T440s Owner´s Thread

Since the T440s is now coming slowly to the market in many countries, I think its time to start an owners thread for this machine.

I myself already have my T440s and also published a nice little review here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/lenovo/732797-thinkpad-t440s-review.html

As you can read there, I like it very much.

My model ( 20AQS00600):
- Intel Core i5-4200U
- No OS (I have Windows 8 installed on it)
- 14" FHD (1920x1080) AHVA LED Backlight Antiglare, Mobile Broadband ready
- Intel HD 4400
- 12 GB PC3-12800 DDR3 memory
- UltraNav with 5-button clickpad, FP-Reader
- 500 GB HDD, 7200rpm
- Internal 3-cell 23.5 Wh front battery, external 3-cell 23.5 Wh rear battery
- Intel Wireless-N 7260AN
- Mobile Broadband upgradable
- 3 years depot / bring-in warranty

The T440s will be available with the i7-4600U, which is the best 15 W U-CPU available from Intel.

T440s Hardware Maintaince Manual: http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc/pccbbs/mobiles_pdf/t440s_hmm_en_sp40a25360_01.pdf
T440s User Guide: http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc/pccbbs/mobiles_pdf/t440s_ug_en.pdf
T440s Service Training: http://lenovoservicetraining.com/content/CourseWarePublic/19958/player.html

Here are some pictures about the position of the T440s in Lenovos new 14" T-Serie lieup, and a comparison with the "sister models" of the T440s, the T440p and the T440:
View attachment 103389 View attachment 103390 View attachment 103388

To all T440s owners: Be carefull if you open up the T440s! The backcover is not only held by screws, but also by small clips, so be carefull to not brake them. Open it up exactly as the HMM says: http://download.lenovo.com/ibmdl/pub/pc/pccbbs/mobiles_pdf/t440s_hmm_en_sp40a25360_01.pdf

 

First :hi2:

 

Got a question: have you installed Linux on it? Do you have any problem with the second battery?

I got mine yesterday, can't get the second battery to show up, I'm thinking DOA...

 

Checking in - I have a t440s too. Got the bigger 6 cell battery and upgraded to 8gb ram. Running Windows 8.1. It was a trying to get the casing out from the back to install the additional 4gb ram haha.

A nice laptop I think.

 

can you take some pics with the 6 cell next to another laptop?

 

I can but will take a bit of time - what do you need to know? the height difference? It has been discussed in the other thread

 

Are any of you T440s owners in the US yet? We are thinking of getting one of these for a family member, and I'm wondering how the long the lead times (actually) are.

 

I'm the proud owner of an invoice for a T440s here in Canada, does that count?

But seriously, I can't wait for this to come in. Bought the 20AQ005SUS model with i5 4300U and FHD LED. Just stock RAM and 500GB HDD since Lenovo kind of wants an arm and a leg to upgrade one and the other.

Don't really have an ETA date, I'll have to check with our supplier. I think we were told ~2 weeks but I find that to be supremely optimistic.

 

Congrats What made you choose the 4300u over the 4200U?

 

My order process was picking a laptop SKU from our Lenovo Partner spreadsheet, which is a tedious process at best. I think the 4300U was the only one that came with the FHD screen and other details I wanted. If I had ordered the laptop from their site and picked my own internals like everyone else I would probably have gone with the 4200U.

 

Hey guys I have a few questions for you guys!

1) Subjectively, how good is the FHD screen? How is the FHD versus FHD touch quality? I don't use touch much

2) How upgradeable is the t440s? What size hard drive? How many ram slots?

3) How hot does it get with web browsing/youtube videos

 

The FHD screen is amazing. It is almost on par with the MacBook Pro Retina. 98% sRGB, 75% Adobe RGB, 600:1 contrast. The rMBP is 100% sRGB, 75% Adobe RGB, 850:1 Contrast

You can install any 2.5in drive and it has one ram slot.

The T440s stays really cool. It never touches 40C at full load.

Reference.

 

Which processor do you have? Trying to get reference on whether the i7 might be too noisy (heat/fan), since keeping noise level to a minimum is a priority to me. Debating 4300 vs i7. I plan on using this for moderate to light loads, with an SSD to further eliminate HDD noise. Thanks.

