For the original German review, see here.

12-inch notebooks have a long history. In the time before ultrabooks, they made up the category of "subnotebooks" and up until today they have been very popular in the business sector. Lenovo's subnotebooks (the X-series) in the ThinkPad series have been very successful for quite some time. Devices such as the X220 from 2011 were probably some of the most popular ThinkPads of their day.

The ThinkPad X270 is the 20th Generation of the ThinkPad-X-series, which began in 2000. In comparison to its predecessor, the X260, the X270 offers a rather limited update. The biggest change is in the CPU. Like all other 70 ThinkPads, the X270 contains a Kaby-Lake processor. This device is the most compact version in the new ThinkPad lineup and is directed particularly at employees of big companies who have to travel a lot and need to work on the go, as well as other mobile workers. Our test unit is a special edition model for students, the model number is 20HMS00T00 and it is equipped with an i5 processor, 512 GB SSD, 8 GB of RAM, a full HD display and no OS. It is available ex-works for 1169 Euros (~$1240) in Germany - which is quite reasonable. Currently, a commercially available and similarly equipped model for regular customers with a 256 GB SSD and Windows costs 1532 Euros (~$1625).

There is a lot of competition for subnotebooks, especially since the appearance of ultrabooks. Not only are there the "classic" competitors from Dell (Latitude 7280) and HP (EliteBook 820 G4), but also other devices such as the Dell XPS 13 or the biggest competitor in-house, the new ThinkPad X1 Carbon.