Are the new thinkpads still considered the best in terms of reliability and build quality? I hear Dell is giving them a run for their money now. And some say thinkpads aren't what they used to be. I was looking at this model http://www.infonec.com/site/main.php?module=detail&id=436995 Anything comparable by competitors these days in terms of specs and quality? It will be my trading machine. Will be backpacking with it so reliability is most important. It's gonna be bumped around a lot so I'll be upgrading to a SSD. I have a 10 inch Acer tablet which I abused during a 2 year trip and it never had a problem even though it's scratched beyond recognition. Would love to have that kind of experience again.
If you are carrying that around, that is way to heavy at 6+ lbs. Many comparable laptops are much lighter.
Doh... I forgot about that issue. I never really thought about it because my Acer was 3 pounds and was easy to carry around.
If you want to find out more about the thinkpads go to www.thinkpads.com which is not associated with Lenovo or IBM. When I heard the IBM engineers would be leaving Lenovo in 2009 I bought one of the last, if not the last, T61p's coming off the line (in the US they were already discontinued). I am very happy with the machine, it is a really nice one. If you can get your hands on a new, late model T61 I suggest you should seriously consider it. Some vendors apparently still have a few in stock. (There was originally an issue with it, bsod due to gamers with third party memory and too much current being drawn with the memory and GPU - this was later resolved but took a long time. Check the model number against the motherboard knwon to be faulty. Search the Lenovo forum for more information. The new motherboards (mine is the new model too) has not had a single failure reported since March) I don't know about the newer models, you'll have to ask on the above mentioned site. Personally I am keeping an open mind about what brand I may move to - I am not happy about some cost cutting / short cuts that Lenovo has been doing and pricing is neither very competitive here in our country (New Zealand). Good luck
I thought about getting a T61p too as I've heard good things. I see a few BNIB sold by people on craigslist and such. Thanks for the link to the website. Saw a coupon there for 35% off most laptops for black friday! I'll check out some of the lighter models. What does 1920x1200 look like on on a 15 inch screen? Is it too small? Would be nice to hook up a 24 inch monitor if I wanted.
don't know, I have a 1680 x 1050 resolution and it is fine. I did however set the dpi to 120 (default 96). carefull with the NIB stuff - you'll have to make sure it does not have the older (faulty) motherboards although I do believe that Lenovo will replace the MB if you have problems with it. But our experience with the local service centre has not been that great and I am avoidoing them like the plague: rather than paying for extra warranty I leave it at the 1 year and just buy the part myself and make sure it is put in properly while observing antistatic procedures. On the Lenovo website you can find the "hardware maintenance manual" and you can check the model number against the mother board part number. Maria