 

I don't think anyone thus far has posted about having an i7 yet, but my guess is that since the TDP is the same it's quite likely to not be significantly hotter or louder. I was also debating this but in the end I ordered the 4300U, the i7 will be 10-15% faster but I never really feel that my current CPU is a limiting factor and the 4300U is faster so I figured I'd put the savings into a good SSD instead.

So yeah, I just put in my order, hope to get it in about a month :-\ really can't wait!

 

The non-touch FHD should actually have a contrast ratio of 800:1 instead of 600:1. The panel AUO B140HAN01.2 is used in both T440p and T440s.

Source: Lenovo ThinkPad T440p - cicha rewolucja

 

The reviewers must stay in a really cold place.. because none of my computers ever touch 40C at IDLE, let alone full load..

By that I mean that the temperature are always at least 45C at completely idle.

You really need to take into account your own ambient temperature where you are, because 40C at full load is not a natural temperature for any processor today for many, many climates.

 

Under 40C keyboard/base temperature, not CPU temperature

 

Order tracking not working for me today. Anyone else seeing the same behavior?

 

Same here, I ordered on Friday night though. It was briefly available right after I ordered and then broke the next day.

 

My source said 600:1.

 

Yes, that is because it is a touchscreen version that was reviewed. If you ordered non-touch it is closer to 800:1. Then again, there is always variance in manufacturing and measurement.

 

Glad it's not just me. I was worried my order somehow got screwed up.

 

Dear T440s Owners - Please can you help me by providing some input on the following:

1. Does it come with 3 M.2 slots? One if probably occupied by the WLAN card. Can I then use two M.2 SSD's ?
2. What kind of RAM upgrade should I buy? I ordered 4GB RAM, so I have 1 slot available. I was looking on Crucials website and they have 2 different versions of the 8GB module. One as a CL of 11 and other has a CL of 9. Does it matter which one I choose?

Thank you.
-D

 

For RAMs in general the lower the latency (small CL number) the better. However I think you be hard pushed to find a noticeable difference between a CL9 and CL11 module in real world terms (assuming they are running the same speed). If the T440s ships with a CL11 module (which is common for DDR3-1600) then its probably a good idea to match it for consistency.

 

Thanks, PatchySan.

 

Just reporting for any Spaniard here that tiendalenovo.es emailed me about they'll be selling the t440s at 3rd or 4th week of November.

I can't wait!

 

I ordered the non-touch FHD panel with my T440s. What should I expect? Is it going to be killer? I hope so. IT will certainly be compared side-by-side with my 13.3" rMBP.

One thing I dislike about Lenovo. I order a machine but you never REALLY know when you are going to get it. The current "estimate" is 11/28.

Apple on the other hand will give you a precise date, and usually beat it. Case in point, I ordered iPad Air on 11/1 and received it on 11/4. Why can't other makers do that? Let the excuses begin...

 

No excuses, just the simple fact that Apple generally sells pre-built machines. Order one and it's already in a box in a regional warehouse ready to ship. Any PC maker that allows buyers to customize a machine must have time to actually assemble that custom machine at a manufacturing facility (probably in China) and install software. That takes time.

 

Also, Apple has a different Release scheme: They are starting to produce a new product long before the launch (which is why there are so many leaks about new iPads and iPhones), so that they have it available on lauch day. The other OEMs are doing this usualy different: Announcing a product, and then afterwards start mass production. For ThinkPads (and other Business lines), for example, Lenovo still has the old last year models on sale - they take production capacitys away from the new lineup.

And as pipspeak said, the CTO products also need additonal time. Here in Europe, we get the CTO option through the Lenovo website much later, if we get it at all (3 years ago, it didn´t even exist here). The regular, preconfigured Topseller models, are usually the first models available here. Then the Education-models (the T440s was a nice exception ) and some special models, and then the CTO option.

 

Anandtech did some real world testing of scaling of RAM speed\timings on Haswell AnandTech | Memory Scaling on Haswell CPU, IGP and dGPU: DDR3-1333 to DDR3-3000 Tested with G.Skill

There is a difference, and it is noticeable on some applications. However your point regarding matching is accurate, I believe that for dual channel configs, the memory controller uses the speed\latency supported by both chips. I dont know what the latency of the soldered RAM on the 440s is. Maybe someone with a machine can run a CPU spec tool and find out.

