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Intrigued by the Touch Bar on Apple’s new MacBook Pro laptops, but don’t want to spend $1800 to give it a try? Well, tough… because that’s how much the laptops cost.
But… there is a cheaper way to get a laptop with an adaptive, touchscreen toolbar where you’d normally find the Fn keys. Lenovo tried out the concept with its ThinkPad X1 Carbon thin and light notebooks a few years ago.
While I think Apple has a better chance than Lenovo at actually making this new form of input a thing (because the company controls the operating system that runs on its laptops and has relationships with software developers), you can get one of Lenovo’s older laptops with a touch-sensitve toolbar for a lot less money than you’d spend on a new MacBook.
Woot is selling open box models for just $565.
Keep in mind this is an older notebook with a 4th-gen Intel Core i5 “Haswell” processor… and also keep in mind that Lenovo stopped using the adaptive toolbar for more recent laptops, so there’s going to be limited support for the featur moving forward.
But… the X1 Carbon is still a pretty great laptop. It measures just 0.7 inches thick, weighs just 3 pounds, and features a 1600 x 900 pixel non-glare display, 802.11ac WiFi, a spill-resistant keyboard, HDMI and Mini DisplayPort, and two USB Â ports.
Here are some of the day’s best deals.
Notebooks and tablets
- Open Box Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon w/Core i5-4300U/4GB/180GB for $565 – Woot
- Asus Transformer Book T100 Chi 2-in-1 Windows tablet w/Atom Z3775/2GB/64GB for $175 – Newegg
- Refurb Microsoft Surface Pro 3 tablets for $550 and up – Woot
- Microsoft Surface Pro (1st gen) ww/Core i5-3317U/4GB/64GB for $400 – Woot
Accessories
- Refurb JBL Charge 2+ splashproof Bluetooth speaker for $80 – Newegg
- Jackery Thunder 10,050 mAh portable battery for $22 – Amazon
- Jackery Thunder X 20,100 mAh portable battery for $30 – Amazon
- RAVPower Qi wireless charging stand for smartphones for $16 – NeweggFlash
You can find more bargains in our daily deals section.