T430s owners'/would-be owners' thread.

I get about 4 hours of intense browsing on WiFi plus some hi-def YouTube videos with about 10% capacity left. Brightness was at 12 (of 15). (i5-3320, 4GB ram, 500GB disc, 4000 graphics)

 

But did you pray?

 

Everyone should check their Synaptics drivers. My T520 arrived only few weeks ago and touchpad scrolling was terrible. When T430s arrived I noticed how scrolling worked nicely and was wondering what the difference was. Then I noticed pretty old driver installed in T520. (Automatic update did not detect this.) Even the driver in T430s was few months old and it would not update on its own.

Driver is here (16.1.1.0, 16 May 2012):
Synaptics UltraNav driver for Windows 7 (32-bit, 64-bit), Vista (32-bit, 64-bit) and XP (32-bit, 64-bit) - ThinkPad

 

While I was browsing? No, I was just holding my breath.

 

Still completely torn on this. Last week almost pulled trigger on T430s with i7, but decided against after reading reviews.

This week almost pulled trigger on W530 with FHD screen, until I learned it doesn't have a Thunderbolt port (what the heck, why not?).

So now thinking about T430s again. Not sure how much I care about viewing angles, if 99.9% of the time staring straight at the screen.

Do I really need the Thunderbolt port? Don't really know, seems like the future of connectivity.

My thinking on W530 was that it would be a screaming machine for 4 years, and still reasonably portable when needed. And for ultra portability, within 12 months there will be affordable Windows 8 hybrid tablets to supplement the W530 (if hybrids are cheap enough to afford).

Need something within the next 5 weeks. Wonder when Yoga will be out.

 

Urgh, I'm in almost the exact same position. I almost pulled the trigger on the T430s, then the W530 and now I'm looking at alternatives. The new Dell XPS line doesn't feature thunderbolt either, so that's out of the running. The only viable option at this point appears to be the Gigabyte U2442N (don't know the exact model number this is just off the top of my head), which has a seemingly decent screen, thunderbolt, and i7 non-UV processors, and even that has questionable build quality.

But other to empathize, I think the importance of a thunderbolt port cannot be understated. Thunderbolt is the future of connectivity, there's no doubt about that. If you're going to be buying a new machine and using it for 4 years, you're going to need thunderbolt. Personally, I know I'll be using thunderbolt for an egpu which will solve my gaming needs, which is why I feel thunderbolt is so important.

Anyways, good luck with your search.

 

For the screen, it lacks good contrast, but this can be slightly remedied by calibrating the screen with Intel's graphics driver panel (bring down the gamma to 0.8, up the saturation a little) and it looks much better. Vertical viewing angles can't be helped, but how often will you be started at your laptop's screen halfway closed anyway?

 

Battery life also doesn't look stellar. If carrying the weight of an ultrabay battery, it seems the T430 would have been a more logical / less expensive choice. But then again, there's the problem of no Thunderbolt, thus back to T430s we go.

For the T430s, it may be less convenient, but maybe it would be better to carry a spare 6-cell battery around with you than to get the ultrabay battery (especially if have SSD that boots fast)? Or worst case, could get both. It just seems all of this defeats the purpose of paying for the lighter weight, and it keeps adding more $ to an already expensive solution.

I assume it will be no more than a few months before the T430, T530 and W530, with i7, will get Thunderbolt. Maybe it's just these early production runs where it is lacking. IMO, no way these models don't have Thunderbolt by year end. Too bad some of us can't wait it out.

 

That is a sound yes! My T430s Core i7 with Intel HD 4000 is capable of simultaneously driving 1 internal + 2 external screens using the 75Y5728 Thinkpad Dock Series 3 Plus 170w (older model without USB 3.0) at the following resolutions:

Internal 1600x900 + Two external screens via DP at 1920x1200

(I was worried there for a bit reading this thread, but not anymore

 

Memory upgrade is definitely a good opportunity to boost the performance. I installed 2x4 GB of Kingston HyperX memory with proper specifications (DDR3 1600Mhz) and this is what happened to performance index:

(i5-3320, 4000 graphics, 500GB 7200 rpm)

Processor: 7.2
Memory (RAM): 5.9 --> 7.5
Graphics: 4.9 --> 6.5
Gaming graphics: 6.3 --> 6.5
Hard disk: 5.9
​

Those modules look pretty cool. Too bad you can not see them once installed.
Kingston KHX1600C9S3P1K2/8G 8GB 1600MHz DDR3 NON-ECC CL9 SODIMM (Kit of 2) HyperX Plug N Play - DirectCanada

 

Hey guys, just got my t430s from UPS! The screen seems fine to me right now. Of course it's not astounding, but I could easily get by on it. As someone pointed out earlier, It's not like I'm gonna be looking at the screen from multiple vertical angles at the same time. The horizontal viewing angles are just fine. All I have done is web browsing so far though so I'll keep you all posted.


