Originally Posted by themicah
Every soft sleeper I've ever been on in China had 4 berths per compartment, including the Beijing-Xi'an train (although that was in 1998). I think you have to get the "te-ruan wo" ("special soft sleeper") if you want only two beds per compartment--as opposed to the regular "ruan wo" (soft sleeper). Or something like that. But it's definitely not available on most trains.
Whatever guidebook told you that soft sleepers would have only 2 berths is a bad guidebook--unless they meant two levels of bunks as opposed to the triple-decker bunks in the hard sleeper.
But we're getting a bit off-topic here.
You are correct here.
However, China Railway has gone through numerous changes since 1998. Nonstop trains between PEK-SHA, PEK-XIY, PEK-NKG etc. are proliferating and more Z (nonstop) T (special express) trains have luxury cars. Also there are more frequencies. Between Beijing and Xian, there used to be one special express (te kuai) per day. Now there are 3 daily. Between Beijing and Shanghai, there are 7 express trains, plus other trains go beyong Shanghai.
Still, 2-bed soft sleeper compartment cars are rare.