T400 Owners: Are You Happy?

One thing I want to note, the trackpoint interface is amazing. Much more responsive and intuitive than endless touchpad scratching with my finger.

As for battery life, I've been tweaking this thing for hours and I've yet to see 5 hours on 6 cell. The max I was able to attain was around 4:10 with minimal brightness, minimal wifi and bluetooth/optical drive/speaker off under Intel, which is not a good score on latest business class laptop (advertised battery life was 6hrs wasn't it?). And I'm not willing to waste any more time on tweaking my computer when I have mountains of papers to write... Sigh.

The reviews report fantastic battery life under 6 and 9 cells. Can't they put up what exactly they did to get that kind of battery life?

 

Has anyone here or any website been able to confirm this?

 

It might be true check out this thread.

 

Thanks, Fire Snake.

 

I'm quite happy with mine, though I did have problems with OS and battery life.

 

What kind of problems did you experience?

 

I just got my t400 today.

The good:
-I love the screen. I mean I love it. Going back to a matte screen is awesome (My last two notebooks both had glossy screens, and my desktop monitor is a NEC 20WMGX2 which also has a glossy screen.) Glossy has its advantages, i guess, but dang, the matte screen sure is nice on my eyes!
-Sound. The speakers are considerably better than probably any notebook i've had before. That's not saying much, but the t400's seem pretty decent to me.
-keyboard. There's some flex. More than I expected, honestly. But i cant see it ever affecting me. Overall the keyboard has a great feel to it (better than my Asus W3v and Macbook).
-Build Quality. This area is up in the air still, but so far it seems to be pretty good. I'm quite rough on my notebooks, though, so we'll have to see how well it's holding up after some heavy use.
-Touchpoint seems pretty cool. But I doubt i use it much.
-Battery. It's telling me i'm getting 5+ hours of battery life with the integrated gfx turned on (6 cell). Pretty good compared to my last notebook
The Bad:
-Touchpad is pretty small. Not a huge deal as i've already gotten used to it, but it would've been nice had it been a bit bigger.
-Seems kind of plasticky. Not cheap, just plasticky.
-Comes pre-installed with too much bloatware.
-Battery sticking out the back is somewhat inconvenient.

Overall, I think i'm pleased. While this probably isn't the best notebook i've ever had (I still love my W3v), for the price it's tough to beat (the W3v cost about $900 more). I'd like for it to last me the rest of my undergrad career (1 year left) and through grad school (if i go), but we'll just have to see how well I can take care of it (and it take care of me!).

Also, I might add that I was down to this and a new "updated" macbook. While I have no regrets getting the t400, had the macbook come with a matte screen and been a bit cheaper, I would have definitely gotten that over the Lenovo.

 

I hate it. The "trackpoint" buttons combined are almost as big as the touch pad!! There is almost a centimeter of wasted space between those buttons and the touchpad itself. Basically, I'm just pissed at how small the touchpad is.

 

ThinkPads and other business line notebooks from Dell and HP all have the nub with those buttons. Business users love the nub. If Lenovo, Dell or HP removed the nub, they would endure the wrath of the corporate world. The corporate world buys a lot of computers too!

I prefer using the nub over the trackpad. The nub is like an analog joystick except you only use the middle digit instead of your thumb. The harder you press the nub, the faster it moves.

 

This is quite informative and seems very unbiased. Thanks.

 

I'm having a difficult time with the touchpoint in that i'm way too imprecise in my movement. I'm not sure if i'm just too clumsy, too inexperienced, or if i just need to replace it with a smaller cover.

I even tried gaming with it in HL2. Haha big mistake

 

Here in hungary, I can buy it only with CCFL display.
Can anyone tell me how does this change the power consumption / battery life of T400?