I was curious about the bloatware aspect. I have read that thinkpads dont come with much bloatware. Personally I'd rather not deal with reinstalling a fresh copy of windows 7 unless it would noticeably improve my performance. What do you guys think? Can I achieve the same goal of getting rid of the bloatware by just uninstalling what I don't need, or should I go for the factory installation?

 

With all these new ultra books coming out you cant change the battery on the fly and the ram is soldered in you can change the hard drive if you want to tare it apart i am looking at the t430s as a base to start with by 2013 the ssd will be faster and cheaper + bigger you also see some more innovation in the ram and the screen looks fine to me i am old and cant see anyway

 

vow. This is certainly worthy the money.

 

I just got my T430s today and tried installing windows 7 64bit ultimate on my Crucial M4 128GB. When I tried to select the drive to install windows on during installation, my SSD was not found. It says to provide mass storage driver for installation. Does anyone have this problem? Please help!

 

Not T430s specific, but I find Thinkpads actually come with tons of utilities. They are generally useful though since Thinkpads tends to have unique features. The Access Manager can impact performance significantly though, so if you don't need the advanced features, you can uninstall it.

 

That is too funny! Can any one say IPS screen for $25 bucks more which any of us on this forum would HAPPILY pay? What is their freaking problem at Lenovo?

 

Yes. It is highlighted.

 

The more I use this machine the more bothered I am by the screen. I've really been noticing that off-white colors on a white background are difficult to view. I updated my review with some pictures to compare the T430s screen next to my external monitor as I browsed.

 

Calibrate via the Intel graphics control panel. It really helps. Set it to 0.8 gamma, increase saturation. Won't help with viewing angles, but lack of contrast is the key concern for this case here.

 

Thanks for the tip. I already had set the gamma to .8, but hadn't done much with saturation. Significantly increasing the saturation does help, though it's still inferior to my external monitor.

 

I would lower it even further, after some testing. 0.7 for gamma, 15 for saturation. Good enough for me.

 

Return it and buy something else. It's the only way Lenovo will ever get the message.

 

Hmm... Maybe it's just the photo, but the T430s seems to be far brighter than the external monitor.

 

LOL. Browsing the price on the Retina. Priceless.

 

I have been following your faith and love to the rMBP and I cannot blame you as I had the same feeling that was assured when I saw it yesterday. Did you have a chance to do some review about it or comparison of pros and cons to the ThinkPad line. Do you think it is a business laptop because I personally do not think so. For some reason, I always feel that Macs have some lag when opening apps or performing actions no matter what the specs are even the new one. They also get very hot especially if you heavily use the dGPU and the aluminum makes it worse as you feel it al around the machine. If you would not mind sharing some of your thoughts about it, I will appreciate it.

 

This forum isn't the place for that discussion. I suggest you ask questions in the following locations:

Apple Laptop Forums - Macbook and Macbook Pro Forums and Discussions

9 to 5 Forums

Apple Insider Forums

https://discussions.apple.com/community/notebooks/macbook_pro

And possibly the Fusion or Parallels forums.

 

My T420 w/ i5 2540m can power a 30" Dell or 30" cinema display and the internal screen. That is how I've been running the past month.

 

With a the 170w Series 3 Plus dock, the one specifically designed for the Workstations, you get 2x displayport and 2x DVI on the back. (The cheaper ones only give you 1x DP + 1x DVI on the back)

The point here is that the T420s with HD 3000 would only allow 1 x internal + 1x external screen, a limitation that clearly has been taken away with the HD 4000

That, and the fact that the HD 4000 and NVS 5200m are so much closer in performance, to some extent make the choice for Optimus graphics less obvious.

 

I have driven four external monitors using a T420s Optimus machine with the 135W and 170W docks. That was one of the only reasons to buy Optimus then.

 

True. Since my requirements however do not exceed 2x external screen, I am quite happy that I can now do that with the HD 4000 only

 

It's not a comparable situation. Since the T420/T430 are bulkier there also is room for higher capacity batteries. In fact, our T420s / T430s machines would do exactly as good on battery if we would have the same battery capacities.

But in real life, a T420/430 9-cell (94wh) battery exceeds the T420s/430s 6+3 cell battery combo (43.2wh + 32wh = 75.2wh) by 25%. This is a design trade-off. If you require a slim but powerful machine, then you accept slimmer batteries and therefore a shorter autonomy. If autonomy is your primary driver, then the T420s/430s most likely should not be your first choice.

On top of that, the regular T series gebinning with the x10 have the option to add a 9-cell slice battery, resulting in 2x9 cell max.

