Quality of more recent Thinkpads??

A collegue of mine feels that Thinkpads have gone downhill since Lenovo took over and encourages me to get an HP. I have heard some problems with HPs as well. Do people here feel the quality has dropped over the last few years? Are they no longer the top of the PC notebook line?

 

The quality slightly dropped . But they are still the best ones.
You won't be able to find a better business class laptop, but beware of samsung screens.

 

I think the HP business class notebooks are on par if not slightly better than the Lenovo series, however you can expect to pay alittle more as well.

 

There is no evidence that Thinkpad quality has dropped, none, zero. People that actually OWN a t4x AND a t60 attest to the quality of the T60 in terms of build, design and even keyboard.

Lenovo was the CHIEF manufacturer for IBM before they took over. IBM, as part of the contractual exchange, kept their team involved in notebook design active. Look to the words of some of the admins here to back up my claims.

 

While I have not handled older Thinkpads or HP's business line, I can say that my T60 is very well built. There is some flex in the palmrests and above the keyboard. However, I think that the lid is where this laptop shines; I can not get ripples on the screen by pressing on the lid. The hinges also feel very solid. Personally, I think it feels much more solid and less plasticky than my friend's HP dv6000t.

 

No, the quality has not dropped.It's currently Lenovo's best business.The bad thing the was with Thinkpad was the RAM shortage (I think it is no longer).So don't worry about the quality

 

This has been untrue in my experience. The Z61m I reviewed last year was as solid a notebook as I have ever used. The T/R60s seem just as good to me. I think overall notebook quality has declined some, but one must consider that a nicely configured notebook purchased five years ago cost $3k. A similarly equipped model cost half that today. Something has to give somewhere.

 

I dunno, the Lenovo is definitely more durable than the dv6000 series however I feel that the HP business notebooks built with the magnesium chassis seem to be more durable than most of Lenovo's current line. Thats my experience anyways...

A agree with Zaz as well.

 

You can see the quite rigid roll cage on my R60 here.

 

Very well said.

 

None. Lenovo hasnt change the quality of the ol Thinkpad. Even the engineer and keyperson are the same.

Please see my system... well, when i bought it there is none of the lenovo emblem in the screen bezel though.
The newer release from Lenovo have its logo in the screen bezel. The picture was taken using XP, now i am using Visa and everything runs fine and fast.

 

I have a new 14" T60. I've had previously a Dell Gen1 XPS and a HP nc8430. The T60 is definitely better built than the others, though the nc8430 wasn't that far behind. I mostly had software/driver issues with it, and with their support services. I might even have to say the nc8430's keyboard was slightly more to my liking, but that's more of an opinion thing.

However, my roommate has a 15" T42 and I have to say mine has some areas that are a tad 'squishier' than his, but only a little. I think some of those areas are a result of making user-servicing easier, like getting to the RAM under the palm-rest, for example.

Even if, as someone mentioned above, the build quality of Thinkpad's has gone down since the switch to Lenovo ownership, they're still some of, if not the best, built notebooks out there. And their included software works well, in my opinion. HP's sorta-sometimes worked. And Dell didn't really include any, actually.

 

Oh, also, I need to point out that my T60's 1.83 Core Duo lets my new laptop run snappier than my HP's 2.0GHz Core 2 Duo. It doesn't make much sense except for me to think that perhaps HP has terrible motherboards or they gave me a bad CPU or something.