My t-61 decision process (Warning... an bit of a rant)

Yesterday I ordered a t61 14” widescreen and I'm so excited I can barely stand it. For the past three years I have been using a 15” dell inspiron. Actually, the Pentium m 2 gig processor and 15” wxga+ matte screen has performed quite well, it's just that it is hardly a laptop, more like a side-table-top. Prior to that I always used Apples and would have never switched but I needed to run a bunch of windows specific software and intel for mac was nowhere in sight at the time.

It all started last week because I was looking for a used laptop for my 12 year old who won't stop whining about his, (my old pismo with the g4 550 upgrade card). He has no clue what a cool box that was in its day, but alas, things move on. While shopping, I came to the conclusion that my bulky dell was the perfect replacement and besides, he likes it. Wife agreed, Lucky me, now what to do.

Still a relative newcomer to the pc world, and actually quite satisfied with my current dell, I jumped on a 500.00 off coupon for a new virsto 1400 totaling around 825.00 shipped. Was looking forward to receiving it until I walked through a best buy over the weekend. Imagen the horror as I noticed all the laptops had the high glare screens. Not that there is anything wrong with gloss when you are alone at night, but I certinaly didn't want one sitting at the window table at starbucks. I checked my dell order and sure enough, the wxga+ I ordered was if fact, a high gloss screen. Dell graciously informed that I needed a latitude 630 to obtain the screen I wanted. No problem with that other than no 500.00 coupon and the machine I wanted would spec around 1,300.00 shipped. Whoo horsey, I could go back to apple for that, but frankly, I just don't care anymore. Dell was great about canceling my order and retrieving it back from the shipper. Not bad for outsourcing.

So now I have promised my laptop to the kid, and told my wife I was spending around 800.00 on a new one. I started researching and stumbled onto Lenovo. I always though those ibm black things were kind of cool but everyone said they were expensive. Some more shopping reveled that Lenovo is just as tricky as dell with the pricing coupons and figured out that the cpp was maybe the way to go. I configured a wonderful r-61 at around 800.00 before tax, and then decided to pay the difference to the T series because I've suffered long enough and really did want to have one of those kind of cool laptops after all. I still feel like maybe I overpaid a bit because the cpp page offered an additional coupon discount for the r series, but not for t series. Still, the price was a bit better than the best price on the regular site with the coupon, and much less than in the past, (bet there is a model change this summer), so I pressed buy. I hear that if I can find a better price that lenovo will refund the difference for a few weeks.

Heres what I got and why.

T-8300. This was not an option with the first dell I ordered and seemed like the thing to get. I struggled with the 70.00 more for the t-9300, but, enough is enough.

1 gb 1 dimm. I ordered a 2 gb for 35.00 and will run that only , or 3gb. I plan to try it both ways to see if 2gb vs 3 gb make any difference.

Windows Vista home premium. If I knew I wanted Vista for sure, the Ultimate seemed like a good deal for 75.00 more. But if I don't want Visa, I would have saved 30.00 and got basic. So, because I'm clueless, I paid the 30.00 for Home Premium and we'll see.

DVD Combo. I have never burned a DVD with any laptop. Plus, if I even need to, I hear they are easily upgradeable.

14.wxga+. Had to have this. Considered the 14” xga+ standard screen, but that case is the same depth as the 15” widescreen, so if more depth was ok, why not get the 15" widescreen. I don't care about the width nearly as much as the depth. Would have liked a camera though.


Nvida 140m. This was hard. I order it without it first, then called and chanced it. More battery life vs better graphics, well maybe. Same cost difference as the t-9300 vs t8300. Since I was conservative with the processor, I figured I would splurge with the video. Like I said, this was a hard choice.

160gb 7200 hd. 20.00 more than 5400rpm. Easy choice. Was 100.00 more with dell. Thanks Lenove.

Wireless Thinkpad abg. Seems easy enough to upgrade later to something that will be standard, not draft. Meanwhile, I have no use for n.

Bluetooth. Got it. Don't need it, but seemed hard to upgrade later. 20.00, why not.

9 cell. Got to power that video card. I know, I guess I don't mind a little extra depth after all. At least if I hate it, I bet someone will trade me even up for a 4 cell.

Total $933.28 before tax Plus 35.00 for the 2 gb at newegg. A little more than I expected, but when I consider I could have ordered the r-61 with integrated video for about 200.00 less, I only have myself to blame. Hope its worth it.

I got a lot of great information from this forum. Thanks for all the help. Ok, so where is it already?

 

Good for you.
You will like it!

 

Wow. Just wow. I am so bloody jealous!

 

Nice config, I think you did well. I don't think you should regret the t61 at all. it looks like you keep machines for at least 3 years, so why not pay a little extra and get something real high end? Most of your config looks fine but I am going for the Intel 4965AGN card, since there are already a lot of new routers that are using N and draft is supposed to match the final version of the spec. What kinds of things do you plan on using the machine for?

 

Thanks, I only use my home wireless router and won't update for at least a year or so, so i figured when I did, i would change the wireless card to whatever was available then. I do keep machines a while and since i plan on a little more travel than i have the last couple of years, I thought the t series would be worth it. I run mostly stock market software with a ton of charts. I can never figure out if video makes a difference or not. But I do notice in my desktop machine where i have several monitors and 3 video cards, the better card seems to make a difference. Other than that my uses are pretty light.

