No one likes misplacing expensive gadgets, but especially not a laptop. If you were thinking about copping one of Lenovo’s newly announced ThinkPad X1s, good news. Tile and Lenovo are teaming up to make the computers findable via the Tile app, even when the laptops are offline.
This is Tile’s second embedded PC collaboration — the first was with HP. As for which Lenovo laptops are compatible, the list includes the X1 Carbon 10th gen, X1 Yoga 7th gen, and the X1 Nano 2nd gen. To enable the feature, download and install the Tile Windows app from the Microsoft Store. From there, activate the ThinkPad as if it were a Tile tracker. Once that’s done, should you misplace your shiny new laptop, you can find it using the Tile app for iOS or Android.
One neat perk is that the laptop remains findable even if it’s shut down or offline for up to 14 days. However, because it acts like one of Tile’s own trackers, there are some limitations. One of the handier Tile features is to ring your lost device. You can do that with the Lenovo PCs as well, except it has to be within Bluetooth range or 250 feet. If you’re outside that range, Tile says you can view the most recent location or “enlist the secure help of Tile’s global network.”
Tile’s network works similarly to Apple’s FindMy network in that it relies on other nearby Tile devices to find a device that’s out of range. It’s just not quite as effective, given that there aren’t as many Tile users as there are iPhones (for what it’s worth, Tile says its Find with Tile business has expanded to over 40 different third-party devices).
In any case, if this is a feature you want, you’ll have to wait a bit. Lenovo’s new ThinkPad X1s won’t be available until March, and the Tile integration isn’t backward compatible with older ThinkPads. It’s probably not the number one reason why you’d want a new ThinkPad, but hey, at least the feature is free.
