T410/510: switchable graphics?

Thanks guys~

My T510 suddenly got delay a day by UPS. Now I can't lay my hands on it until next Wednesday. Other than the weight/size concern, I am sure it's gonna be a gorceous system

 

Hi Scout929,

I came across a short review from a guy on the Lenovo forum. He reports keyboard flex on his T510. This sounds worrying, especially with his youtube videos:

http://forum.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T500-and-newer-T-series/THINKPAD-T510-FIRST-LOOK-REVIEW/td-p/198355

May I know if you see anything like that on your new T510? I hope it's a single exception, otherwise it'd be pretty bad that they mass produce low quality build keyboards like that.

Thanks!

Campion

 

Hi Campion,
I'm a heavy typist and I haven't experienced any noticeable flex that was particularly bothersome by any stretch. I noticed the left palm rest would pop sometimes as my wrist was resting on it but that was it. Otherwise, mine feels pretty solid. Perhaps it is a defect.

Chad

 

Thank you. Mine is due to arriving these two days. Hope I will have a solid keyboard as well~~

 

Also, I played Need for Speed Shift on mine yesterday with both Medium to High Detail settings and the fluidness of the graphics was pretty impressive for a non gaming unit.

 

Really. I am not a gaming guy per se, but it'd be nice if I can at least sometimes run some decent games through the system. It's the only machine I'm gonna have. Does switchable graphics work for you now, however?

 

I'm typing on the t510 right now and it seems to be great typing experience for me. I really haven't noticed any flex to speak of. Hopefully Lenovo will resolve any problems that may arise with others. I'm not sure if the switchable graphics are actually working; I'm going to check the drivers that we mentioned in the Lenovo forum.

 

The T400 is still having issues with switchable graphics on W7 - when you resume from sleep, both the integrated and discrete are active, which kills your battery life. So far I've sidestepped the issue by switching in the BIOS instead, which is better than nothing.

 

Switchable graphics progress for Linux:
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Nzk0OQ
and references therein.

Dave Airlie mentions that he used a W500 (Intel/ATI). Apparently it kinda works, but of course needs a re-start of the X server.

 

Great, but won't work on the T410 and T510...

 

To the owners of the T/W510, just use CPU-Z to check what motherboard chipset you have. If you have a PM55, you won't be able to use switchable graphics. If you don't please let us know what chipset you have (HM/QM55/57).

 

Everest states Mobile the Intel QM57 Express Chipset.

 

Hi...

Just got my T410 last week and have been having fun with it. My previous TP was a T43 which I loved, but it got sooooooooo slowwwww after a while. I'm still using it because I've got a SCSI pc card and so it's the only SCSI machine in a six computer household. I use the SCSI port for a slide scanner and a flatbed scanner.

I've got a couple of questions about switchable graphics....

My T410 is running Power Mgr 3.11a and it has switchable graphics.

So...there seems to be consensus that T410 does not have sg. Is Power Mngr 3.11a lying?

Also...if sg is such a good thing...and PM is not lying...why would I upgrade to 3.15 other than to watch SG disappear?

IOW, are there benefits to the new PM version I am unaware of.

BTW...the T410 so far is vastly improved overt the T43. I use the powered USB to charge my IPod, I can boot from power off to Win 7 with one finger swipe, the screen is bright, etc etc. So far so good. It's not as rock solid as the T43 (which has an IBM logo on it) but it is very close.

 

I sidestepped it by just using a copy of Vista I had lying around. Runs beautifully on an SSD

 

The problem is, what you have right now is not SG, it's just an option that doesn't do anything.