I am considering flying into Beijing and training my way to my final destination...

I know this is a flyer forum but hopefully it's ok to ask this here:

Has anyone had recent experience with training out of Beijing? Every time I have ridden a train in China it felt like it was out of a 1930s movie, I rode hard seat and berth and both were painful... however they were in old style box cars with no AC...

The websites all list Beijing-Dalian as AC and the trains look newer (kind of TGV style) in the picture but I have learned pictures are not always what you get...

So my basic questions are:

Is it feasible to hop from the Beijing Airport to the Railstation (I think I am going to the old one since I will want to go to Dalian which is north east and I understand the new one hands south west stuff) in terms of cost (taxi fees - this is considering a flight to the same location will probably run me $100-150 and the train to my destination is supposed to be about $25) as well as time (it looks close on the google maps so is say a 3 hour gap from landing to train reasonable)?

Are the trains more comfortable now (When they say soft seat with AC I think of TGV that has car style seats, but years ago I think I rode soft seats and they were just benches with leather wrapped around them as opposed to benches without leather for hard seats)?

Thanks for the advice!