Lenovo laptop for college

What would be a good lenovo laptop for college?. My budget is rougly 1000-1300 dollars, but the less the better. I won't be doing any truely extensive programs. Mostly word, excel, email, internet, maybe a game or two(CS:S is probably the most intensive game i'll play). Lenovo's have a reputation of being built extremely well, which is really important to me, over style.

 

Good thing the ThinkPad has both durability and style.

I recommend the 14" Widescreen ThinkPad T61 with discrete graphics (nVidia 140M).

This is what I carry around campus and it's perfect.

 

I would say either the 14.1 or the 15.4" would be fine I carry mine around alot from class to class and it's not bad.

 

what type of battery life would the 4 cell get?

 

w/ discrete card, about 2-2.25 hours.

w/ integrated card, about 3+ hours.

You could probably increase your battery life by turning off Wi-Fi and lower brightness.

 

thinkpad T61 is a great route to go if you're a student. I would highly recommend it. Great build, it can take a drop or two, maybe a splash here and there as well. It doesn't call for much attention either in my opinion, so you may be less of a target for theft as well.

 

The 14" T61 and R61 are nearly the same with the R being slightly heavier and thicker. Unless you need WWAN, the R seems like a good choice. I'd wait for the coupons to come back.

 

Having owned at 15.4" Thinkpad, I would advise you to go with the 14.1" T61 instead of it's larger counterpart. You'll appreciate the slimmed weight while walking on campus.

 

Yeah, you'll get a lot of the same recommendations from a lot of people. They're all right. You can't really go wrong with an R- or T-series model in either 14" or 15.4". The size and weight difference between the two is negligible. I say this carefully, though, since I've only tested the difference and never really had to carry either for an extended period of time.

Joooeee, how did your situation with the pixels work out?

 

With the 6 cells battery, does it stick out of the 14.1? And what is the time I should get?

 

It sticks out of the 14" widescreen but not the 14" standard ratio.

 

sorry, but how do you know what is the 14 standard ratio? is this the 14.1 SXGA? and how the battery life for this?

thank you.

 

It's the same as I have mentioned; dependent on the video card and power/brightness settings.

You'll know it's standard ratio on the website because it doesn't say "widesreen" in the title, it will just say ThinkPad T61 14.1". Another way you would know is by the resolution of the screen. If it is a 4:3 resolution, then it is standard. If it contains the letter W in the resolution (i.e. WXGA) then it is a widescreen computer. If it is something like SXGA+, then it is standard ratio.

I recommend that you get widescreen.

 

Could you answer me why widescreen? Is there anything significant better? I just don't want to see something sticking out of the back of my laptop

About the battery: let say X3100 and power/brightness medium

many thanks.

 

IMO, widescreen is better because when you're looking at a webpage, would you rather scroll vertically or horizontally? With standard ratio screens, you have more of a chance that you need to scroll horizontally. With widescreen, it expands horizontally more and also allows you to infinitely scroll vertically. Also, it's just awesome to have windows side by side, e.g. an IM and a webpage.

I'll assume you're asking about 4-cell for the widescreen and 6-cell for the standard since those are the only ones that don't stick out.

4-cell, ~3 hours.

6-cell, ~4 hours.

 

appreciate your help

 

The size difference between 14" and 15.4" is not negligible. 15.4" is significantly bigger. I have had both. The 14" noticeable lighter. I like my 15.4" one better though and I do not mind the larger size and weight.

 

i dunno, screen size isn't a huge thing for me, but if it really makes a big different i may consider going with the 15.4 inch screen. I'm really leaning towards lenovo because it seems perfect for my school use

 

with the 6 cells... if its 14" Widescreen, yes it will stick out a bit... but i find it useful when carrying the laptop (a place where i can wrap my fingers around while holding the laptop)...

Also, if you use vista, disable aero and go to vista basic... and u should get another 30 min with the discrete nvs140m graphics card... i personally get 4 to 4.5 hours...

cheers

 

I just wondered why they have this kind of different design. Does it mean that the 14 widescreen will be a little heavier than the standard or something like that?

 

They have both designs because some people prefer the old-fashioned 4:3 screen than widescreen. A 4:3 ThinkPad is more square in dimension than the widescreen version.