 

You will love your new T61. I bought mine about a month ago, and love mine ! Mine is also built with almost the same options as yours (except the 9 cell battery). Good luck with it !

 

Makes sense. The curve gets steep the higher you get.

Yep, third party is definitely cheaper

Vista Business seems to be the best feature/price solution from what I can tell, but it depends on what you need.

VERY easy to upgrade, but very expensive. You are better off getting the burner when you get the machine.

This is definitely a person preference item...

Good idea if you want decent video but don't want to go the P route..

Good deal. I went with the 100GB 7200RPM when I bought. I planned to upgrade to a 200GB separately and wanted the "spare" to be fast and very usable. The reality is the drive is sitting on my desk unused... The 200/72 through Lenovo was cost prohibitive.

That works, I've heard good things about the Atheros cards, and if you don't want N you should be all set.

Good plan, damn near impossible to add later unless you have the BT antenna in the LCD already.

Good plan. A little heavier and does stick out, but much better battery life.

Enjoy your new machine!

 

I went through the same and placed a total of 3 orders while cancelling the previous one each time. They kind of got sick of me. My latest one is almost perfect, but in the excitement, I forgot to go for the WXGA+ screen instead of the regular WXGA. Other than that I finally got the config right.

Interesting side note, I cancelled the same day that I ordered, yet it looks like the first order just shipped out. How are they so bad at not stopping shipment if the order was cancelled? I guess I am expecting to receive three laptops and they better setup return shipping for two of them.

 

T7500 and T8300, which one shall I get?

shall I opt for higher cache or faster CPU?

 

go for the T8300. Longer battery life.

The higher CPU speed won't make that much difference; nothing really noticeable in daily use.

I read that 3mb of cache versus 4mb of cache does not hamper performance either. I can't remember where I read that and I only saw it once, so don't quote me on this but I think it makes sense.

In any case, there should be little difference in day-to-day use between the two processors. My bottom line is that T8300 is newer and more efficient, so a better purchase. I bought at T7500 about 6 months ago, and if I were in the market right now I'd go for a T8300. My 2 cents!

 

If you're going to use it for personal use then Home Premium was the right choice.

I thought about going for Ultimate but determined I didn't need the extra features it had so I figured I'd save the $70.

The only feature that I wish Home Premium had from Ultimate was the Complete PC Backup, but you can get Acronis True Image 11 for $30 or less which will do just what the Complete PC Backup feature of Ultimate does.

Home Premium is a MUCH better value than Home Basic in my opinion. There is a very big difference between the two in terms of features yet the cost differences are not enormous. The fact that Vista Home Basic lacks the Windows Mobility Center is quite problematic for laptops (although ThinkPads come with the Power Manager software which is quite good).

 

Thanks for all the great comments. I'm now second guessing not getting the dvd burner because i looked up the prices of adding later, choke. Still, I have a desktop machine with two two burners and have never used the burner in my current laptop while on the road. So, I am going to let the order stand and not change it again. Also, my prediction is that when blu ray comes out for ultrabay slim, there just may be a glut of good condition used burners available at bargain prices.

If I were upgrading my destop cpu, I think I would have opted for vista ultimate because of the remote desktop feature i find so handy. But I have never had a need to remote from my laptop so hopefully home premium will be ok. I've always been happy with xp home on my current laptop.

 

rob65780....do let us know when it arrives and how much you like it...weather its up to ur expectations etc..

 

It seems that Lenove shipped my order without the bluetooth, which was a last minute change on my part, but was assured they could do it. When I called to ask if I could do anything about it, they said sure, as long as I do not open it and place a replacement order they will pay for shipping back and wave any restock charge. Nice... I hope it really works that way...

Soooo, since I had the chance to redo it, I decided to make a few changes. This is so hard. I originally started with a 800.00 budget and the other order already broke it ~$933.00 before tax. I have totally blown it now as the new order totals $1,009.79 before tax.

I kept the vista home premium, the 14.1" wxga+, (still wish it had a camera) the nvs 140 video, 1 1gig 1 dimm, 160gb 7200 hd, bluetooth and the thinkpad abg wirelesscard.

Largely in part to the comments above and the fact that i look at this as a 3year purchase, I made the following changes.

I moved to the t9300 processor. not that I think I needed it, but it just seemed like a good deal for the 70.00 difference over the t-8300. Not for the speed, but double the l2.

I broke down and added the dvd burner. again, i don't think I need it but if I ever need do it it will sure pay for itself. Its a good thing there isn't a blu ray option yet or i would be in real trouble.

And finally, I changed from the 9 cell to the 6 cell battery. two reasons here, 1, I keep thinking that I like the t61, (and chose it over the r-61) because it is a bit lighter and thiner. I realized (and I could be wrong about this), that it seems the 9 cell sticks out almost twice as much as the 6 cell. (would love to know exactly) and is about 25% heaver. I am crossing my fingers that it can get 3 hours. 2, the total price ~1000.00 with 6 cell. Going over 1k just makes me think its too much, not that its not worth it, just that it is already 20% over budget. I guess the fact that I can always buy a 9 cell after market once I recover from this expense is a factor too.

Thanks for all the great input everyone has offered.