Opinion on T440p Configuration

Hello,

For the past weeks I've been reading the forums trying to decide on a work laptop. I settled on the T440p thinking that it's a good mix between portability, performance and build quality.

Long story short, what do you think about this config: Lenovo ThinkPad T440p 20AN009CUS 14-Inch Laptop (Black) at Amazon.com . The thing that I am not so sure about is the SSD, as most of the references I've found about SATA 600 date around 2011. Obviously, any other comments are welcome.

Thanks,
Alex

 

Get the FHD IPS LCD, GPU you want and quad core if needed above all else. You can upgrade everything else down the road, but those you're stuck with.

The FHD LCD is IPS, which will give you much better color and viewing angles, just a much better screen than the other LCD options available like the one you linked from Amazon.

I wouldn't be concerned concerned about SSD performance at all. All SSDs are fast. There's not much of a practical difference between SSDs outside of the benchmarks, so the make and model doesn't really matter much. Good luck and welcome to NBR.

 

Thanks for the reply!

I'm a bit on a budget and the Amazon version ticks all the boxes. However, I could go for one bought directly from Lenovo that has the i7 4700MQ and FHD screen for ~1400$ and then add RAM and SSD later on. So these are the two options right now and I am seriously inclined to go for your recommendation.

By the way, I am a software developer working with Eclipse, Visual Studio, so performance and weight are key. Battery life, not so much, as I normally have sockets wherever I go and a 5-6 hour battery life should be more than enough. I briefly considered Macbook, but I am forced to use Windows by the tools that I use and I don't think that the combination between the Mac's super high resolution, smaller screen size and Windows' problems with scaling is a happy one.

 

I'd also suggest going with buying the customized version from Lenovo. I just purchased a T440p from Lenovo and am very pleased with it. I went with 4GB of RAM and the 500GB hard drive and then upgraded the RAM to 16GB and replaced the hard drive with a 500GB Samsung 840 Evo SSD. I opted for Windows 7 Pro downgraded from Windows 8.1 Pro, so I can "upgrade" to 8.1 later, though I doubt I'll want to. Also, the Amazon unit indicates that the wireless card is only 802.11 b/g/n. If you buy from Lenovo, you can configure it with the Intel 7260 card, which also supports 802.11ac. There is a known problem with the 7260 not coming back on-line after coming out of sleep mode that I've been fighting with, but I think I have a driver that fixes this.

Good luck with the decision. I do Android programming using Eclipse and am running Ubuntu under VirtualBox, and the T440p handles both extremely well. The form-factor and power are really working well for me.

 

Quoted for truth.

I'd go as far as saying that a T440 in any flavour is simply not worth buying without the FHD IPS panel. The difference it makes is night and day.

 

I am patting myself on the back for posting here, then Before, I was 90% sure before to go for the Amazon one as I was judging the displays just from the resolution point of view. Glad that I didn't.

Another question, is it worth getting the 9-cell battery in terms of weight and the added extension that sticks out the back of the laptop? Is it reasonable to expect 4-5 hrs autonomy while doing software development and with the Wi-Fi enabled on the 6-cell battery?

 

I opted for the 9-cell battery. I don't feel like it adds too much weight, and the bulge out the back is manageable--the laptop still fits in a 14" sleeve I bought through Amazon.

Doing light work on the laptop while battery-powered seems to be giving me around 7-8 hours of run time. It's really hard to predict the max time, since it varies so much depending on screen brightness and the type of work being done. You might be on the edge with the 6-cell battery of being able to get 4-5 hours of run time if you're doing software development work, which could tax the system if crunching on code compiling or running an aggressive application.

 

The T440p also has the M.2 SSD option too. So buying one with a larger platter drive, then adding a 120GB M.2 SSD, you don't need more than 120GB for the OS, might be the way to go.

 

The laptop what I want