What’s with the Lenovo ThinkPad X200? Well, the most important thing you might want to know about it is that it has won the PC Magazine’s Editor’s Choice award for 2008. That is by itself no mean feat and a testament to the quality of this laptop.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X200 comes in a lighter chassis than its predecessors, and has quality components. These include Intel Centrino 2 parts, Intel Core 2 Duo L9400, 1.86 GHz and also 2 GB RAM. That’s certainly more than enough to run any applications at top speed.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X200 comes in a black color. Yes, boring. But that is the tried and tested look of almost all ThinkPads, so I don’t figure Lenovo will change their color soon. The machine weighs a mere 4 pounds. This is extremely light and weighs in less than the X200’s competitors, the Fujitsu LifeBook T5010 (4.8 pounds) and the and the Toshiba Portégé M700-S7002 (4.5 pounds).

Let’s take a look at the display of the Lenovo ThinkPad X200. The display size is about 12.1 inches – a size some might consider small in this day of wide screens. But I find that 12.1 inches is just right for an ultraportable like the X200. The graphics are powered by an in-built Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 4500MHD card, while the tablet display is poweredt by Wacom display panels. These are well built, so you can actually use your fingers to operating the touch screen.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X200 offers a great typing experience, surpassing many of the competing models I’ve seen. You’ll also like the tablet input capability, which is one of the highlights of this laptop. Coupled with great microphones and speakers, and you can see why the Lenovo ThinkPad X200 wins awards.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X200 comes with 3 USB ports, an SD slot, and an ExpressCard slot. These are definitely enough to let you connect up any components you might need. Also included is the support for WWAN, Centrino 2 Wi-Fi, WiMAX and UWB. So as you can see, the Lenovo ThinkPad X200 has a huge array of options in terms of ports and connections.

The Lenovo ThinkPad X200 has amazing battery life. We’re talking about 5 hours 29 minutes of battery life. This is very good considering the features it comes with. If you need, you can purchase a four-cell battery option to bring down weight of the laptop.

Are there any downsides to the Lenovo ThinkPad X200? Well, perhaps the only downside is the fact that there is no built-in DVD drive. This is a small problem for those who don’t need one while on the go. I have a Lenovo ThinkPad X61 and I have no problems not lugging my DVD drive around.

On the whole, you can see why the Lenovo ThinkPad X200, with its powerful feature set, garners awards from the industry. One of the most important technology updates in this machine is the latest Intel Centrino 2 platform, which puts it way ahead of its peers.