Life of your ThinkPad

I really forgot when I bought my T400, either late 2008 or early 2009. The first few months was really heavy usage for it, but now, I tend to use my netbook more since its more portable.

I think when talking about how long Thinkpads last, one must remember that most of us own our Thinkpads, thus take better care of them than, lets say a person who was issued a Thinkpad. Company issued Thinkpads, or any company issued laptop for that matter, take a lot of abuse from my experience.

 

T410s purchased in January of 2011 still going strong. I actually bumped it a few times on the walls and have had a semi-drop with it. I had it in my backpack sat down really quickly forgetting I had my notebook it my backpack. It slammed into the desk not a scratch on it. I'll try to get 10 years out of it, hopefully by then they have paper thin 1lbs t300sx or something of that nature.

 

lol lead_org I knew ThinkPads were tanks. Just nice actually owning one now (or more incoming)

lol I was being sarcastic.

 

"are the ones buying another top-end, well-built machine when their loaded "tank" from 1-2 years ago is outdated (performing no better than the budget machines of the latest generation"

I'm not quite sure about machines being outdated. I have a t61p, that besides about a 20% differential in meory speeds will show similars processing times to any processor today.
Renee

 

CPU needs have sort of plateaued as for most things a X201 is not better than a X61.

 

I couldnt agree more. The x200s I just got feels the same as my XPS does. I dont feel as though Im running on a much less powerful computer working right now and Im a power user.

 

Seeing that typical thinkpads with rollcage are lasting long.

I wonder how would SL-L-Edge Series would last without the rollcage.

 

The x61 with the T7xxx CPU does run excessively hot in the cpu department, the X200 was far superior in the heat management area. The only X61 i would consider purchasing are the T8xxx and T9xxx variants with the Penryn CPU.

With the X200 the intel GPU (also 4500 MHD can handle blu-ray decoding) could also handle displayport through the ultrabase, and the provision of the expresscard slot means that the DIY Vidock can be easily implemented. Thus making the X200 laptop more useful than the X61 in the aftermarket upgrade department.

The biggest problem with the SL and L series of the past is the weak hinge design rather than the lack of the internal rollcage. This problem is addressed with the new L series that Lenovo released, which implemented the full stainless steel hinge (i think it is the biggest one used). If Lenovo can do away with the odd keyboard design of the current L series, then this laptop will give most users a serious bang for their bucks. Like the R5x Thinkpads of the yore. Personally, i still preferred the R series with the internal rollcage, and especially that T series imitating R400/R61 14.1 inch widescreen variants.

 

I still use my T42 on a daily basis. It's almost seven years old, but I really love the Flexview screen and don't need a very powerful system. A couple of years ago I upgraded the HDD and RAM and that gave a small but sufficient boost to my system. The USB ports operate on USB 1.1 speed though and that's the only downside at the moment.
If Lenovo launches a T series with IPS screen I would purchase it with no hesitation.

 

Macbook Air now!

 

Best alternative is refurbished new/previous generation T series it seems, though I find it weird that the SL series still uses C2D CPU and not i Core series and the L using i series CPU.

Outlet is a nice place to find mid to high-end gems for great price.

 

well the L series was a replacement for SL + R series, so basically by the time the SL series was phased out of lenovo product portfolio, there was still no i Core CPU on the market.

@Markio, your laptop's usb is operating at 1.1 speed most likely that your southbridge is playing up. You can address this issue by getting a pcmcia usb 2.0 card adapter, this should be about 10 USD on ebay and works as an alternative usb 2.0 port.

 

IBM ThinkPad R40 (2003) still going strong.

 

Penryn was a very nice improvement all around over merom. Between the bus increase and the die shrink it was a night and day for me.