 

Oh, I know. I just want it to be quicker than weeks.

 

Further on that note, I'm a prospective buyer and was wondering if anyone could weigh in on the new M.2/NGFF SSDs. I read through the T440S owners manual and found a few strange things:

The User Manual Says:

and

and

My question is... why all of these caveats? Is there some sort of technical reason I couldn't or shouldn't use an M.2 drive as a bootable drive? Why have an extra slot then? Why would it be "unreliable"?

Could someone with some expertise about this sort of drive and/or Lenovo weigh in here? I understand that NGFF drives are new, expensive and at this point are often used for caching, but I'd guess that over time capacities will expand, and it would be nice to be able to upgrade down the road and move my boot/system drive over to a new SSD. But I'm not going to buy something that I can't upgrade.

As it stands, I think if I've read correctly, Intel SRT is limited to 64GB drives. So the best case scenario is to get yourself a 64GB M.2 SSD and use it as a cache for a bigger HDD.

But, can I safely get a bigger M.2 SSD (say 128 or 240GB) and use it as a boot drive? The manual seems to be casting doubt on this, which seems crazy.

 

I'm pretty sure since they say "drive" as a singular noun, they mean not to use the built in 16gb cache drive as it might be too small for an OS.

Edit: see http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=736398 a guy with a different Lenovo laptop can boot his off of M.2.

 

Added this note to the Start-post:

 

Thanks, wish I'd seen this the first time around

 

for anyone who's opened their T440s, what brand memory did yours come with?

which memory from this list would you recommend?
Newegg.com - Computer Hardware, Memory, Laptop Memory, DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800), 1.35V, 4GB

someone mentioned something about L memory but i'm not sure what that is.

 

what is the battery life for the t440s?

 

L memory is simply low voltage (1.35v rather than 1.5v).

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

 

Just placed an order this morning and cant wait to receive it. Estimated ship slipped to Dec 4th from what it said online, hoping it gets shifted to the left as others have seen. First Lenovo and excited to get something lighter and smaller.

 

i think you were the one who mentioned it the first time too so thanks again.

 

can anyone go into their recovery partition and tell me how many gigs are necessary to make a USB recovery disc?

i only have an 8gb usb drive and dont want to have to buy a new one.

 

I would plan on getting a good 16GB or 32GB stick.

 

ok thanks.

 

What is the recomended procedure to make a USB recovery disk? Just binary copy or something more elaborated?

 

Is the T440s being shipped with Windows 8.1 or 8? I see another thread where the T440p is being shipped with the dreaded Windows 8, and on top of that a user is having problems upgrading. I am also struggling whether to just get Windows 7 instead, as it has been rock solid on my desktop since the first day it was released; the only issue would be a shortened support time frame.

 

The T440s is shipped with Windows 8. The only ThinkPad shipped with 8.1 yet should be the ThinkPad Yoga.

I have installed Windows 8 on my T440s, and then upgraded to 8.1, no problems yet. But notice my ThinkPad had no preload, so maybe the preload makes some problems with the upgrade.

 

All the T440 series are shipping with Windows 8, not 8.1. Despite the new interface that confuses people at first, it's actually a faster OS with better battery life than Windows 7. 8.1 made the interface better, but there's nothing really to dread from Windows 8. Unless you have outdated incompatible software or you're unable to deal with change well. Don't choose a 4 year old OS... Microsoft isn't going to return to the old style anyway, so I say "might as well learn it now".

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

 

How long does it take to charge the 6 cells fully? I read the T440s has VGA and Displayport, can you link to external Displays while the T440s screen is still on or only T440s + external screen or 2 external screen and T440s screen off? Or you need a dock to use 2 external Displays with the Intel GPU?

 

The windows 8.1 upgrade is very painless in general, you can do stuff while it downloads too. And I think it's actually a pretty nice OS overall, boots really fast and pervasive search is nice. 8.1 doesn't really do much to make it better or worse but it just adds some small things which help make the transition.

 

How usable would you say windows 8 is on the T440s without a touchscreen? an additional $230 seems quite a premium but playing around with windows 8 laptops in a store, lacking the touchscreen seems to make navigation a major pain. Granted, there's a lot of customization you can do to make things better and I think windows 8.1 added some more support but I'd hate to regret not getting the touch panel for years to come.