’ve always been in big favor of higher resolution screens on Tablet PCs. That battle has been won and lost as OEMs have moved their focus to the widescreen format (WXGA 1280x800). I can see their point given the marketplace, and of course the advent of Touch has something to do with this as well. Supposedly Touch is more difficult to implement on higher res screens.

The Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout continues. As I mentioned in the full review of the HP 2730p Tablet PC I’m not too fond of the output of the single mono speaker. The Lenovo ThinkPad x200 Tablet PC is another story. Lenovo beefed up the multi-media capabilities of the X200 due to customer demand. And the results are quite beefy. Even though the speakers are located on the underside of the keyboard they produce quite a full sound. I’ve also included a play off between the X200 and the X61 so you can hear the differences there as well. But, here you can listen for yourself.

Check out these other posts in The GBM Lenovo/HP 2730p Tablet PC Shootout

• GBM InkShow: Interview with Lenovo’s Mika Majapuro on the ThinkPad X200T Tablet PC
• GBM InkShow: Lenovo X200 Tablet PC Hands-On Video Review
• GBM InkShow: First Look at the HP 2730p Elitebook Tablet PC
• Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout: Testing Webcams
• Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout: Testing Webcams in Slate Mode
• Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout: Windows Experience Index Scores
• Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout: Side by Side
• Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout: Weight
• Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout: Outdoor Viewing
• Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout: Benchmarks
• GBMPodcast #61: The Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout Continues
• Lenovo/HP Tablet PC Shootout: Performance Testing
• GBM Review: The HP 2730p Elitebook Tablet PC

I am really, really enjoying using both the HP 2730p and the Lenovo ThinkPad X200 Tablet PCs. I’ve said this before and will say it again, these are both excellent additions to the ranks of Tablet PCs. I’ve posted benchmarks, but as I said in that post, I’m not a fan of using benchmarks to gauge things. I much prefer to see how a Tablet PC performs in my real world scenario. The emphasis there is on “my real world.”

Most of the work I do demands very little processing power, but when I hit those tasks, the need for power is there. The heaviest demands I place on a Tablet PC are in just a few areas. They include:

• Processing audio for GBM podcasts.
• Processing video for GBM InkShows, Shortcuts, and work at the theatre.
• Importing scripts into OneNote so that I can use them for note taking.

For this testing, I also included the Lenovo ThinkPad X301 notebook along with the Lenovo ThinkPad X61 for comparison. The HP 2730p and the ThinkPad X200 Tablet PCs are running the newer Intel Core2Duo L9400 rated at 1.86GHz.

I’m so glad that the Internet allows us to live and experience things vicariously at times. I’m not one of those who lives to crack open a new device and expose the innards, but I’m glad others do enjoy doing so. Liliputing reader Tommy Yoo has opened up the Lenovo IdeaPad S10 and posted up a slew of pictures for all to see. He also makes some comparisons to the MSI Wind and offers this interesting observation: Tommy says the build quality on the IdeaPad S10 s excellent, and in fact makes the Wind feel like a toy.

Check it all out at Liliputing.

It is my contention that both the Lenovo x200 Tablet PC and the HP 2730p Tablet PC are worthy contenders for anyone interested in Tablet PC computing. They both offer great processing power, good battery life, and a range of options for anyone to consider. They also offer some distinct differences and similarities. In GBM Podcast #61, Matt Faulkner and I talk about the the two new Tablet PCs on the block, which continues our Shootout series, this time with audio.

I’m not one for benchmarks as a rule. I much prefer to work with devices and use them how I use them to determine if the performance measures up to what I need. I know others are just the opposite. So, for all you benchmark fans out there, here are CrystalMark scores for the HP 2730p Tablet PC (top) and the Lenovo ThinkPad X200 Tablet PC (bottom.) Also, for those who wish to see comparisons to the Lenovo ThinkPad x61 Tablet PC, here’s a link to a post with Crystalmark scores there.

Almost as fast as the release pace of new Netbooks, Laptop Mag has published a full review of the Lenovo IdeaPad S10 Netbook, right on the heel’s of the unboxing review that was released yesterday. Avrim Piltch does the chores and he covers the S10 from top to bottom.

Well there might be shipping woes with the Lenovo IdeaPad S10, but Laptop Magazine has their hands on one and has done the full unboxing treatment. Avrim Pitch unboxes, sets it up and has published his first impressions along with video of him not only unboxing the unit but taking it apart to see what’s on the inside.