Comments on T500

Before getting into details, if anyone can recommend a laptop backpack for the T500, that'd be great.

I just got a T500, and I'm as satisfied with it as I would likely have been with a Dell Latitude. I got it at 20% off (seemingly a biweekly sale?). It shipped 3 business days early. I thought the following might be useful to someone. Details of my configuration are at the bottom.

The bloatware is much more annoying than I was expecting -- can we assume that Lenovo is getting paid to install all these free trials, etc., and that they're using this revenue to lower prices for us consumers? Also, I have reservations about the Thinkvantage software. I'd like format the hard drive and do a clean install (I'm betting this would improve performance...), but I have a feeling that dealing with drivers will be a pain, and I don't have that much time on my hands at the moment.

Ultrabay with SATA seems useful -- could one day move hard drive to this bay and put an SSD in the hard drive bay

Actual thickness seems to be in keeping with Lenovo's stated specs (review on notebookreview.com says it's thicker at 1.8"?)

Thinklight works fine, backlit keyboard would be slick, but neither is really necessary

Displayport seems to be all the rage among laptop manufacturers, but not among display manufacturers

Expresscard slot seems like the sort of thing people think they'll one day use but never do

Option for high-resolution LED screen would have been nice

I have reservations about widescreen -- the track pad ends up being small and close to the edge of the machine, which I find not so ergonomic.

I tried to get Dell to price match the e6400 to Lenovo's T400 with 20% off, but they insisted on matching it to a T400 with 3-year warranty, and I consider the extra 2 years to be a rip off, so I declined their offer and, in the end, chose the T500 over the T400 because I realized that I want the screen real estate.

Configuration:
Intel Core 2 Duo Processor P8600 (2.40GHz 1066MHz 3MBL2) 25W
15.4" WSXGA+ TFT, w/ CCFL Backlight
Windows XP Professional Downgrade
ATI Mobility Radeon 3650 with 256MB
3 GB PC3-8500 DDR3 SDRAM 1067MHz SODIMM Memory (2 DIMM) (yes, I know I should have bought the second DIMM from Newegg and installed it myself)
1.3 Megapixel Integrated Camera
160 GB Hard Disk Drive, 7200rpm
DVD Recordable 8x Max Dual Layer, Ultrabay Slim (Serial ATA)
Intel WiFi Link 5300 (AGN)
6 cell Li-Ion Battery

 

So because you can find no use for it, noone else can

Card readers, wifi, FW/USB adaptors, SATA, audio cards, tv-tuners, 3G network, and on and on.

There's plenty use for an expansion slot – in this case an Expresscard slot.

 

I have a Swiss Gear Pegasus (by Wenger) backpack for my T500. This is a 17" sized backpack and it works well. The backpacks that are for 15" models don't fit the T500 very well. With some of them it was a real squeeze to get the zipper to close over the T500 which meant no padding on the upper corners. My suggestion is to go to your local store that has backpacks and bring your T500 and just try out the backpacks (I did).

 

I just use an ATS RAID backpack with a ZeroShock III for the laptop. (Campus life)

I love my T500.

 

Thanks for everyone's comments. Now that I've owned the machine for a while...

Overall, I'm happy with the T500. (The operating system I'm not so happy with. XP has been patched so many times and gets so bloated so easily.)

The back light went out (nothing else was wrong with the machine, as it worked fine with an external display, and you could faintly see that the built-in display was dim but functional) so I had it shipped out for repairs. They paid for overnight shipping (empty box from them to me, box with laptop from me to them and back) and they had it for 3 business days. (I live in the US.) They replaced the screen and changed out several other components. The MAC address of my network card changed, so they may have replaced the entire motherboard (?). Repairs like this make me wonder whether I should extend the warranty to 3 years. Also, when I shipped it, they suggested I keep the AC adapter, and I decided to hold onto the battery and hard drive as well.

With the lid closed, the screen touches the keys and trackpoint, leaving marks. The marks don't really show up when the screen is on, but it's mildly annoying.

I would have preferred to configure the machine with a smaller battery. I almost never run the machine off the battery, so I'm carrying around a tiny bit more weight than I need.

The machine runs pretty cool compared to other laptops I've used.

The DVD drive is noisy.

I ended up getting a SwissGear Wired backpack for 17" laptops. I wasn't much interested in the MP3 player wiring, but it was otherwise fine. The top corners of the T500 are not covered by padding, which is fine for my purposes.

I don't doubt that some people find use for the expresscard slot.