 

I must say that after a first workday on the T430s (with the T420s next to it being reconfigured for its new owner) it strikes me that the T430s actually is a lot quieter. The fan hardly kicks in and when it does, it makes less noise than the T420s. The temperature at the venting hole also is lower.

I'm quite pleased with my upgrade so far

 

Wditters, why do you have both a T430s and a Macbook Air? How do they compare?

 

The why is more of a WBIC thing I simply wanted one to toy around with and to experience to what extent the MBA is capable of catering for the outright die-hard road warrior (me). I sometimes find myself on last-minute2-3 day business trips flying airlines that only allow 10kg of (hand)luggage. Sometimes traveling light in my case means LIGHT

These machines are hard to compare. The MBA is about 500 grams lighter, 13" instead of 14" and any form af Windows ran in bootcamp on the MBA by design will be somewhat at a disadvantage without proper AHCI support.

Aside from that, you are comparing a regular Core i7 against an ULV Core i7 and two different OS'es. Performance-wise the T430s outclasses the MBA left front and center. That also goes for general features and capabilities. Functionality-wise I am bound to Windows. On the MBA therefore I run W7 under bootcamp and a copy of WXP under VMWare Fusion or VMWare Workstation. (I can start WXP from within both OS'es)

From a portability perspective however, the MBA outclasses the T430s but then again, they aren't exactly similar machines. The MBA fits just about every compartment of my luggage that I try to fit it in. Also the screen on the MBA is a lot better (albeit glossy).

If you really want to compare, wait for the X1 Carbon to come out. I suspect things will be a lot closer then.

 

EDIT: My bad on the double post

 

Just out of curiosity, what do you guys have your saturation set at?

 

After some additional testing, I found 30 to be just perfect.

Gamma and saturation are the only things you need to mess with to improve the image on the display.

 

Damn, 30 looks good. It makes me not need the screen quite as bright to look good. Do you have it on .7 or .8 gamma?

 

I found the most significant upgrade to my T430s besides the RAM was the application of the ICC profile posted earlier in this thread, it made the screen look MUCH better.

 

Just got my unit, the screen stands out. It's not good. Comparing it side by side with my XPS M1530 screen, it's terrible. The blacks aren't black, the colors aren't anywhere near as vibrant, and the screen door effect ruins bright colors/whites.

It sucks to downgrade my display like this, but I guess if I park it behind 2 big external displays I'll be OK.

 

About the keyboard, I am actually starting to like it ... one of the things that i aprreciate over the classic keyboard is the fact that during meetings, typing makes less noise and as such is less obtrusive

 

On my machine bringing up saturation removes details in red colors pretty quickly. If I set it to 30 then little red window close [x] button starts glowing in the dark.

Find some picture with lots of details in reds (like raspberries) and tune it from there.

Effect probably depends on the screen type you have.

 

0.7 gamma.

 

Under some further testing, I discovered that I can run the two batteries in the T430s an upwards of 6 hours under moderately light usage.

 

You're giving me hope! I'm getting mine tonight, so I'll do some battery testing.

Sent from my ADR6300 using Tapatalk 2

 

Nevermind...

 

I found much better results with the screen by individually adjusting red, blue, and green. Occasionally the screen randomly gets brighter and darker when windows open and minimize or things like that. It's pretty annoying actually, but maybe I need to make sure my drivers are all in order.

 

anybody have the ability to compare the E430 screen (which is 1366 x 768 res) with the T430/s 1600 x 900 screen??



Asking because I can look at the E430 screen locally at a retail store, but no way to look at a T430s. I really prefer matte screens, especially my T60 WS, but I must say the E430 screen was really bugging me after about 10 minutes of giving it a try, no way could live with it, not near as good as my T60 WS.

Leaning toward W530 now, unless I can find some evidence that the T430s display is much better than E430. But have a hard time predicting how important Thunderbolt port will be (missing on W530)

Really wish the T-series could be seen at at least at one retail store per major city.

 

I think it depends on a number of factors:

How long do you expect to use a new computer before upgrading again?
What type of peripherals do you intend to use in the near future?
Do you currently use Apple computers?

Fact: Thunderbolt has higher bandwith
Fact: Thunderbolt supports more protocols and therefore more types of peripheral
Fact: USB 3.0 is easier to implement and devices therefore are chaper.

But:

Fact: If you use external (SSD) drives, the difference will be marginal since you reach the maximum limit of the drive, not the interface. There are no drives yet that operate at higher speeds than any internal drive.
Fact: Apple now also started to integrate USB 3.0, so unless you expect to connect and daisy-chain multiple devices, Thunderbolt might end up as WBIC but not crucial.

 

Add another fact. There are few if any Thunderbolt enclosures you can buy right now that don't already have an expensive and over priced drive in them.

I would like a 2.5" TB enclosure but they just aren't around.